DAVID GRUBER CONSTRUCTION

In June 2009 David Gruber was hired to build a deck leading from our kitchen door down to the patio and to the back yard, and an upper deck. At our initial meeting we agreed upon the scope and price of the project for which he subsequently pulled permit with the Village of Oak. At this initial meeting at which our landscaper (on whose recommendation we hired him) was present, he told us he would build the deck when asked whether he (David Gruber) would do the work himself, or hire it out. He told us he would do it himself. In reality, the actual deck was built by a high school/college age boy and a young man in his twenties, with occasional work done by David Gruber. We paid 50% up front and the other 50% at the completion of the project. The majority of the work was done in a reasonable time frame, but there were other aspects - gate to exterior basement stairs, drop-down tray, etc. that were done after much prodding, despite assistance by our landscaper to compel him to remedy the problems. The aesthetics of the deck were problematic and evident immediately with loose boards, trim nails, uneven edges, screws through the top of the railing, stain that didn't properly adhere to the wood, etc. He said as it was the end of the season that he was short of money, but that we would be his first job in Spring 2010. The landscaper made every effort to get him to remedy the problems, but to no avail. We contacted the Village of Oak Park building inspection department in early June 2010 and the inspector Lee Harris failed the deck on four code violations (1) deck not properly bolted to the house, (2) railing doesn't support 200 lbs. Of pressure in any direction, (3) handrail doesn't extend beyond last stair, and (4) stair risers are of differing heights. Inspector Harris gave David Gruber 30 days to fix the violations, then until the end of the summer. No correction of violations occurred, so the Village sued Gruber with me as a witness in court at Village of Oak Park in mid-October. Village judge fined him $500 for each of the four violations on 10/14/2010. He contested and rescheduled the appeal several times before finally appearing in Village court on January 6, 2011. A this court appearance the judge heard both my and Insoector Harris' testimony and that of Dacid Gruber and the judge found his testimony lacking in credibility and imposed the four fines totaling $2,000. Despite being sent 35 and 60-day notices from the Village of Oak Park Adjudication department, he has not yet paid the fines. He is currently being sued by the Village in a least one other case. The Wednesday Journal ran this article about the situation on June 8, 2011. http://www.oakpark.com/News/Articles/06-07-2011/Frustrated_with_the_quality_of_a_new_deck_on_her_Oak_Park_home,_owner_looks_for_answers

Work was contracted to go from 4/2010 to 6/2010 (2.5 months). It still isn't finished to this day, one year later. Quality went downhill rapidly. David Gruber did hire a good electrician and plumber, but did virtually everything else himself poorly, including HVAC and finish plumbing which he was not licensed to do. Heating system has failed repeatedly, and is in violation of many codes. David attempted to design the system himself, with poor results. He refused to hire a qualified HVAC company to perform the work. He has massively failed village inspection, and has not responded to requests by village to repair. David Gruber has poor workmanship, is dishonest, and a safety hazard. For example, tile in our bathroom is terrible, the tile run on one wall is 1 inch offset from the tile run on the adjacent wall. David Gruber wrote up a fraudulent contract - the total contract price was 83,000, but the payment schedule added up to 87,000. The "error" was introduced while working on a minor edit in another part of the contract. We didn't catch it, and have been overpaying him. David Gruber's work is a serious safety hazard. He replaced our old boiler himself, and left pipes with leaks and failing solder welds. On one occasion, the weld failed and sprayed water over exposed 110V. He attempted to pass inspection with leaking boiler and exposed electrical work. He installed the heating coil in the attic air handler in the wrong place. He installed new windows, and capped and flashed them by himself, leaving interior lumber exposed to the elements. He refused to fix the boiler and flashing, despite repeated requests. There were 3 separate instances of water damage to our first floor, due to stupidity on his part. He installed doors that don't close properly. He installed MDF trim everywhere, even though drawings call for pine or poplar trim. And on, and on, and on.... Run away screaming. Do NOT hire this guy. A brief update, 4 months after above description was written, work is still not complete, and many inspection violations remain outstanding. David Gruber is no longer attending to this project at all. Our air conditioning compressor failed completely in the hottest July on record. David's HVAC subcontractor will not fix it on the grounds that he did not install it. So, David Gruber has also falsified the permit, and the original HVAC team that put in the AC system is not on record anywhere. So added to our list of woes, we are stuck with a non-functioning central AC system. The repair estimate from a reputable local HVAC company is $10K - $14K.

I felt that the work that Dave Gruber Construction did was great and timely. I had a lot of work that needed to be done and they tackled it in a very professional way. I was very happy with the service.