Feeling Sick
This morning I got a phone call from our contractor. He wanted to "stop over our house and pick up the money we owe him". Huh? The work isn't finished yet. I had asked Rob to call and deal with this, but he was away last week and had not yet gotten around to calling.
We only owe him $1400, which is unfortunately a very small percentage of what the project from hell has cost us. So it isn't like he paid for a bunch of materials and needs to pay those bills. This $1400 is purely money in his pocket.
Anyway, Rob was still home and I put him on the phone to deal with the contractor.
Now here is the sickening part. He tells Rob that when he was at our house last week he noticed that the porch is pulling away from the house. And that it is all *my* fault. I said I would do all the painting and seal the flooring. Well, I did the painting, but just never got around to doing the sealing.
He said that is the cause of the porch failing. His reasoning is that as it got colder the floor boards expanded from the moisture. Huh?
1) The porch was built during the height of the humid summer. Therefore I would imagine the boards have contracted, not expanded as the humidity has decreased and the weather turned colder.
2) I would think that the strongest place of the porch would be where the decking is attached to the house. If the boards had expanded so rapidly during this moisture ridden cold weather wouldn't they buckle themselves before pulling the huge support beam off the house?
3) There are no gaps in the flooring to indicate any sort shrinkage or expansion.
4) It is a covered porch so there is no direct contact with water, his theory is based purely on the humidity levels in the air.
I feel physically ill over this whole thing. In my hormonal pregnant state I can't stop crying and of course I am having more contractions from the stress.
And I am SO going outside and tearing the sign down now.
We only owe him $1400, which is unfortunately a very small percentage of what the project from hell has cost us. So it isn't like he paid for a bunch of materials and needs to pay those bills. This $1400 is purely money in his pocket.
Anyway, Rob was still home and I put him on the phone to deal with the contractor.
Now here is the sickening part. He tells Rob that when he was at our house last week he noticed that the porch is pulling away from the house. And that it is all *my* fault. I said I would do all the painting and seal the flooring. Well, I did the painting, but just never got around to doing the sealing.
He said that is the cause of the porch failing. His reasoning is that as it got colder the floor boards expanded from the moisture. Huh?
1) The porch was built during the height of the humid summer. Therefore I would imagine the boards have contracted, not expanded as the humidity has decreased and the weather turned colder.
2) I would think that the strongest place of the porch would be where the decking is attached to the house. If the boards had expanded so rapidly during this moisture ridden cold weather wouldn't they buckle themselves before pulling the huge support beam off the house?
3) There are no gaps in the flooring to indicate any sort shrinkage or expansion.
4) It is a covered porch so there is no direct contact with water, his theory is based purely on the humidity levels in the air.
I feel physically ill over this whole thing. In my hormonal pregnant state I can't stop crying and of course I am having more contractions from the stress.
And I am SO going outside and tearing the sign down now.
2 Comments:
My husband is a contractor and hopefully in your contract with this guy you have a one year warranty. That is a standard practice with remodel jobs. There is no way that not sealing the floor caused your support beam to pull away, that just means it was not conected correctly. What would have happened is the floor would have buckled under itself. P.S, If you havent yet pay him nothing until it is completed to your satisfaction.
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