What's up with Malek?

Maybe he has all the work he can handle right now, or maybe thought you'd be a pain-in-the-ass client. His perogative. Just remember that the second possibility when dealing with the next contractor you like. (He once told me the job would cost more if he was forced to deal with a certain person in our coop - can't say I blame him - it was an accurate prediction of the time and pain generally involved in dealing with said person.)

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 12:51 AM

Contractors who don't show for the appointment, who show very late, or who never submit their bid, comes with the territory. Move on (or would you rather be dealing with this problem after you put down a deposit?).

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 8:44 AM

Try Zoltan Olti at AYC Group. He did a lot of work on my landmark brownstone over the past 9 months. He and his workers were extremely professional and the work was high quality. http://allyourconstruction.com/aboutus.aspx

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 12:24 PM

"Maybe he has all the work he can handle right now, or maybe thought you'd be a pain-in-the-ass client. His perogative."

Then the appropriate thing to do is to say so promptly so the OP can find someone else. Professionals don't say they'll get back to you with a bid and then dodge your calls.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 12:30 PM

Funny, when contractors don't call me back to give me a bid, I assume they aren't interested in the job - it is a pretty clear message they are giving.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 1:11 PM

I had the same experience with Malek. He came to look at my job, gave me an estimate which I accepted, and said he would come the following week (it was a b'stone repair). This was in September 2007. In November I gave up on him after several follow up phone calls and called Metro Restoration in March to do the repair. They came within a month, did the work in one day, and I was very happy with the result. 1:11 goes radio silent, they aren't interested in the job...which is a dumb way to do things, but then again, many contractors (not all) come from the same defective gene pool.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 1:38 PM

Sorry, 1:38 here, I inadvertently left out a few words: "1:11, I agree, if a contractor goes radio silent, they aren't interested...."

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 1:49 PM

While it is annoying when contractors don't follow through to actually start the job, of all the potential problems one can have with them, that's one I can live with. (I did chase one other contractor for months to get him to start a job, but I did it because I'd seen his work and knew it would be good, which is was, great actually, just slow to start, him being so in demand, and it was a smaller job for his company.)

I've hired A. Malek a few times, and the work was done very well. That's mainly what I care about. Still, since he's in demand, he may have more than he can handle well, and that must be frustrating. But less frustrating than having work started by a lousy contractor - I have (knock on wood) successfully avoided that situation so far.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 1:59 PM

Agreed, 1:59, but a phone call doesn't take more than two minutes...all it takes is a "thanks for your interest, but I can't do the job now or until whenever," instead of stringing people along and driving them nuts.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 2:09 PM

yeah, I agree with you totally, but they often don't seem to do that..just saying that, while annoying, it's one of the lesser sins of contractors.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 2:16 PM

and that stringing you along thing, I know, I know...I started to feel like a high schooler trying to get a date when I was trying to get the other contractor to start the job - so many calls unreturned...

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 2:18 PM

i have to say that contractors who don't show for the appointment, who show very late, or who never submit their bid, are basically showing how extremely unprofessional they are. there really is no excuse for this kind of treatment. the problem is that good work is sometimes hard to find and if they know it then they abuse it. in an ideal world these people would get left in the dust, treated the same way that they treat potential clients.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 5:38 PM

I used to use Malek regularly. Until he accepted a job several years ago, showed up and started it, then suddenly quit showing up to complete it. I called and called, to no avail; the secretary told me he would call back, yessed me to death every time, but he never did. The job was relatively small, involving patching the masonry on my stoop, so perhaps he had bigger jobs for his crew and just decided it wasn't worth the aggravation. But bear in mind I was a longtime client, with a good payment history, and not a pain in the ass - I just wanted to get the job finished. Since the remaining work was minor, after no response when I called every couple of days for six weeks, I finally just finished the job myself - and haven't heard from him on the subject to this day. The weirdest part of it was that I never even gave him a down payment, and he never sent me a bill. Not that I'm complaining about that part, but it seems like a pretty bizarre way to run a business, and I won't call him again.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 5:52 PM

I know this is a contractor bashing conversation; however homeowners play the same silly games and go silent more often then contractors considering they often get multiple bids per project. How often do contractors provide estimates but not get a coutesy call back to say someone else was hired or a returned call when they follow up to see if a customer received the 3 page estimate, if they were hired, etc.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 7:00 PM

Well, if the homeowner is a amall coop, someone takes initiative and gets a nice bid from a contractor they like, they take it to the coop board when they coop board finally meets, the others say - get some more bids, or change this and that in the work and get another bid, so the responsible person who is doing all the work (thankless job) because they want to see what needs to get done get done goes and does that. Then at the next meeting, the others (who have done nothing) say (1) make some more changes and redo the bids, (2) call some more of the contractor's references, (3) I heard blah, blah about this, (4) let's not do this now, (5) let's get bids on some other project I want to do instead of this one... oh, it's fun. Get back to the contractor? With what? They'd rather not hear from you until you've actually made a decision, any decision. Which, if something isn't an emergency, can take years.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 7:40 PM

For many contractors, it's their major flaw. I sat down on a stoop one day and heard. a few discuss how to take indoor jobs in the summer with no intention of starting them till the deck and outdoor season was over. They traded stories of the bullshit lines they used. Not all trades people are business savvy.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 8:17 PM

Actually, that strategy sounds quite busness savvy.

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 8:52 PM

Neil Curry- Curry & Co. He is working on our house right now and is doing an amazing job.
http://www.ncurry.com/

Posted by: guest at July 8, 2008 9:13 PM

poster at 7:00pm makes lots of sense. Contractors can play games, homeowners can play games.
When you're following a rant remember there's always two sides.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 8:51 PM

I'm an architect in nyc and was working on a historic renovation in Connecticut. After some research I came across Cathedral Stone products- historic mortar and re-construction materials that are excellent for repairing old buildings.

When it came time to do brick re-pointing at my own home I contacted Cathedral Stone because I wanted to use their products. They also reccommended a handful of contractors trained to use their products; they reccommended Tri Boro Waterproofing, out of Queens. They do very little work in Brooklyn and concentrate on restoring landmark buildings in Manhattan. Before hiring them I looked at a row of brownstones they had restored in the upper west side near Amesterdam ave. Impressive.

We've had a working relationship now for about 3 years; they may be a little higher end but really reliable, direct, honest and very pleasant to work with. Professionals on every front.

Posted by: guest at July 15, 2008 4:49 AM