Ball's Remodeling

The Good: The gutters are BEAUTIFUL. They are well formed and look great on our house. They solved our water problems. They were the 2nd lowest quote that we had of 3, and we thought the price was very fair. The salesman was very nice and funny. He was easy to reach and prompt. Our water intrusion problem is fixed and we're HAPPY! The bad: They were very unprofessional. Their sales guy was referred to me by a family friend. He was a nice guy. When the workers came out to do the job, they were loud and came unannounced. Since my fiance' and I work nights, it was a rude and unexpected awakening when the worker was pounding on the door at 9AM on a weekday without so much as a phone call. This was after weeks of calling and asking for an approximate date, and no clear communication from them, even to say "Not sure when". The sales guy told us it would start in 2 weeks, it took them several, can't remember how many weeks, I lost track. 5 or 6? maybe less.The guy at the door simply said "we need power" so I got an extension cord and put it through the door for them. I was so grateful that they actually showed up finally. Then, the fun began.I had been doing some work on the roof and had installed a brace through the ridge of the roof and some roofing platforms. To my disbelief, when I walked to the back of the house, the worker was taking the brace out!!! He was using a hammer right on the shingles. I nicely asked if he would like a piece of wood to remove the nails and he responded "No." If I wasn't sleep deprived and in such a state I may have asked him to stop. From there things got worse. They weren't aware of all of the work they were supposed to do. After some phone calls, and apparent work-order updates, to my disbelief, the worker grabbed a new piece of MY lumber that I bought for another project and began to saw into it! It wasn't even the correct size for the job. He split the wood in the middle length-wise and installed it on the roof. It looks unprofessional at best.The gutters are of high quality and look great. They definitely work well. The water intrusion problem at our house is almost solved. For this I am grateful. There are some glaring problems with them. First of all, they caulked the gutters in the rain. Caulk doesn't like to hold too well to wet surfaces. The mitres are a bit leaky, and were from day 1. I inspected the gutters myself, and the caulk job seems sloppy and excessive. One of the downspouts is in a few feet or so in from the edge , and lots of water collects there and drips from the leaky mitre joints in our driveway. There is a depression there from months of water drips. The workers left a mess - lots of long roofing nails in the driveway, and there are still screws sitting on the roof shingles rusting outside of my home office window. I'll power wash them this fall when it's time. ALSO I requested that the straps be installed UNDER the shingles instead of on top of them. They said it wasn't a problem. Each and Every shingle where they installed the gutters is cracked with a 3 inch crack at the point where the gutter straps contact the roof. Our roof is 8 years old, so it;s not like the shingles are brittle. The roof looks brand new. When the work was completed, I called the company and told him about the leak, and told him that I wouldn't have time to inspect the work until later that day, and that I would call him after such time. I was on my way to work.Within a half-hour of my phone call, I got a call from my fiance' at home. She sounded scared and told me that the owner of the company was AT OUR HOUSE and was VERY upset. She told me that he would like to talk to me. She put the gentleman on the phone.Neither of us had ever met, talked to, let alone seen this "gentleman" before. He proceeded to berate me over the phone, using my fiance's phone, telling me that he did not appreciate the message that I had left earlier, and that the gutters were beautiful, which I agreed with. He described how they had all previously sat around the answering machine and listened to my message with disgust. (Why didn't he then CALL ME?!?!) He asked me what my professional qualifications to inspect gutters were (a ridiculous and insulting question) and THEN threatened that they would "cut the gutters down right now" if we weren't satisfied with them. I know how to work with caulk, I formerly worked construction for a very good contractor in New York City, a fact which I chose not to mention during my verbal bashing. He continued his rant, and again threatened several times to cut the gutters off "right now". He also put words into my mouth, describing how he thought I felt about the work done, which was totally not accurate and nothing like the message I had left. He also told me how the quote for this job was way too low, and that the salesman doesn't even work for the company (WHAT?) even though he had official looking paperwork with the company logo on it. At this point, I was standing there shaking, feeling so sorry that I had put my fiance' in this position, and hoping that I could calm this seemingly irrational person down. I was just eager to have these guys away from us, away from our house, and hopefully never to be seen again. I apologized, told him he was right, tried to explain that I wasn't trying to cause any problems. I asked my Fiance' to give the man the check. He then changed his tune, calmed down, and apologized for all of the things that had happened, and tried to explain why the work was performed as it was. He stated that his iPhone had just broken and that he was upset about it. Being a person of lesser income who can't afford an iPhone, I don't have much sympathy for him; although I can definitely understand that things don't always go your way. My fiance' later told me that she was very frightened by the anger of this man towards us. In retrospect, my fiance told me that if she had it to do over again she might have called the police, simply due to the sheer anger that was being expressed at her, and the confrontational attitude of this gentleman. In my opinion, we were both very nice and forthcoming through the entire process, and not once did I raise my voice or swear at the workers or anyone else - that's not my style. In fact, we were nothing but hospitable and courteous,to them the entire time, treating them with dignity and respect, as professionals hired to do a professional job. The company claims to have a lifetime warranty for their work, but if that man ever shows up at our house unannounced again, we will call the police. I know due to the nature of this website, he will likely read this letter, and when he does, I would like him to think about how he could have avoided intimidating a young defenseless woman whom he had never met before, and instead left a good impression and heard our concerns on how to improve the quality of his business in person, instead of through this very public forum. We weren't going to make an issue of any of these things at all and were / are very thankful that there are gutters on our house now. I wish I would have had the opportunity to speak with this gentleman on that day, but instead of calling me to schedule something or talk it out with me on the phone, he just showed up unannounced at our house and started acting like a child, trying to intimidate us and threatening to "undo" the work that was done instead of trying to work things out with us. That's why I'm writing this review today. I wish no ill will towards the workers, the manager, or the company, but I will NEVER hire Ball's Remodeling EVER again, and I wouldn't call them if the gutters sprang leaks in every inch of them and they were the last gutter company on earth.

