Custom Built Design & Remodeling

VERY POORLY. The lack of response from the beginning should have been my first indication that they were not a company I should hire. It took sending them a second email inquiring if someone was going to contact me, since that's what it says on their generic email response. I finally received a call from Michael Foley about 5 days later. I had about a 25 minute conversation with Michael to discuss about our deck repair needs. As he tried to inquire exactly what services we need from Customer Build, I explained that we are interested in getting quotes for possibly three stages: small (repair), medium (repair and update), and large (repair, update, and possible addition to the deck). I explained to him that my husband and I have ideas but we're unsure as to which direction we were going to take. That's why we had wanted them to come and discuss the options. Michael and I set an appointment (7/28 between 4:30 pm - 5 pm, due to another appointment he had). Fast-forward to 7/28. I had called Michael about 3:15 pm, to inquire if he was still planning to come between the agreed times. I mentioned to him that I hoped it was closer to 5 pm, due to the fact that my husband was running a bit behind schedule. I informed him that should he come closer to 4:30, and my husband and I are not there yet, Bob will be there to meet with him. Michael had asked who Bob was. I let him know that he is a dear family friend, who is very familiar with what we are looking regarding our the deck projects. Michael, all of a sudden, became very suspicious as to why we would have Bob there. He asked again why he needs to be there. Ignoring the rudeness of the question, I told him that Bob is a close family friend, whose opinion my husband and I value; and as I had explained, is very familiar with what we're looking for with the project. I also assured him that as agreed upon, my husband and I will be there - we might just be running behind schedule. Unfortunately, my husband's delay caused us to come home closer to 5 pm. As I was approaching our house, I noticed a car driving away from our house, and I saw Bob shaking his head. When we approached Bob and I asked if that was Michael driving away. He said that it was. Naturally, we inquired what had happened. According to Bob, Michael seemed very annoyed that we weren't there. Bob reiterated to him the situation and let him know we were on our way. Bob continued saying he showed Michael the areas of repairs we needed on the deck and possibly what we were thinking, in terms of updates. Per Bob, Michael didn't really ask questions. Apparently, after 10 minutes of being there, Michael's associate arrived. According to Bob, he was the "salesman" of the team. We asked Bob if this associate asked questions, he said that he didn't. After about 30 minutes, Michael indicated that he didn't think Custom Build will be able to help us with the project. Bob mentioned that all Michael focused on was that I told him that I would be there and I'm not. Needless to say, my husband and I were a bit confused, considering I called him ahead of our appointment to explain the situation. As soon as Bob was done going through what had happened, my phone rings and sure enough it was Michael. First thing I did was apologize for being late. Being commute traffic, it was hard to go at a faster speed. Michael responded by accusing me of not being truthful. He mentioned that I didn't keep our agreement of being there, when he came. I reminded him that I called him 1.5 hours ago, and said that there was a possibility of us being delayed. Then he hurled the next accusation saying that I am just not trustworthy. He accused me of lying to him about who Bob was. Michael indicated that Bob did say he was a family friend, but he does some maintenance work for us. Of course, I was taken aback with his vile accusations. He proceeded to question why Bob was even there and kept reiterating that I had lied; therefore, he didn't think Custom Build was going to work with us. EXCUSE ME?!?!? Needless to say, my anger was immediate. I responded with, "How dare you of accuse me of being untrustworthy and a liar? Is this how you treat all your potential clients? I called you with appropriate lead time to let you know we may be running behind. I explained to you who Bob was to us and how we value his opinion. How dare you! To show you that I'm a person of my word, I will pay the consulting fee of $250 for barely 30 minutes of your time. Expect the cheque in the mail!" Michael tried to say that it wasn't necessary to send a cheque and he would not cash it, if it came. I told him I don't care if he will not cash the cheque, but he will still get paid for his time. I told him again I don't want him accusing me of being a person, who doesn't know how to keep an agreement. I mailed him the cheque. Needless to say, our experience with Custom Build is a VERY UNPLEASANT one. I have never been so insulted and called a liar by a potential contractor. Michael Foley was basically so paranoid with Bob being there. Michael couldn't get over the fact that Bob was there to start the meeting. He probably thought that Bob was just there to fish for opinions and suggestions, and then we will have Bob do all the work, which couldn't be further than the truth. Just so the people reading this review understand, Bob is over 70 years old and was the one who suggested we get estimates for our project, including this company. He was there to guide us, in order for my husband and I come to a decision. Bottom line, NO on Custom Build.

Everyone at Custom Built was phenomenal to work with. They were very professional, detail-oriented, and strong/timely communicators. We'll certainly be reaching out to work with them again on future home projects, and would recommend their services to others.

