HomePro Services

In word, awful. He did the mirror first (which I should have learned from) and tried to hang it on a small hook, which it tore out of our wall and almost shattered (damaged the bottom). We still have a mark in our wall from where it pulled out. He then was doing the Wine Cellar and Front Door projects together. I'll cover the wine cellar first. On the wine cellar, I provided very detailed architectural plans for how to layout the cellar and specific dimensions for the racks so that the bottles would fit. My brother is a commercial architect so had him review my take-off and he checked and tweaked so it was accurate. Chris provided a quote for me based on the drawing. Chris showed up on Day 1 to work on the cellar and struggled from the start. It was obvious he had never done anything on this scale. His attention to detail was pitiful and he laid out the racking incorrectly (too narrow so that bottles would not fit). After much discussion, he agreed that he hadn't followed the plans and guessed on a few dimensions. He adjusted the racking so that it would fit bottles, but then ended up being too wide so bottles would lay over on the sides. They were supposed to be stained wood and he simply painted them. While working on this he started working on our Stained Front Doors (custom-10' tall) that he was supposed to re-stain as they had faded over the years. He over-sanded them taking the original stain off and damaged both doors so it had to be filled with wood filler (never looked right). He didn't really know stains and had serious issues trying to get the stain to take. I went out of the country for work (with my wife overseeing the project). He couldn't get the stain to work, so he painted our front doors! My wife told him that she was not happy with either project, which had now take over 1.5 weeks to get to this point and we had closet with an unusable wine rack and a $7K custom front door that had been painted. My wife told him she was not happy with the project and he would need to make it right (especially the front door). He threatened her that she had better give him his money or he would not leave (which happened at night). She had to threaten to call the police to get him out of our house. I was not pleased remotely and forbid him to set foot on our property. I have no respect for someone who would threaten women. We have since filed against him with BBB, which upheld our claim. As a final note, we had our front stained this month (as the paint was falling off) and the person painting it asked us if we did it ourselves because it was done with indoor paint...shocker...he couldn't even get the paint right. We end up removing the wine rack and having it put in by a professional so at this point the damage is undone, but would never want someone to go through what we did with him.

At the beginning, Chris seemed helpful, knowlegeable and responsive. When we asked Chris simple questions about process, extra costs, and damage incurred at the job site, he became very unprofessional and defensive, which was was quite shocking to us. Because of this, we would certainly not recommend him to anyone. In addition, most of the repairs he performed eventually had to be corrected by another contractor.

