Copperhead Contracting, Co.

I really like him.  He is fantastic.

Working with Mike Childers with Copperhead Contracting has been a horrible nightmare. I asked him to pull up the carpet and padding, clean up the glue off the floors from the padding and DO NOTHING ELSE but urathane them. The floors had a 70 year patina that was just beautiful. There was a dull spot on the floor in the livingroom and he sanded that section down and mixed paint with stain to get the colors to match. Of course that didn't work. He then proceeded to cut the hardwoods with a knife! That was the last straw. I had him hire a subcontractor that had to sand the floors down to bare wood. He could not sand one spot enough to get the cut marks out so my floor is ruined with knife marks for ever. Lost all that patina too. It has been over 6 weeks since the walk through and his work is still not complete even though he has turned in the keys. The sheetrock over the livingroom door was not taped and floated correctly because there was no taping done there. The dining room window has not been painted. There is texure on the door trim that looks like a horrible lumpy mess. He cut the door trim too short and caulked between the trim and the floor to fill the void. Mike Childers does not seem to take pride in his work and I am positive that he would not do such a horrible job in his own house as he did in mine. He did not even install the thresholds on the floor between the rooms and I even purchased the wood to get that done. I would not suggest that anyone ever use Copperhead Contracting or Mike Childers to do any work of any kind unless you want to wait months on end to get the work done and the minute you turn your back he high tails it out of town on vacation.

Overall, Mike does a fair job for a fair price. However, I found his knowledge and abilities as a general contractor/handyman and painter lacking. I first noticed this with small but consistent things about the way he handled assisting me in my chimney cap removal, and installation of the new one. A little rough and haphazard in it's removal around fragile stucco, but no harm done. When installing the new one, he just seemed to lack a little bit of confidence and saviness in how to get the job done and seemed to be rushing a little. For example, the new stainless steel cap was very hard to screw through but he kept trying to press through it with a drill and force. Eventually I suggested marking the points with an icepick and predrilling small holes to get the screws in which worked. Something I would have expected him to intiate. A little sloppy, inaccurate, and light in sealing the screws with caulk that we put in the top (forgot one of the points until I reminded him). Didn't notice his drill bit was in the chuck crooked once. Small things and nothing I couldn't have screwed up myself, but they seemed to keep coming consistantly and also I don't call myself a professional handyman. Second major clue was when he moved on to the main job I hired him for, painting the garage door. After having sanded down the rust spots and primed them, he asked me how I liked the color of the primer. It was white, which was the same color I was going to have him top coat the door in. I said I liked it fine. He then suggested just topcoating the door with the same primer. The common sense bell went off in my head and I asked if you could use a primer as a top coat. He said he didn't see why not and suggested I ask the guys at Ace if it was OK as I was about to make a run over there. Turns out he took off before I left and said he would stop by there and get the stuff we needed and ask about the paint. He returned claiming they said it would be OK. Me, not being a professional painter, said I'd go along with the plan then, and he would return the next day to complete the job. Later that night I did some research (and called Kilz the paint company) to find out that you should NEVER use primer as a topcoat. So he painted it with an exterior acrylic I wanted. When I came home after work, the door looked pretty good, but there were paint spots on my driveway. Mike at first claimed they had been there from before but when I pointed out a couple obviously fresh ones, he admited he may have dropped a couple drops and hadn't used a drop cloth (there were some brush marks on the stucco frame around the door he claimed were there to that looked pretty fresh but I won't call him a liar on those). That was the last straw and I settled up with him rather than have him do a few more minor handyman jobs on my place. After having done the little bit of research, I would never expect a professional painter would suggest using primer as a topcoat. Overall, the door paint job is descent, but there are still a couple dull/rough sposts. Lesson learned by me, I never asked him if he was licensed (because you don't have to have a license to be a general contractor or painter in TX) nor if he had insurance (which might have indicated how serious of a professional/how much experience he had at his job). Not the job I expected from an A rated guy on Angie's list (1 review).

Great. Came every day until project was finished. Just what i asked for

The work was conducted over the course of several months. He prepped all the areas and filled all nail holes and patched small damage without being asked to do so. Mike completed the entire job ahead of schedule and for a fair price. He cleaned up after himself everyday. On the bedroom, a paint of lower quality was used. He was not satisfied with the result so, at his own expense, matched the paint with a better quality and completed the job.