Bichelmeyer Renovations LLC

I decided to wait until I had "lived" with my new kitchen and bath for a while before posting a review. I had chosen Matt Bichelmeyer because he did not try to sell me anything, was cooperative about scheduling and materials, and quoted a rational price for the work. I also very much liked Emily, his designer. The work started early in the summer and went very smoothly until a few weeks into the job, when things went a bit haywire because Matt took his crew off my job to do a TV renovation program. It took a few weeks before my job became prioritized again, so what should have been a 5 week or so job took 9 weeks. I don't blame Matt for wanting to get on the TV bandwagon, but I was not happy that his focus on those jobs led to problems on mine. Ultimately he did apologize for the delays but I had to do a fair amount of texting, calling, and emailing to get the job back on track--and I had to fire a couple of people on the job as well. Now for the good part: Matt's full-time crew was splendid. They were the best guys I have ever worked with: professional, talented, hardworking, and really cared about the job they did. Indeed, without Ben and Stephen, especially, the job would never have been completed to the standard they provided--and this review would have been a lot more critical. I would hire them in a heartbeat, with or without Matt and Emily. I love my new kitchen and bath and despite a summer spent without either, I feel that it was money well spent and a job well done.

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It started out well, however as the project progressed the owner Matt Bichelmeyer was absent. Emily, the project manager, was great and would even sometimes correct Matt when he had forgotten when he told us certain things. Emily went out of her way to help us track down hardware for cabinets and other various things. Problems started with the installation of Arabesque tile. The grout lines were uneven and the grout color was inconsistent. There were even sections missing grout. When we pointed it out they redid the tile, but the problem was that no one was quality checking the work being done. We feel that if we didn't say anything about very obvious quality issues, they were going to ignore them and just expect us to accept it. Also, the painter Matt hired was someone he was trying for the first time. The painter told Matt (per Matts words) that we were "being too picky". For a $50,000 remodel, we should be picky when there are missed areas - especially on the kitchen cabinets. The worst of it all is our rustic hardwood floors. They had to stain, sand, and restain 3 times. At one point a worker had gouged holes in the wood trying to fix a wood putty color issue and when they realized they couldn't fix it they had to start all over again. The floors were supposed to be finished when we went on vacation so that we were already out of the house. They didn't get completed, and the workers left bags of sawdust on our lawn which combusted and caught our lawn on fire. Luckily our neighbor saw it and called the fire department. We didn't even know it happened until we returned from vacation and our neighbor told us, then we received a letter from the fire department. After all of the work and rework on the floors, we immediately started seeing issues and contacted Matt back in November 2016. We had sinking boards and unbelievable scratches, holes that weren't filled, and uneven boards. When Matt was unresponsive we had a company come out to give us their unbiased opinion and they said they were not sealed properly and really the quality of the boards were poor. We contacted the manufacturer of the flooring after Matt did nothing but come out to look at it and never got back to us. The manufacturer in their own words said "quality of workmanship can be achieved if properly sanded, filled and recoated". It would cost another $1500 to do this so we asked Matt to cover these costs and he has not responded to any emails so that is when we decided to write this review. Had he backed up his work, this review would have never been written. There were some small things they never finished as well.

All the details are in the finished product;  it is always done correctly. He does most of our updates for the rental properties that we buy.

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