Minkoff Company

I would highly unrecommend to anyone not to use. I have been dealing with them for 2 years. I've paid them $6,000 and that is a third of what they are asking to rebuild the back porch. They were recommended by our insurance company. They came out right away and patched up our house so rain wouldn't come in. That was in April 2010. In February 2011 they finally came and removed the portion of the back porch that had been standing. Part of the time was fighting with the insurance company. When that was settled Minkoff submitted plans to the county without our approval. We didn't know they had been submitted. They started work and my husband had an issue with the work so they stopped work and haven't come back. We did not get any other estimates. They would say they would come out and then they wouldn't. We would call on the phone and they wouldn't return calls. They wouldn't hire an architect to draw the plans; they had a draftsman do it. My husband called them 5 times and finally drove to the business of the draftsman and he refused to talk to him and said it was a conflict of interest. It was nightmare and it is still in disarray.

We had a fire in our attic on August 13, 2009. We have a Victorian row house on Capitol Hill. Our insurance company (that's another story) brought in Minkoff to do the emergency work on the house. Overall, Minkoff did a good job with the emergency response especially getting the power restored and "roughly" cleaning up and securing various doors and windows that had be broken by the firefighters. The temporary roof repair was not adequate. From that point on, Minkoff and the insurance company began working together to develop the "scope" for the repairs. Here is where things started to go wrong. The main problem was that Minkoff really works for the insurance company and not the home owner! I believe that they get most of their work through insurance companies. We had to work hard to get agreement (several months) on actual restoration of the damage. Minkoff's estimates (and scope) started out to be inadequate and we had to keep asking questions and pointing out the need for various repair needs. The insurance company made it clear that we would need to have many estimates from many contractors to satisfy them if we didn't use Minkoff. Minkoff represented to us that change orders (when needed) would be easy because the insurance company trusted them and they would take care of them. This turned out not to be the case and we had to work hard to add necessary work to the scope. Despite the "contract" between us and Minkoff, the reality was that Minkoff worked for the insurance company. For the actual work, here are the good outcomes: The work by the two major subcontractors for the roof replacement and the antique floor restoration was excellent (although we insisted on having approval authority for the floor restoration subcontractor). Here were the some of problems: The initial permit was pulled for our neighbor's house and Minkoff wanted to begin work (We would not let them until to permit was corrected). The permit drawing was not correct for the roofing materials and structures (and had to be corrected). The structural work in the attic was not completed as stated in the permit drawings. They had "sistered" the some of the beams. The project management was terrible. Change orders and estimates often were not provided. Work was staged wrong and Minkoff would disappear for weeks at a time (leaving us in the middle of construction mess). Walls were painted before the floors were restored and had to be repainted. Packing and moving furniture was haphazard and damaged furniture and doors. Construction dust was everywhere. We are still finding significant dust from the floor re-sanding in closets and on clothing. Actual work by Minkoff employees was mediocre and generally tried to "cut corners." It took months to get Minkoff to agree to fix problems. Minkoff did not advocate for us with the insurance company. In hindsight, we would have gotten better results if we had been the "general contractor" rather than Minkoff.

If you are ever in the unfortunate circumstance of needing a contractor to restore your home following a disaster, Minkoff is the company for you. This company is simply amazing! Because they do only water and fire restorations, they have the work and processes down to a science. My first contact was the person who negotiated with the insurance company on the scope and extent of work that needed to be done. He was my advocate. After the insurance part was taken care or, I next worked with the job supervisor and the business manager. They coordinated the various subcontractors and their own employees. Everyone was very easy to work with. I found all the staff to be extremely knowledgeable when I had questions. It's easy to see why the Minkoff employees have been with the company for decades. They take great pride in their work, are very personable, have great people skills and are extremely accommodating. They made what was a horrible experience as painless as possible and certainly lived up to their promise of making my home as good or better than it was before!