MHI

We hired MHI to completely remodel our master bath. MHI was reasonably priced and when the work was completed it looked good. Eventually we started getting strange smells in that bathroom. Then we noticed some tiles starting to displace a little around the shower threshold. We got a tile guy to come in to fix that, but when he removed a tile he found everything behind that tile to be completely molded. It turns out the tiles were attached to sheetrock, and not a proper backer board. Under the sheetrock was a vapor barrier, but that vapor barrier didn?t completely cover the 2x4s. Those 2x4s were completely molded black. When another tile was removed from the corner of that shower?s threshold, it exposed a hole that went into the wall. There wasn?t a true shower pan installed. The vapor barrier went into the wall creating a cesspool inside the wall next to the shower. We contacted HMI the day this was discovered only to get lies and threats from the owner Marshall Mainard. He?s told us a couple times he would take care of it and gave dates were his people would come out; only they wouldn?t show up or even call. Fortunately I work from home otherwise I would have stayed home a few days for nothing.

Very well. When ever there was a discrepancy, we discussed what was needed to fix it, and it was taken care of.

Are you kidding me! Is an F the worst I can give? After two conversations with Marshall on the phone, he had sold me the dream. I was already into starting my basement finished and asked him to come out and price the custom bar portion. After finally getting an appt for him and rescheduling my electrical, plumbing, and hvac around him... he called 10 min after he was supposed to be here. He let me know that he would be 20 min late and I was fine with that. After an hour, I called him to see if he was ok. He said he had to stop and see another upset customer and explain to them why he was right and they were wrong again??? That was the second such story I heard from him and should have taken heed at that point. He finally showed up over an hour late and came to the door. I answered the door, shook his hand, took his business card and asked him if we could walk around the side of the house to get to the basement. I turned around to get my shoes on and when I looked back he was driving away in his truck??? I thought I heard him mumble somehting after I turned, but didnt pay any attention. I tried to call him several times but he will not answer his office or cell phone. I take that back, he did answer once, long enough to tell me to go to h*** and hung up???? At this point, I am at an absolute loss? Did someone forget their medicine? What just happened? I left him numerous voice mail asking what happened, but no return call. He sent me a text and said that since I didnt invite him into the house, he wasnt going to work for me????? I explained that I dont use the basement stairs since construction started because of the mess... I go around the house. Forgive me for getting straight to the point when you finally showed up. If you were on time, perhpas we could have had time for tea and krumpets! I was home alone with my daughter and she was finishing up dinner when he arrived. I find it easier to discuss a job, when you are standing in front of the site. After looking around for Mr Maynard's reputation and his company's I could not find a single positive experience (Angies List, Kudzu, or BBB). I wonder why... consumer be WARNED!!!!

