Mayo Construction

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Generally, the construction went ok. The basic structure is fine. Interior finish work was fine. Major problem with the deck. Boards were installed incorrectly, without the proper spacing and have caused major problems. We now need to replace most of the deck floor and rails after only 7 years. This is a major expense and very disappointing to us. Some of the workers and subs that Mayo had on the job were not skilled.

Working with Tony was fantastic.  We had been planning (and saving) for almost 3 years to remodel our house.  You always hear of so many "nightmare stories" from people about their remodel experiences.  From expenses doubling or timelines stretching out by years or even firms going out of business and projects being left incomplete.  None of this happened with Tony.  We were able to move back into the new part of the house almost to the day from the original estimate.  He broke ground in October and said it would take 5 months.  On March 11th we were cooking in our new kitchen!  The winter in which we did the remodel was brutal, and at one point Tony had his whole crew on our roof breaking up the ice dams to preserve the older part of our home.  He and his son also came out in a snow storm on a Sunday night at 10 pm as our upstairs heat had stopped working properly due to the work that had taken place the day before.  Many contractors would not have answered their phone at that hour of the night on a Sunday.

All of the work was performed to the highest quality and a year later we have had zero issues.  The remodel has changed the way we live and we couldn't be happier.

The week that the excavators dug the foundation one of our children became very ill.  We handed complete control of the project over to Tony for the next couple of months and, together, with the architect, they did a great job and made all the right decisions.  The team was professional and made suggestions for changes/improvements along the way that only enhanced out final product.   We decided not to move out while the work was being down and Mayo construction was very sensitive to our family still living in the house.  They set up temporary kitchen & laundry facilities for us and only broke through to the main part of the house when it was absolutely necessary.
If we were not completely happy with any of the subcontractors work, Tony was extremely responsive and any work that needed to be redone (minor retiling, wood refinishing, recessed light placement, etc) was taken care of promptly - no questions asked.  We are very detail-oriented and we were happy with the high standard to which everything was finished.
The project came in on budget and on time.

Mayo Construction was recommended by a friend of a friend.  References were good and solid.  Estimate was the lowest of the 3 we obtained.  Based on recommendations and Tony's easy going personality, we decided to go with Mayo.   WOW is all I can say.  I simply wanted a finished basement but Tony takes incredible pride in his work and made the rooms more than just a finished basement.  In keeping with the upstairs of our house, he had his carpenter build out beautiful columns, put in vaulted ceilings and built a small ledge along the wall in the pool room on which to put drinks.  He even had the framer tear down a wall and re-frame it since he felt it would "look better" 1 foot wider.   Despite these improvements, the cost came in at the estimate.  His workers kept the work area neat and tidy and covered vents during framing and wall construction to keep dust out of the rest of the house.  Tony was very responsive and finished the job on time.   I highly recommend Mayo Construction.

The job took about 4 months. Tony started on time. After gutting the kitchen, Tony discovered that a major beam in the ceiling had a huge hole in it. Our architect drew up a specially engineered crossbeam and Tony installed it. We were nervous because this installation meant cutting a supporting beam (I had visions of the ceiling falling down), but in fact everything went fine.

From this point, the construction proceeded smoothly, though a bit more slowly than we'd hoped (as we were eating all our meals from a toaster oven).  Part of the pace was our fault -- we added a second window very late in the process. Tony was great and gave us a quick estimate for the new window and installed it quickly.

Tony worked fine with our electrician (not one of his subcontractors), the architect, and the cabinet maker (someone he'd worked with before). Overall, the kitchen turned out fabulously. We love cooking & eating in it.

Some GOOD things about Tony:

• He is honest. We trust him in our house without supervision.
• He has true integrity. When he makes a mistake (like every contractor does), he takes responsibility and fixes the problem at his cost. This is a big reason we keep coming back to Tony job after job.
• His prices are reasonable. He will overestimate rather than underestimate in order to avoid surprises at the end.

Some CHALLENGES about working with Tony:

• He speaks very quickly with a strong accent. In person, he is perfectly understandable, but over a cell phone, forget it! This can be quite aggravating when discussing something critical on the phone. In several years of working with Tony, I have never found a good solution.
• He's very busy. You have to keep calling him to get his attention. But once you have it, he's great.
• He is not a frequent Internet user. He prefers the telephone. If you prefer email communication, you're going to have a hard time.

In May of 07 we embarked on a total house renovation which was to be completed in August and required that me and my family move into a rental property. Aware that it is not unusual for projects to run over we extended our rental for an additional 3 weeks. The project started on schedule and moved along well at first but deteriorated quickly as the summer progressed. It did not take long to figure out that there were other more pressing issues that were taking precedence over our project. Tony was difficult to communicate with because of his fast talk and heavy Irish brogue (intentional perhaps?). He did not give clear time lines of when things needed to be purchased but instead would give me short notice and then let things sit unused for weeks. It was becoming very clear that this project was mismanaged and with little oversight. My travertine and mosaic foyer tile was laid before it was secured and was walked on resulting in damaged and broken tiles that the tiler eventually installed anyway, (broken and cracked!) They were never sealed which caused staining that is permanent. When August came we notified Tony that our lease was coming to an end and we would need to move back into our home. He said it would be ready. It was not. We moved in with friends. By the beginning of Oct.07 the house was being painted but our floors were yet to be stained and polyurethaned. Tony had the painters leave so that the flooring company could come in. After 2 days we came to inspect our completed job only to find a job that was inadequate to say the least; pooling of polyurethane, uneven staining, and gouges in the wood. Tony assured us that the company would redo them right the next time. We agreed and after 2-3 more days we came back to find a worse job than the first time. The owner of the flooring company assessed the work and assured us that if we would give them one more chance they would get it right. The owner was going to do the work herself. Reluctantly, and without much option we agreed. The floors were bad then and are just as bad today. The paint job is incomplete (probably due to the painters leaving the job and not knowing where they left off) there is primer shining through my walls and peeling on my ceilings after less than 1 year. I have holes in my walls and an outlet in my island that is incomplete (see picture). The day we moved back into our house in mid Oct we had no heat but it was turned on the following day. Despite having all new windows, doors, HVAC, and insulation we froze all winter and had higher heating bills then we did previously. I had two companies come in to analyze and test our HVAC system and it has been determined that the duct work is not large enough to handle the air flow necessary to heat our house. This experience has been extremely painful, frustrating and costly. UPDATE: After only one year we woke up to find a pool of water pouring from a light fixture in our pantry. The culprit, a leaky shower.