Contractor Took 5 Weeks for a 2-Week Job, and Is Now Threatening Legal Action

[Dhruv Patel]

TLDR:
We hired a contractor for a $10,000 rehab job with a 2-week timeline. It took him 5+ weeks, he was consistently rude, yelled at us, called us “cheap”, and now he’s threatening legal action over $200 even though he still hasn’t sent any receipts for the extra charges we never agreed to. We’ve already paid him $12,000, and this has turned into a total nightmare. We are in California, property is in Cleveland.

We’re out-of-state property owners and recently had a horrible experience with a local contractor we hired to rehab our rental property. Here’s a breakdown of what happened:

- We signed a contract for $10,000 with a clearly agreed-upon 2-week timeline (July 21 to August 1). The job actually took him until August 26 (3.5 weeks late).

- From the beginning, his communication was unprofessional and aggressive. He yelled at us on calls, ranted in texts, and called us “cheap” when we asked for updates.

- When his bank couldn’t figure out Zelle, we offered workarounds (e.g., Home Depot gift cards). Still, he made it seem like we were inconveniencing him.

- Despite constant delays, missed deadlines, and refusing help (like us pre-ordering materials), we still paid him $12,000 (excluding PayPal fees we had to cover because of his lack of a payment setup).

- He also let his worker sleep overnight at our property without asking.

- We had to reschedule our lead inspection 3 times and missed our Section 8 window (cannot find another appointment for at least 4 weeks now), which directly cost us weeks of rent and more stress.

- At the final walkthrough, he agreed to send receipts for his claimed overages before we’d consider any further payments.

- Instead of doing that, he’s now threatening to take us to court over $200, saying we’re “mercenary out-of-state investors” and that the court will side with his “humble workers” who will testify on his behalf.

- Still no receipts. Still demanding more money.

We’ve already told him that unless we receive and verify the receipts he promised, we won’t consider any further payments. He’s now gone full-on dramatic about taking us to small claims.

What would you do in this situation?

We’ve documented everything, texts, calls, dates, payments, and we’re honestly just trying to move on, but we’d love to hear what the community thinks.

[Matthew Irish-Jones]

Quote from @Dhruv Patel:

TLDR:
We hired a contractor for a $10,000 rehab job with a 2-week timeline. It took him 5+ weeks, he was consistently rude, yelled at us, called us “cheap”, and now he’s threatening legal action over $200 even though he still hasn’t sent any receipts for the extra charges we never agreed to. We’ve already paid him $12,000, and this has turned into a total nightmare. We are in California, property is in Cleveland.

We’re out-of-state property owners and recently had a horrible experience with a local contractor we hired to rehab our rental property. Here’s a breakdown of what happened:

- We signed a contract for $10,000 with a clearly agreed-upon 2-week timeline (July 21 to August 1). The job actually took him until August 26 (3.5 weeks late).

- From the beginning, his communication was unprofessional and aggressive. He yelled at us on calls, ranted in texts, and called us “cheap” when we asked for updates.

- When his bank couldn’t figure out Zelle, we offered workarounds (e.g., Home Depot gift cards). Still, he made it seem like we were inconveniencing him.

- Despite constant delays, missed deadlines, and refusing help (like us pre-ordering materials), we still paid him $12,000 (excluding PayPal fees we had to cover because of his lack of a payment setup).

- He also let his worker sleep overnight at our property without asking.

- We had to reschedule our lead inspection 3 times and missed our Section 8 window (cannot find another appointment for at least 4 weeks now), which directly cost us weeks of rent and more stress.

- At the final walkthrough, he agreed to send receipts for his claimed overages before we’d consider any further payments.

- Instead of doing that, he’s now threatening to take us to court over $200, saying we’re “mercenary out-of-state investors” and that the court will side with his “humble workers” who will testify on his behalf.

- Still no receipts. Still demanding more money.

We’ve already told him that unless we receive and verify the receipts he promised, we won’t consider any further payments. He’s now gone full-on dramatic about taking us to small claims.

What would you do in this situation?

We’ve documented everything, texts, calls, dates, payments, and we’re honestly just trying to move on, but we’d love to hear what the community thinks.

 If you found a contractor that quoted 10K and did the work for 10K + another 2K that you approved you are ahead of the game.  Furthermore, if he said 2 weeks and got it done in 5.5 weeks you are really doing well.

I am not being sarcastic, this is reality.  Most reputable contractors lose money on a 10K reno, the overhead is too much to make the numbers work.  Add in the amount of time a client takes from California to review every line item, haggle over cost (not saying you did this), etc... and most mid tier contractors will not take on the job you are describing.

That leaves you with lower tier to one man band contractors who are lacking in insurance, pay homies off the books, and don't have workers comp.

Everything you are describing is standard procedure for lower tier, smaller contractors that do this type of work.  Most of them are actually far worse than you are describing and some are straight up crooks. 

If I were you I would have paid a property manager, home inspector, agent, or somebody to review the work that was done.  Video evidence can be deceiving.

Pay the man the $200 and move on.  He has access to your building, you are not there, and $200 is not worth the hassle. 

Why are his receipts relevant?  You agreed to pay a price and he did the work.  If the work is done that he agreed to do, why do you need receipts?