Marshall Maynard is a putz! The only thing he can do is sell, but he can not organize and follow through on a project and he has no people skills whatsoever! We agreed on the project in Nov of 2011 and a contract was signed. Agreement was that MHI would not start the tear out until after the holidays and AFTER THE CABINETS WERE COMPLETELY fabricated. Cabinets were slated for completion on Jan 20, 2012. WEEK I: Tear out happened on Jan 24, 2012. That was a Tuesday - the remainder of that week no one showed up. WEEK2: Following week we had contractors in for about 3 days...not quite 8 hr work days ever! Some electrical was done and some dry wall was done (we had a small opening partially closed up to make room for floor to ceiling cabinetry.) --- BTW, we live in a split level built in 1973 and I had some things changed about the original layout of the kitchen to make it a more useful space. WEEK3: Over weekend my husband called Marshall who promised that cabinets would arrive on Monday or early Tue. Monday came and went. Tues Came and went. Wed came and went ---- NO CABINETS, NO PHONE CALLS. Evening on Wed my husband called Marshall (I had already had it with Marshall's attitude and lack of communication and my husband and I decided that he should deal with him for a while)...that eve Marshall promised that cabinets would be delivered by noon on Thu. Thu noon came and went - at 4:30 they finally showed up with the cabinets. BTW the cabinets were in the back of the truck not protected by anything...they were not wrapped and did not have any blankets or other protective materials around them - you would think that the company would take better care of their "hand crafted" cabinets. Friday was the only day of the week that we actually had people on site....a few cabinets and doors were installed. WEEK 4: Monday - about 6 hrs of work were done on a "floor patch" - we had a peninsula removed and there was no hardwood floor under it so that area had to be patched to fit in with the rest of the existing wood floor. Marshall sent a general contractor to do this. Why the guy was very nice, he did not have the tools or expertise to do this job! And the end results were atrocious. Tue, Wed, Thu no work was done on the kitchen. Fri - full work day. Most of the cabinets were installed, some of the granite was done, the kitchen sink and faucet were installed. Let me also stop here to say that we chose a fairly dark chocolate stain color for our cabinets...we had to send several doors back because they were way too dark and did not match the cabinet boxes ---- the long and short of that one was that our cabinets were NOT finished when they first tor out our kitchen........the doors were actually fabricated and stained two to three weeks after the boxes were done and already in our house... so when they stained the doors they had no reference and the color variations between cabinets and doors were obvious and unacceptable. WEEK 5: Mon - about 3.5 hrs of work were done, Tue - one contractor came by for about one hr, Wed about 8 hrs with one contractor, various odds and ends ere done, Thu nothing, Fri about 2 hrs late in the afternoon into the evening. WEEK 6: Mon - nothing, Tue - 8 hrs one contractor grouting and some odds and ends, Wed - 2 contractors about 5 hrs, Thu and Fri - nothing. WEEK 7: Only day any work got done was on Wed - we had 2 contractors for about 5 hrs. WEEK 8: Only day anyone came out was on Thu for a little while to do some touch ups............... - meanwhile I had had it with Marshall and his contractors and called an independent electrical contractor to look at the electrical that was done because I did not feel comfortable with it, and I called in a professional flooring installer to look at the attempted floor fix. Both needed work. I wrote a letter of demand to Marshall and sent it certified mail outlining what needed to be done and by when I expected it finished (we had been paying him according to our contract all along --- but we still owed him one more large payment and I was holding on to that until everything was done correctly.) In the end HE had to hire a professional floor installer to fix the horrible "fix" that he originally had his contractor do, plus he had to go pull a building permit (which he had NOT done at the beginning of the project) because now he knew that he would need an inspection to get me off his back about the electrical. At any rate, the final inspection was done and passed on April 20, 2012 - about 3 months after the tear out of the kitchen...........it should have been a two week project! And all along, the WORST part of all of it was Marshall Maynard.....after the sale he was rude, unresponsive, yelled at me - at one point he even said to me, in so many words, "I've kissed your a** enough...." that time I hung up on him. He is a jerk and I really don't know how he has any clients at all other then he is a good salesman - and there is where it ends. Also, he does not have a project foreman so NONE of his employees ever know what the whole project is supposed to look like. I had to be on site EVERY time we had contractors over to tell them where the lights were supposed to go, how much of the wall was supposed to be close in, where the cabinets were supposed to go (and they build one set of base cabinets to the completely wrong size - they had to be adjusted…and the cabinet over the fridge was not fabricated correctly either.) NONE OF HIS EMPLOYEES EVER KNEW WHAT THE WHOLE PROJECT WAS SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE...................What a horrid, horrid experience!!!!!!