Mike Flory came to the house in early June and gave me an estimate of $2500.00. I gave him a down payment of $1000.00. He said the company was very busy but would fit the job in when possible. In early October, the job was begun. It took the better part of 3 days to complete. Everything looks very good. I am satisfied with the work. I do think it was pretty expensive but I guess that is typical.

The workers were courteous and the quality is excellent. It was very pricey so my expectations for quality were high, and they provided it, plus they provide a warranty. Because contractors were so slammed in 2014, the deck didn't get started until about two months after originally projected, so that was a bit disappointing but understandable. I would recommend them.

I have been very happy with his work. He shows up on time and is professional.

I can not say enough good things about the job they did. Michael came out, took a look at the project and designed the deck and stairs from the deck into an area of the yard that I wanted to fence in. After all the plans were made, the township building inspector would not issue a building permit because in the original plan, the deck would have infringed upon the required building setback by inches. Michael worked hard with me to redesign the deck to fulfill my wishes and meet the building inspector requirements. The work went smoothly..the builder was extremely meticulous and the deck is beautiful. The subcontractors for the fence worked hard and quickly and also did a great job. At first, I thought the price for the project was high but they were right in line with other contractors. I am so happy I chose them and highly recommend Custom Built

Mike was clearly the salesperson and he made a very positive first impression. He clearly gave the impression that he wanted us to be satisfied with the job, was very attentive and stuck to his schedules. I'm not sure there could be a better PR person. Chris took over the supervision of the job and we did not find him as easy a person to get along with.
This was a very big job and you never expect everything to go perfectly. The primary disaster was the landscaping. With their
suggestion we had decided on Michigan boulder retaining walls. This sounds nice but the boulders we got were mostly huge and did not match the aesthetics of our yard. We raised concern that there was no landscaping cloth used to avoid erosion around and under the boulders. We were told that it was not necessary that plants would prevent this. We insisted and they willingly rebuilt the walls. But on reading we discovered that all retaining walls should have a drainage system and we indicated that the back of the house tended to collect water. They argued that this was not necessary. In reality all it takes is some inexpensive drain pipe and some trenches for tiling. We also had a paver patio partially constructed by them but the sub-materials used did not meet the specifications of the paver company. In the end, we wrote out all of the landscaping out of our contract by change-orders. This was a pain but I think by that point they were as equally annoyed with us. We guestimated the cost of doing the landscaping on our own and underestimated. We ended up hiring Stiles and the first thing the mentioned, without asking, was the need for a drainage system. All of our walls now have a drainage system meeting the paver manufacturer specs and we have a drain tile out to our pond. We had 7 inches of rain over two days last month and no puddles in the back yard. I can't imagine what would have happened if we had stuck with the boulder walls without ground cloth.
We had blown in concrete foam insulation which I believe was the first time CB had ever used this material. I think it is great but probably over kill for a sunroom as most of the heat loss is through the windows. This material is water based which meant that water started to seep through the drywall and as it was applied in winter it took forever to dry. We ended up solving the problem ourselves by putting a dehumidifer in the room. As we were having concerns we called the company that supplies the material on a Saturday and the president answered the phone! We got quite the lowdown and he suggest we have an Infrared survey of the room. We insisted on this and found several gaps in the insulation and had to have it reapplied. This was not CB's fault really but if we had not been proactive we would have ended up with a very poor job.
We had a significant issue in figuring out how to heat and deal with the exhaust pipes from two gas fireplaces. We had installed the gas fireplaces about two years prior; one on the house wall abutting where the sunroom is, the other in the basement below the sunroom. I recalled that the fireplace upstairs could have blowers put on it to heat the house and I requested that we run these vents into the sunroom. Otherwise we don't have heat to the sunroom but this works great. But the sunroon was exactly where the fireplace vents are so these had to be moved. CB wanted to have these vent to the front of the house which would have been an eyesore. I finally came up with the idea of a chase in the sunroom and installation of a chimney and it looks great; added some nice character to the house. CB had an HVAC guy out and I was not impressed. We actually brought our HVAC guy out who CB ended up hiring.
My overall assessment is that CB should stick with sunrooms and decks. Our deck is wonderful; though somehow in their design they failed to calculate the number of steps needed to land the staircase on our patio. So far the Trex decking is holding up well. The sunroom is built very solidly. I would rather have had the doors open on the yard side than the house side as the doors keep knocking the furniture... but just as much our oversight as theirs. We have triangular windows at the apex of the room and these were placed very close to the ceiling such that the frames around the window nearly touch the ceiling. These could have been dropped a few inches and it would have been perfect. So overall I would probably have given CB a and quot;Band quot; rating with the exception of the landscaping which if I scored separately would have been an and quot;Fand quot;.

Overall it was a good experience and I would work Custom Built again in the future