Why do homeowners all of a sudden want to work on...

Why?

Why can a homeowner ignore an issue for years, but after the contractor shows up, they want to help?

     The home needed a lot.  New siding, roof, windows and more.  The old rotten siding (a mix of Masonite and wood) came off pretty easy since the home had been neglected for years.  But now that the work had started, the homeowner wanted to be involved in some manor.  Her son needed a job so he might eventually get out of the house.  Sure, we'll watch him quit real quick.  He lasted a couple days.  In the middle of summer, sweating his tail off, we had him hauling debre.  He did little complaining, but his huffing and puffing told us he'd never worked a day in his life.  Then, came the day, I was on the roof and asked for a Dr. Pepper.  He quickly got the drink and then got distracted.  I stood there and watched as he opened the bottle and drank my last Dr. Pepper.  One of my guys saw this and knew the huge "NO! NO!" he had just done.  The rest of my time on the roof was quiet.  And he was working twice as hard in hopes I would not fire him.  That evening, I never said a word.  The next morning, he showed up with a replacement Dr. Pepper for me and a smile.  I could have done without the smile.  By that evening he had decided it was too hot to do that much work.

     You may not notice it, but the straight roof line was not straight.  It dipped over six inches in the center and a metal roof was really going to show this.

     The homeowner drew up her own window trim with keystones.  She wanted a Victorian home.  As everyone knows, there are no keystones for aluminum trim.  Well, let's make some.  That was the final decision as you will see soon.
    

     The poor little bay was just a messed up protrusion from the home like a pimple that really did not belong there.  It does later.

     So, do you think she let this go too far?  Every exterior board, even on the roof, had to be replaced.  And her design ideas kept coming.  She opted out of raising the roof for a taller ceiling on the second floor after she found out the existing framing would not support it.  Too much money.  

     Here's how it turned out...

     She chose the Rising Sun gable vents to dress out the gable.  The tiny square gable vents weren't even vented.  We also added cornice vents.  Now the hundred year old roof could breath properly instead of through holes in the walls.  She wanted sculpted fascia boards until she found out these do not come in aluminum. 

     She chose the box end aluminum shutters for the front of the home.

     Like I said, we made her aluminum keystones for every window to keep her style.

  

     And a nice standing seam roof on the entire home.

 

     How about that ugly bay window now?  It now makes the home look complete.  And it even has it's own decorative gable vent.  All new vinyl windows were required as the old wood windows were falling out.  But in the upstairs, where her twin boys room was, a window we had just replaced got broken all by itself.  We had to order new sashes for the window.  And board up the broken window while they came in.  While I was putting in the new window sashes, the boys were sword fighting with real swords.  I told her, we would leave the job and not come back if they were allowed to continue breaking things.  The swords were then locked up in the garage.  The exterior went so well she wanted work done on the inside.

     This is where it hits the fan.  The dining floor was sinking and could not be jacked back up.  We cut out the entire floor and replaced all the framing.  She thought our floor guy was outrageous to match the living room hardwood floor.  So, she used her own guy.  We leveled the new subfloor perfectly level.  Once the new hardwood floor was in and sanded and stained to match, she jumped all over us that the floor was an eighth of an inch out on one corner.  Well, we cannot help what her floor guy did with his sanding.  

     Next was placing the washer and dryer out in the garage where there was more room.  Our electrician ran a new plug and our plumber ran the plumbing.  After everything was sheet rocked in, everything worked fine.  But, at some point I was called back about a faulty plug that almost caught the house on fire.  No, the plug was secure in a flame safe case and secured in the wall above a concrete floor.  There was nothing to catch fire.  I went out with the electrician to see what happened.  The plug had a small silver ball on each melted prong that looked like sauger.  Her kids and their mischief had plugged in a paperclip to the 220 plug.  They were very lucky they weren't killed.  The plug was replaced with the warning that we were done.

     She calls two weeks later, her hot and cold on the washer was reversed and ruined her work clothes and her dryer was on the wrong setting.  We were responsible, in her mind, for replacing her old work clothes.  And she had done many loads of laundry in that week after we left and was just noticing, but we somehow came back and magically changed her settings.  Sometimes there is only one answer.  OK.  Sure!  Why not?

    

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