The best part of my MHI experience was Marshall selling his services. After we signed the contract and work began, Marshall was a completely different person. A true Jekyll and Hyde performance. For instance, before we signed, Marshall had said many times that once our basement was framed, we would walk through the floor plan and that if any changes were needed, it would be best if they could be made at that time. When we walked through the floor plan, Marshall actually suggested that we move a wall to give us another foot or so for our master bedroom. I agreed. The next day, Marshall sent his plumber to install plumbing on the other side of the wall that we had just agreed to move. Marshall then informed us after a few days of trying to reach him that it was no longer possible to have the wall moved. We reluctantly took the adjacent room as the master, now that the previous master was the smaller room. Now that this room was no longer the master bedroom, we also needed to change where certain doors were, all due to not being able to move the wall in the previous master bedroom. My wife contacted him and very politely told him the reason that we now needed a door in a place where there previously wasn?t. He blew up on my wife, and then hung up on her. Until this time, Marshall had no experience in talking about the project with my wife. Marshall also called one very early morning during the process, woke me up, and started to yell at me because his workers were not completing the job quick enough. He ended this conversation by insulting the materials I picked out for the kitchen by referring to them as ?afro engineered.? Real classy. Had two more blow ups of yelling and screaming with Marshall myself after these incidents. I just couldn?t handle being talked down to every time as a paying customer. MHI?s employees are great. There was always an employee that spoke enough English to communicate efficiently with. The work was altogether slightly above average, but having to deal with Marshall made the entire experience unnecessarily frustrating. Marshall also has a person that specifically deals with the finishing touches of the project. If this person is not sent to your project, then it will lack the needed attention to detail to finish all the small details correctly; although I suggest not working with MHI as there is no way to go around Marshall, the owner.

It was a nightmare! Marshall was so imaginative at first and welcoming, together with the good price he quoted, we felt it's the best offer we can get. The deal was to complete the job in about a month. my wife was pregnant, and we planned to first enter the renovated house, and then get well prepared for the new born. Right after we agreed to do business with Marshall the troubles started - 1. Not standing in time frame - the first few days he completed the demolition, then for 3 weeks, he did nothing. the work got delayed time and again, until after MORE THAN 3 MONTHS, when my wife already delivered the baby, we terminated our business relationship with him, called another contractor to complete the job, and went ahead to get some legal consultation. 2. No manners or acceptable behavior ? when we asked about the time it took to perform a job, he would shout at us!!! (standing in front of us or by phone), hang up phone calls in the middle of conversations, or not answer our calls at all (while we knew he gets them). He would never watch his employees while they work. I had to be on site at all times to watch and guide them, while I have no training in construction work. This was of course on account of my real work. why the h*** we kept working with him? we had our share of trouble with the pregnancy and baby delivery, and had to get in the house in a short while. we were afraid that finding another contractor will take even more time. Marshall kept things unfinished, and didn't bring building materials we already paid for so we didn't want to feel we are throwing all that money to waste. 3. The end result ? he didn?t complete the job. For what he did, (a) We have a certified wood inspector report describing how bad was the wood floor installation. Nothing was done right. We had to remove everything Marshall put, and get another contractor to redo it. (b) We have a certified electrician report describing how wires were installed against regulations. (c) A plumber described the toilet installation negligent, and had to redo it. (d) I?m not going to elaborate how negligent and malfunctioning he was, to ruin our master bath vanity. There is not even one detail he did right about it. We had to bring another guy to redo it. (e) The same guy who installed the wood floor, also did the tiles. We decided to currently keep the tiles as-is until we have new budget to replace them. At one point I asked Marshall why they don?t use the level? He explained they are so professional they don?t need it... There is not one tile at the same level as its neighbor. Whenever I walk barefoot on the bath floor, I curse the man who did it. (f) Marshall is very proud with his cabinetry skills. In fact, his company mainly does cabinets. The cabinets were built to our satisfaction, but the installation was so poor. Although I mentioned it twice, the handles and knobs were ALL installed in different levels, nonparallel, and not centered; Doors bang each other when opening and closing; The countertop is not cut like we requested; Base molds were never installed. (g) You think Marshall has an office with a secretary in it? Think again. That employee doesn?t know anything about what?s going on. She wouldn?t answer the phone; she lost emails (how do you manage to do that?); she didn?t know where Marshall or any of his employees are; she didn?t update the contract by our requests. We are now going to court demanding our money back with compensation. I will let you know the result. There are so many more terrible stories to tell about that bad job, but I?ll leave something for next time.