Eichlin General Contractors

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Bob Eichlin was one of 5 general contractors from whom we originally requested estimates. It was easy to recognize from the pre-estimate stage that he was thorough and well-qualifiied from the questions he asked us and the way he conducted his site inspection. He understood older homes very well and had even done work on some historic properties. Even before providing us with an estimate and knowing that he would have the job, he provided excellent suggestions to us on options and alternatives to our project and ways we could prevent problems with whomever we would select to do the job. Even though we had already selected a cabinet-maker to help us with the cabinets, Bob suggested having his cabinet-maker take a look to provide a second option on the project. Turns out that Bob's cabinet-maker was the only one of 4 that we had consulting who was willing and interested in working with us to combine our original cabinets with new ones. Our original cabinets are a beautiful american walnut, although 40+ years old. The other cabinet-makers were only interested in scrapping all the originals and making all new ones. Bob met with us at our request at least 4 more times to answer additional questions or concerns (or to discuss changes as we continued to adjust our ideas) before we signed a contract. He was very patient and responsive every time, providing us with as much additional information that we needed to make a decision. The work, itself, went very well. All Bob's specialists (carpenters, plumber, plasterer, cabinet-maker) were professional, friendly and very skilled. They were sensitive about the disruption and took measures to minimize the inconvenience of not having a kitchen for an extended period. Bob also managed his work around some of the other disciplines we had hired, ourselves: electrician, the hardwood floor provider, granite counter people. He even helped me with some of them, rescuing me a couple times from problems with them. The only problems I experienced in this process were with providers who were not part of Bob's team (the ones I had hired directly). If I had it to do over, I would use all Bob's specialists rather than trying to hire them myself. End result: My new kitchen looks FANTASTIC, I was able to keep the original walnut cabinets but give them a more updated look, (people seeing the kitchen think we got all new cabinets), the new cabinets built match the original ones beautifully (when we ask people if they can tell which are the new ones...they can't pick them out), and the overall cost was dramatically lower than going the 100%-new cabinet route, with no sacrifice in quality.