See above.

They were very good. It was hard to get a hold of them sometimes.

They came and did the work in a timely fashion and I was satisfied with the final product. The workers were very considerate and polite, and they didn?t take too many breaks. I did have questions after a month and have not been able to get them to call back. It now seems like they are not in business.

The original bid for roofing was $7,300. The proposal had a clause for replacement decking if needed but they thought that I might need just a couple of sheets of plywood if any when they examined the roof. After they got the roof off they said I needed plywood to cover all the boards (they were aware of part of my roof was boards and part plywood when they gave the estimate) for an additional charge of $1,728 at $1 per square foot. They also said I needed a 3 inch PVC elbow in an exhaust duct and charged me $25 for the elbow. Total cost was $9,053 when I expected to pay $7,300. Although I was concerned because the cost escalated, I thought that they did a good job roofing and felt secure because they provided a warranty. During the winter I had some leakage and again in May. I called them May 28, 2009 and said I had a problem. They said they would come out that afternoon or on Friday. I said Friday wasn?t good for me because I would be out of town. I waited for them all afternoon and they didn?t come. The following Wednesday I hadn?t heard from them so I called again. They said they came out on Friday and that there is nothing wrong with my roof. I said I didn?t know they came out because I wasn?t home and that I was confused because water was coming in by the exhaust pipes. The receptionist said she would have the owner call me in an hour. Two hours later he called and said that nothing was wrong with my roof. I explained that water was coming in. He said it wasn?t his problem and that it was a plumbing issue. I said that it didn?t make sense to me. He then said I was stupid and that they would be sending me a bill. I said I didn?t know about a charge. He said nothing is free and that I was told about the charge. I said I wasn?t. He then put the phone down and I heard him ask the receptionist if she told me. The receptionist said that she didn?t know but that she usually does. The owner got back on the phone and said that I was told. I said that I wasn?t and then he proceeded to call me a liar. The next week I received a bill in the mail for $125.