AMWOOD HOMES

Very Bad. Many issues. For example, had to replace every one of the deck supports with 6X6 inch (versus their 4X4 supports) at our expense. Several design problems. Another example is they designed the covered part of the deck at 10'2" but used 10 foot 4X4s, which twisted and bowed and then they spliced in a 2" piece, versus putting in a 10:2" post. They did not properly support the floor joists for the deck and did not properly construct it. We had to correct the problems at our expense. Terrible cooperating builder, that you had to use if you wanted Amwood to build your home. We first approached Amwood and had several meetings with them before we found out we would not be contracting with them but with their builder. I suspect they do this to limit their liability by moving it to their builder. Hm? Perhaps a smart move from a legal perspective but it makes you wonder why the felt the need to do that, versus standing behind their product. Builders contract was for MN but we were building the home in Wisconsin! We had to rewrite the contract at our expense.. Amwood flat out lied to us on the windows. They promised us they would install the windows that we wanted but later told us that they would not install the windows that they previously said they could. I even offered to by the windows and deliver them on time to their factory but they refused our offer. Note: this was very important to us. We had to pay more for substitute windows that were rated lower by Consumer Reports. Many problems with work done by sub-contractors. Took the builder 10 months to put up the siding once it was delivered. He only did so after we started the proceedings, at our expense, to go to arbitration. All the Locks in the doors did not work. Garage doors did not work. For both of those we had to call the builder back to fix the problems. Builder put in the stairs to the basement but refused to put in the risers. The builder did not check the work of his subcontractors and flat out claimed he did not need to. (Then one might ask, who needed him as a general contractor?). Builder ignored many of our specifications, which were included as part of the contract. Basement floor was supposed to be smooth, it is not, not even close. Serious mistakes made by Amwood on billing and insulting and rude behavior by their representative. Weird claims made by builder to include he wanted a monthly fee (which was not in the contract ) plus, his fee for each subcontractor for acting as a general contractor (which we did not object to and which we paid). We finally fired the builder and did the work ourselves. Builder was very non-responsive. We acted in good faith and were taken advantage of. The only good thing I can say about Amwood is that the do a pretty good job manufacturing the shell of the home in their Madison factory. Unfortunately, you have to deal with the Janesville staff and their builders. Note: when the President of the company became aware that their builder was incompetent and unresponsive, he did nothing, that we are aware of, to resolve the problem. Nor, did he seem to care that we had been misled about the windows. When it came to designing and picking out the kitchen cabinets and the vanities, we received very little help from Amwood and had to go to Lowes and Menards for design help. The reason we went to panalized construction was we wanted a tight energy efficient home that would go up quickly. We were not happy that we had to compromise on the windows and there were several scheduling problems, that negated the desire to have the home built quicker than a stick built home. If you go to Amwood's web site it all sounds like it is a wonderful process and that they have their act together. Words are one thing - actions speak for themselves.