First, Chris gave me a proposal which specified components to be used on the project as well as the price to complete the job. He said he had a crew standing by and said he could get work began very soon. I agreed to the proposal and gave him my first half of the total payment. His guys promptly arrived as he stated. When his guys began tearing off the old wood they noticed more extensive damage due to water. Chris wrote up a new proposal with the added change orders. I agreed for the work to continue and gave him the second half of the initial total payment. The third installment was still outstanding. During the 2-3 day span of work, Chris stopped showing up to the job site to view his employees' work after the first day or two. By the evening of the third day his guys were wrapping up the project and clearing and cleaning their tools. I went to view the quality of work and noticed so much wrong. To start, they damaged my existing slab foundation by chipping chunks off of the edges and covering up with siding to hide it. When I got on my hands and knees I could see exposed the wood sill/sole plate. This piece of wood should not be exposed to moisture. Next I noticed that most of the siding panels were not lined up with each other. Large gaps were in between some of the panels and some of the gaps were not even parallel. His workers just pumped ample amounts of sealant to cover the problem. On many of the vertical trim pieces that his guys tried to seal with white silicone had inconsistent gaps in sealant. About that time his employees asked for the final payment. I told them to call Chris to view his employees' work before I made such payment. At this time the contractor, Chris was out of the state on vacation for what I remember being his birthday or something similar. Being frustrated with the project and I wanted closure, we agreed over the phone to have his guys come back an additional day to use other methods to hide the inconsistencies of his work and to repair the damaged slab foundation. Again, Chris was not available to view his employees' work. Two and a half years have past and most of the vertical wood trim has split. Upon further investigation from old pictures I took of the project, I could see that his employees split the wood with nails and covered the cracks with sealant and paint. Most of the sealant has lifted and cracked. Next to the chimney chase is the back door to the backyard. On another project, I was going to replace the back door and began to tear out the door and casing. That is when I noticed I had more water damage from before the chimney was replaced. One of the wood pieces that needed to be repaired was behind the chimney chase and that was the only entry point. I cut out a two foot by two foot panel from the panel siding. As soon as I removed the panel I knew Chris's employees did not do a job that is deemed up to code by the City of Arlington. The first thing I saw was that he used fiberglass insulation with paper backing to insulate the chimney chase. Not only did he use paper products in a combustible area, his employees never nailed or stapled the product to the exterior walls. Thus, the insulation has fallen onto the fire box. After removing the insulation from the fire box I saw there was a large and clear sticker that stated there needed to be a minimum of 1/2" clearance around the entire fire box. Obviously, with the insulation laying on top of the fire box that it was not up to code. Next I noticed that the piece of panel that I cut out was not the product material that we discussed and that was written in the initial proposal, nor the amended second proposal. Next I noticed that one of the sill/sole plates that he was supposed to replace only had 2/3rds of it removed and replaced. The remaining 1/3 was left there in poor condition. The 2/3rd section that was replaced, a 12" section had eight nails in that span joining the 2x4 to the concrete. That's roughly 1.5" between each nail. I imagine this is why my slab foundation was damaged. Next I noticed that the first corner of the chimney chase only had one vertical stud. How one can build a sound frame with only one 2x4 as the corner is mind boggling. Code depicts three studs to be used. The next issue was Chris's employees instead of creating a plumb stud they slid one end of the lower stud over to cover the gap between the old piece of sill/sole plate and the new piece. He then attempted to toe nail the out of plumb stud to the gap of the two pieces of horizontal wood. The nails went right into the crack and have no integrity holding anything up. At this point I stopped looking as I need to get a professional out here to assess the damage of the poor quality of work. I called Chris up and explained some of the issues, mainly regarding using other material than what was specified in the contract/proposal. Chris proceeds to explain to me that we discussed using different materials to help my budget out. I never signed that one nor do I remember that conversation. Now Chris denies any future repair of this project and will not make good on his wrong doing. Small claims court won't take the case because it is over two years since the work was complete. Now I am forced to hire an attorney, hire an inspector to assess the damage, hire another contractor to repair the damages, and spend ample amount of time in this case. The costs of this incident have already cost me more than originally budgeted and now I am forced to pay probably 2-4 times that cost trying to get my money back. I DO NOT RECOMMEND USING HOMEPRO SERVICES UNDER CHRIS DANDRIDGE'S MANAGEMENT FOR ANY PROJECT. UPDATE: I have listed several reviews on other websites for HomePro Services and Mr Chris Dandridge of Garland feels the need to continue to lie and claim that he is still ethically and legally correct in his poor practice. He claims that nobody will accept my case because of the "absurd" demands that I have made but in fact, the courts won't take the case because of the time frame between completion of the project and the time of claim. He claims the BBB sided with him because his work was professional and complete. Another lie as the BBB denied the claim because Mr Dandridge (the company owner) claimed that he attempted to correct the situation. Never once has Mr Dandridge extended his hand to me to correct anything. The first thing he pointed out was that my warranty period was over and that he would not correct anything. Where was the assistance there? Mr Dandridge still believes that because I paid him his final check that ALL services were performed correctly and by my standards. How can a homeowner know what is hidden behind a wall panel if it is covered? What I paid him for was the aesthetic look after the work was done assuming that a contractor has enough tools and experience in their arsenal to complete the project correctly. Incorrect. This contractor came to my house twice. Once to a**** and quote the original bid and the second was during the 2nd of the 3rd day to check on the laborers. He was in another state by the time the work was supposedly done attending a birthday. If you want a contractor that leaves his workers to work autonomously while he sits and sips on margaritas by the pool while work is performed, then by all means, hire this guy. If you want something done correctly and without having to hire other contractors to fix the mess, then DO NOT HIRE THIS SO-CALLED CONTRACTOR.