If this is from your home inspection, run like hell, if this is your house and those plumbers where just there get an attorney the fix is on them and will be expensive, if this is a flip then it seems about right.
This is why "licensed and bonded" is important. Not only for them to claim that, but for you to go online and google theirs.
Otherwise, you're basically just capable of suing them, unless they are actively breaking the law, you could be shit out of luck for hiring them. But hopefully your insurance would cover it...
Bonded means they have put up money to cover this sort of event. (usually its insurance they've pre-paid afaik)
The bond is almost always a pretty comically low amount of money. The bond in CA is $25k. And that just got raised in 2023. And if you know anything about the cost of construction here 25k isn't fixing much.
That's the minimum required by law. If they're asking for more than that much money to do the work, you can reasonably ask them to increase the bond to cover it. You can also require them to have liability insurance.
I wouldn't hire a contractor on a 120k job if his bond is 25k unless he has some serious stake in the area with their reputation. Sometimes they can post a higher bond to win a contract that demands a higher bond.
Who you gonna sue? Doubt this crew even has an llc let alone a phone number listed anywhere. Suing only works if you can actually find the other party and show they actually caused the damages.
Did you speak directly with their bond’s surety company? The contractor’s desire to stay in business doesn’t matter if he had an active bond while working in your project. Surety company pays and collecting from the contractor is their problem.
It's been a number of years and my spouse did part of the work so it's hazy.
If I remember correctly, it was a good company that went bad. When they did the work for us is when they were on their downhill slide.
We had problems with their work not being done to code and called and they were out of business. Someone had bought the contracts and employees, but the old company was bankrupted.
Contacted the state, etc., but all that was available to us was $600.
Like I said, it's been a number of years and I didn't handle all of it, but we brought in attorneys as well. We didn't pursue it in court though.
Yall act like people who do work like this also do paperwork and follow the law… This was done by Joe bobs cousins buddy from the trailer park who just needed a little help last month after his meth dealer beat his teeth out for not paying. Ain’t no paperwork, bonds, licenses, contractors, surety, nada involved here. It’s just illegal work all around.
We're talking about people that ARE licensed and bonded.
Even if they're lying, there's a thing called due diligence. If you're spending thousands of dollars, you can take five minutes online to verify the license, and can ask for documentation of the bond before paying, and before work starts.
This was done by Joe bobs cousins buddy from the trailer park who just needed a little help last month after his meth dealer beat his teeth out for not paying.
I have seen plenty of dodgy work done by fully licensed and reputable companies it just takes one shitty employee or a change in ownership etc. etc.
If they're legally bonded then the money was in escrow and any damage would have been already paid for at the regulator. Are you saying you never got your money back for damage they did?
I think you're not understanding all the facts and it's not worth delving into it here. As I said, we brought in the state, attorneys, etc. All that was available to us was $600.
Also, the money does not stay in escrow indefinitely. If you find the damage 6 months after the fact, and the company is already out of business, you're not getting shit (or in our case, $600).
100% chance the crew that did this is neither licensed nor bonded, nor did they file for permits and therefore no record is available of who and when it was done besides maybe the homeowners memory if they’re still around.
Contractors and trades vendors are required by law, in every state I've done business (about a dozen), to provide their business license, proof of insurance, ID, and sometimes more to any customer requesting it.
It does no good, though, if the potential customer doesn't go look up the info to confirm its valid and in good standing.
That was the point. Check the information they give you before you sign anything. I know people who gave out made-up information and one contractor even gave another company's license information. There are tons of scam contractors out there.
That is true if you knowingly hire an unlicensed contractor. afaik.
If you legitimately thought you were hiring a licensed contractor, your insurance is usually going to pay out or at least should.
But your due diligence is going to go a long way, hence this entire warning. If you don't even check, your insurance may fight you and you are SOL, for sure.
I'm guessing they're not licensed or insured so even if you find them you'll never get any money out of them because all of their money goes to meth or fentanyl
I made a mistake once, hired an unknown company to sand/repaint my deck. Two days work he said. First he shows up, brings the tools and then disappears. Some other dude shows up 3-4 hrs later, sands half of it then disappears around 2PM. I called the guy the 2nd day at 10AM after no one shows up at 8AM. He has no clue why and sends someone else. This dude shows up but says he’ll just finish sanding. He vanishes after done and on the third day the first guy shows up and does the worst paint job ever. And once I gave him the check he asks if I can leave a positive review on Angies or something. Like wtf bro. The audacity….
Bold of you to assume he even has Facebook. Dude probably needed a favor from a friend after his meth dealer beat his few remaining teeth out last month so through some long chain of cousins brothers sisters cousins friends uncles they showed up and did the work then hitchhiked back to the trailer park to load up on meth for the night and raged until the money was gone.
Ask the contractor for the bonded license number or name that will appear on their estimate or contract. If they're not legit they will run away from your knowledge.
If they give you something, call or email the DPOR and provide the info and you'll get what you need. Just Google dpor Virginia.
I mean, I'm a plumber, and the actual plumbing work here is acceptable - I'd rate it 'not bad".
But for some godforsaken reason, they put in that 4x2 combo at a really dumb spot. How they decided smashing the cinder block was the way to go? That one I can't figure.
I can see its a stem wall made of poured concrete. You can even see the imprint of the wood concrete form, imprinted onto that front side of the stem wall.
Or perhaps the foundation was already busted, and the plumbing work happened after. Breaking through foundation wouldn't be easy, unlike adding a simple few more sections of pipe. Why would a plumber work twice as hard to do a worse job? Why should we trust the title of the post?
Giving me flashbacks to my old landlord's handyman. Call him over for a simple job and he'd sit outside chainsmoking in his truck for 4 hours before he came inside and then for 2 hours after the half-assed job was done. He was paid by the hour.
Ah cool, you know Greg too. Two weekends ago we were drinking and tried to install a small doggy door. Completely destroyed the foundation on that house. Good times
A LOT of 'lowest bidder' companies here are just dissolved after the job is done and they get paid. Anything goes wrong? You're suing a company that no longer exists. You can attempt to sue the person but you'll just waste time and money 99% of the time.
No idea about wherever this person is. But I'd imagine something this dumb would involve a similar practice.
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u/mjh2901 5d ago
If this is from your home inspection, run like hell, if this is your house and those plumbers where just there get an attorney the fix is on them and will be expensive, if this is a flip then it seems about right.