Capitol Improvements, LLC

We contracted with Capitol Improvements to complete a large addition on our Arlington home and had an absolutely terrible experience, particularly with the owner Taft Hawken, nearly from the get go. Taft is an extremely confrontational person who does not take suggestions or criticism well at all. He did not exercise adequate supervision over his crew and would often show up first thing in the morning, give them some brief instructions, and then disappear until the end of the day. Without fail, his crew would make mistakes, which he would often try to argue his way out of. He overlooked several large items on the plans and then later claimed they were not part of his contract. The basement walls were poured crooked and in the wrong place, windows were frequently located incorrectly, the floor of the addition does not line up with the existing house, and the roof was built incorrectly. There are multiple other examples of inferior workmanship, including crooked walls and doors that do not close properly. His trade subcontractors regularly expressed frustration about the fact that Taft's mistakes were making their jobs more difficult. Timing was another huge issue. We were told that the project would take 3.5-4 months, and it ended up taking nearly 8. The reason for the delay was a result of regular mistakes that needed to be fixed (and the inevitable argument about why it either was not a mistake or not his fault) and Taft's unwillingness to apply a large enough crew to the job. On average, we were lucky if there were 3 guys on site working on any given day, which is an extremely small crew for a 1200 sqft addition. Even after repeatedly expressing our dissatisfaction with the delays and highlighting the fact that we were expecting a child and needed the addition complete, Taft still refused to put forth the effort to get the work done. We came very close to firing Taft on several occasions, but were on a tight budget and concerned about incurring additional costs. To top it all off, in the most significant example of inferior workmanship, the basement Taft built has major water problems that will require major repair work to remedy. Not surprisingly, Taft refused to honor his own warranty and made a whole slew of excuses as to why this was not his fault which have no basis in reality. After going back and forth for several months, he finally stated that the fact that the basement HE built leaks like a sieve is not due to any fault of his own. I can only assume that makes sense in his mind, because it sure doesn't in anyone elses. The primary problem with this company lay with the owner. Taft is patronizing and condescending and has absolutely no business interacting with customers. This coupled with his inability to supervise his own crew, resulted in a very dissatisfactory experience. I cannot NOT recommend Capitol Improvements strongly enough. If you are planning a major addition, save yourself the pain and aggravation by going with an experienced contractor who can provide a long list of good references. If you just need some tile installed or a small bathroom remodeled, that may be more in line with Taft's skill set, but I doubt it. UPDATE: After obtaining several quotes from experienced and well-reviewed companies around our area, we hired another contractor to repair the water issues referenced above. There was not a single company who came out to look at our basement that did not confirm that our water problems were a direct result of shoddy workmanship in the form of the concrete in our new basement being improperly poured and waterproofed. Insisting that a problem was "pre-existing," which in this case is false, can be used under any circumstance to get out of warranty repairs and is not an excuse. We did not have, and to this day do not have, any water issues in any part of the basement that was not touched by the provider. Furthermore, the provider's insistence that there were a set of existing conditions that he was aware of that could cause the structure to fail, but chose to not make the homeowner aware that a design change might be necessary and proceeded with construction, goes much further than pure incompetence and represents gross negligence on his part. Taft will come off as agreeable, friendly, and accomodating at first but that will rapidly change if there is even the slightest difference of opinion on any aspect of the project. Buyer beware, don't make the same mistake we did. Go with experience and understand there is reason why someone is the lowest bid.