Home extension and interior reno
We hired Wellcore to complete a ground floor extension and interior renovations on a new-to-us house. We did not have a positive experience and I would not recommend them. Their engineer completed drawings for us that we used for permits. She did not measure our house properly and even reversed two of the rooms. This incorrect measurement led to our kitchen being extended into the garage and a corner in the wall on the roof that should be straight. This corner traps water and snow which has led to the shingles coming off in this spot. Something we will have to fix. Overall, their structural work seems alright but that is not something we would know unless the house falls apart. The majority of our issues we had were with their finishing details. We have made repairs to many of the issues we found but some, we just cannot fix without significant cost. I’ve included a few specific examples but there are more. My first example is with the exterior. We chose stucco for the exterior extension and have noticed that where the stucco meets the roof, bare wood from the roof is exposed. This didn’t get fixed by Wellcore. Another example is in the main floor of our house where we have an open concept kitchen/eating area. The flooring here is ceramic tile. They put in tile with very narrow spaces in between which they filled with grout – except under all of the kitchen counters. Not sure why this area was skipped. No tile there is grouted and the spaces are just empty. The grout they did install on the floor came out. We insisted this get fixed as it is very unsightly. They had a guy scrape it out. In doing so, he chipped several tiles from the tool he used and left a lot of scrape marke. They regrouted but the issue of the grout coming out happened again. So now we have missing grout and several very damaged tiles. The project manager would not fix this. Another example is that they forgot to cut out the old roof where the extension exists which led to no attic insulation being put in for the new area. When we brought this issue up – as we opened a light and saw no insulation, noticed this area freezing in winter, and we had massive icicles along our eavestrough, we were met with strong arguments and basically told we didn’t know what we were talking about. It took a while and lots of arguing with the project manager but Wellcore eventually fixed this. In fixing it, we noticed that they covered the soffits and the ballasts for attic air circulation. We have been told that this will be an issue in the future but Wellcore won’t fix it. They did not connect a bathroom fan to the pipe that connects it to the roof vent. This caused severe moisture to build up in the attic which we noticed with water leaking from interior light fixtures. Wellcore fixed it but it’s these things that cause us to be concerned with their overall work. They did not do our exterior landscaping as their cost was ridiculous for grading and grass. We cleaned up ourselves and found a lot of rubbish dumped in the yard. Saw blades, lots of screws, plastic cigarette butts, bricks – we find more each spring. We have two small kids so this – especially the sharp things- was pretty upsetting to deal with seeing how we paid for their “clean-up”. The project manager made a small adjustment in the cost for this so at least they acknowledged their short fall. They also kept driving heavy trucks over our front lawn. We are on septic and our weeping tiles extend out the front. We told the project manager several times to let his workers know but the driving continued. Finally we had to put up a large sign which the workers followed when we were on site. Our list of issues continues but they aren’t minor things. They forgot to install a floor vent in the kitchen, the bench in our ensuite shower, the overhead showerhead. They eventually fixed these things after they were pointed out but it’s not my job to point these things out. That is what the project manager was paid to do. They also put in a large window we had told them prior to the construction that we no longer wanted. They could not fix this. We feel as though the negligence of the project manager is responsible for many of these things. On that topic, the project manager was very difficult to deal with. When we were on site with him, we noticed most of the time he was on his cell phone and not paying attention to us and our discussions. I think this is where many project issues stemmed from. He did not pay attention to the job site or customer conversations. There was a lot of dialogue back and forth with him where he was unprofessional but it is hearsay so I won’t include it. Wellcore’s costs didn’t seem too bad when our project started. In hindsight we should have done many of the tasks ourselves as – in making repairs to their work and starting other projects, we have found better and much more economical workers. I also found their billing was off. We went through the detailed bill and found we were charged for several things that we didn’t receive. Once these were pointed out, the billing was adjusted accordingly. Overall, we would not recommend Wellcore to anyone. Their work is mediocre, their project manager is unprofessional and unengaged, and they are overpriced for the end result. Our relationship with them ended a little while ago now, but as issues from their work keep coming up.
- Approximate cost of services:
- $200,000.00
- Company Response
We are very sad that we could not meet your expectations in full. We take criticism seriously even though we received this review multiple years after the project has been accomplished. We would definitely try to work things out to avoid this situation in future. We want to thank you for your review as it helps us to grow and improve. Unfortunately when budgets are restrained not everything can be accomplished as expected and compromises have to be made. A lot of work goes into planning an addition and unlike a new custom home certain changes must be made along the way upon seeing the house down to its bare bones. It is even harder when we try to keep most of the existing house in tack and merge new utilities with existing ones . Our team , as knowledgeable as they are, may not be able to predict everything at the stages of drawings and planning and decisions must be made on sight along the way In your case we also had to deal with contractors that are not part of our team and not hired by us which creates extra pressure on communication and financial aspects of the project . As mentioned we came back multiple times trying to rectify the situation and complete the project to your full satisfaction and on the time of move in we have not received complaints of any large scale discrepancies. As usual once clients receive a newly built project there are always small minor touch ups which we were rectifying in the normal way of doing business while at the same time trying to resolve ongoing contract payments disputes. Unfortunately to our regret at some point our negotiations failed which resulted in unpleasant outcomes of this project. To this day we believe that our work has been accomplished right and we handed in a finished, ready to live house. But unfortunately we could not clean minor issues which always arise at the end of the project. Again we are sad that's we could not meet your expectations, despite the fact that project was completed in full, structurally sounded, with a lot of changes and additional works which still lead to on time move in date
