Atlas Renovations

The job did not go well. The contractor requested a 38% down payment which I paid. He requested that the check be written in his name and not the company so that he can cash it and buy materials. The down payment was $12,500. He sent one worker to start removing wall paper from our kitchen and bathrooms. He also demolished the upper part of our kitchen cabinets and the backsplash in the first week of the job. He sent folks from the Home Depot to measure for the new cabinets also in the first week. So the design and the details of the new cabinets was finalized. After removing the wall paper from the kitchen and toe bathrooms in the first week, his worker quit on him. The worker told us that Atlas Renovations owner Kevin Molleda did not pay him all his money so he was leaving. We started following up with Kevin to see what he is going to do to finish the job and he was giving us excuses and blaming his worker for bad quality. He did not send a replacement worker. We also started inquiring if he had ordered our cabinets from the Home Depot (this was his choice to use the Home Depot) and he was evasive. He claimed that he knew others who could deliver the cabinets quicker to the specifications and material as the Home Depot. We started getting concerned as the promised finish date of the job (July 8, 2013) was approaching and no workers were coming and we had no information if cabinets were ordered. After July 8, I submitted a complaint to the BBB in Houston where he has an A+ rating telling them about my trouble. He then sent another worker to finish the removal of the wall paper and retexture the walls in the remaining bathrooms. He also sent us to MS International (again his choice) to pick the granite and the tiles for the job which we did promptly. Finally on July 10, he informed me via email that the cabinets were going to arrive to the house on July 22. I requested that he provide me with a proof of purchase and a schedule for the completion of the job which was seriously running behind the promised date. I started getting the run around from and he would skip on meetings with us and would make promises to about responses or meetings that he would not keep. I was very concerned because he collected $12,600 from me at the beginning in order to by materials and all what he did was labor work that amounted to only $2500-$3000 max and after five weeks on the job I had no assurance that he had bought any material. We were living without the majority of our kitchen cabinets for five weeks already, we had exposed electrical outlets in the kitchen and bathrooms for five weeks and I had no assurance that he bought any material or how or if he was going to finish the job. He then told me that he was going to send a worker to start demolishing my bathrooms tiles, so I refused and told him that I will not allow him to do any further demolishing in the house until I see the replacement tiles delivered to the house. I was concerned that he would make more areas of my house unusable given his poor performance on the job so far and his lies about materials orders. He tried to make the excuse that he does not like to bring the material early because it could be misplaced or damaged. I told him that he can store it in my locked garage where it would be safe. I finally engaged a lawyer who corresponded with him and gave him a week to either produce proof of material purchase or deliver materials to the job site. He did neither. At this time we are seven weeks into the job and he only performed less than 10% of the job. He has close to $10,000 of my money in his possession and he is not indicating any path forward on the job. I am going to sue him in court to get my money back. This has been a horrible experience, I believe that his behavior goes beyond incompetence. He had so many chances to correct his course and I was patient with him, but he kept lying and make promises which he did not intend to keep.

Overall, they were good. The only complaint that I have is that they might be stretched a little thin. They were not as prompt as I would have like them to have been. They were very professional and once we got them to the house they did what they were supposed to.