Christopher French Construction Co

On time, on budget, and looks simply beautiful. What more can I say. We are thrilled with our new backyard and covered patio. We bought a new house in the West Hills community in Valencia, and the backyard came unfinished (just dirt). We set out to get some bids for a patio, patio cover, driveway extensions, retaining wall, grass, and trees. Chris was the 3rd contractor we got a bid from, and we are so glad we talked with Chris. He is very organized. The execution of the job went very smoothly. He started when he said he would, he stuck with his prices, and even finished up a couple days early. He was able to juggle parts of the job around in order to wait for our fuel modification approval, and it still did not impact the delivery of the work. Chris is a very good listener, and was able to make recommendations on things that made sense for us. (For example, we have 3 boys who intend to use the grass to play on. He recommended grass that heals quickly, and placed the sprinklers around the edges so they wouldn't trip over them).
We have had problems in the past with contractors that increased the prices on us after the job began, or would start, work a couple days, show up weeks later for a few days, etc. That did not even happen with Chris French. He always promptly returned phone calls, emails, was on site every day until the job finished. We are also very confident that we have all the correct permits for the work as well.
I think what clinched the job for Chris was the fact that he didn't just give us a bid that said he would do exactly what we asked for. He worked with us to get to a plan that made sense, wouldn't cause problems 5 years from now, and could be built to the existing codes. When something didn't make sense, he would carefully explain why. We suggested leveling out one of our side yards and pouring all concrete. He explained why that would interfere with the drainage. We also suggested a large patio cover - 20 ft deep. He explained that our wall was at an angle to the property line, and we could not put a cover closer than 5 feet of the property line. This meant that the deepest the patio cover could be was 13 feet. We also asked about a vaulted patio cover. He explained that the windows on the wall where the patio cover would need to be attached would need to be moved, otherwise we couldn't get a pitch on the roof to match our house ( an HOA requirement). We had actually got bids from other contractors for these things!
Interestingly enough, we did not explain to Chris that he was our third bid until after he finished our job. It was so clear once the job was done that the first two bids were garbage. What is very scary is that we could not tell they were garbage. The other contractors wanted us to sign contracts for work that would not have been possible to build. The diagrams were not drawn to scale, the patio covers would not have fit in the space in our backyard, and they did not even consider how the changes would impact the drainage. We feel very fortunate to have found a very good contractor.

We had wanted to redesign our patio since we bought our house. We had a lot of wasted space and our patio cover was an open design so we couldn’t comfortably entertain in our backyard. We met with Chris to go over our ideas and the related options and costs. We explained our desire to do a solid cover for our patio and make it into an outdoor room with a fireplace and kitchen. He had a number of great ideas, including a dramatic "A" frame design using the fireplace as a focal point. He was very knowledgeable about the code requirements which allowed us to anticipate possible issues and resolve them during the design phase. He drew up very detailed plans with illustrations so we had a good idea of the way it would look when completed. We wanted to minimize the number of columns to keep an open feel and an unobstructed view of our pool. Chris suggested that we go with steel columns and a sub-header that ran underground so we could accomplish our goal. He worked with an engineer on the plans to make sure they would pass with the building department.
Unlike most other contractors we have used, Chris was on the job site every day. It was great to have him personally performing and supervising the work. He and his crew were careful to protect our windows and other property during the demolition phase. They cleaned up the worksite at the end of each day and did their best to make it safe if our kids got out in the backyard. For each phase, he brought samples and even went with us to the store to look at tile, stone and other materials. He took the time to learn our preferred styles so his suggestions were very helpful. He suggested rough sawn beams with tongue and groove paneling to fit our old world theme. The colors and textures worked perfectly. Chris was good about giving us options and helping us decide where to make compromises to keep costs down and where it was better to spend a little more. All the way through the project Chris did a good job keeping us up to date with what he was doing each week and where the money was going. In my opinion, what sets Chris apart from other contractors is his attention to detail and craftsmanship. He treats the job like he was building it for himself. He doesn’t cut corners but is careful with each step to make sure everything is correct. Everyone who sees the patio for the first time says "Wow." We are very pleased with how our patio turned out and will definitely use Chris in the future.