If this five-star review is too long for you to bother reading, here's the high-level:
*Clay Reed, owner of Aaxis Construction (two "A"s--not Axis) is professional, intelligent, considerate, communicates like a boss, and does excellent work.
*Job: sidewalk replacement using city rebate.
*Would I work with him again? Absolutely.
*Would I recommend him to others: Definitely.
I worked with Aaxis Construction and owner Clay Reed (not to be confused with "Axis" Construction) about two years ago when we took advantage of a city rebate to have our front sidewalk replaced.
Utilizing the city rebate meant we needed to use a contractor from a list provided by the city. I contacted about four contractors from the list to see how they responded and came across. I either got no response or non-helpful voice mail messages which sounded like they were left in a hurry. I tried to verify one contractor's license and went down a rabbit hole of different business names and expired previous licenses which I never was able to make sense of.
Finally I was able to extract from this din a quote. It seemed low for replacing a sidewalk. It made me nervous. And this was the same contractor whose info I had trouble verifying.
And then I got this amazing email from Clay Reed. It was clearly written and conveyed a sense of Clay's professionalism and he sounded unhurried and interested in the work. I pounced. It was too good to be true.
Clay sent me his quote and it was higher than the other quote. I emailed Clay and told him about the other quote and asked him why he thought their's was so low. He responded, completely undefensively, and gave me a list of what I thought were pretty sound reasons why their quote might be low: they may not really be licensed and bonded; they may be using workers they're not paying decent wages to; etc.
Clay said he could come out and have a look at the sidewalk and meet me. I agreed. When he showed up, promptly, I thought what a nice man. He wasn't pushy, he wasn't silent, he wasn't gruff, he wasn't trying to give me a hard sell. He projected confidence and sanity. (If you've worked with contractors before, I don't need to explain about sanity.) He said it looked like a pretty clean job and that he should be able to do it in a matter of days.
I realized I needed to tell Clay upfront about... The neighbor.
One of our neighbors is intensely territorial and protective of his property and family. We'd had some unfortunate encounters with his difficulty when we'd cleared overgrown plants in our back yard and then we experienced his rage when we had DWP come out to clear vines from the electric pole behind both our properties. By the time I met Clay, I think the last thing I had said to this neighbor and his wife was that if he ever came onto our property again or raised his voice at us, I was calling the police.
I gave a rundown of this to Clay. Clay was unfazed. Other contractors have just said, "well, let's hope we don't do anything to make him mad." Or, "oh, nothing we're doing here will affect him." Neither of which is very reassuring, since the neighbor has always made it his business to at some point bully contractors at the house.
Here is what Clay's response was: "No problem. I know how that can be. Here's what I'll do: I'll write a letter explaining exactly what we're doing, when we're doing it, and how long it will take, and I'll put all my info and say please feel free to contact me with questions or concerns--and then I'll slip it under the door or put it in the mailbox of ALL your neighbors."
And that's what he did. And of course that neighbor called him immediately and Clay said they had a 15-minute conversation. 15 minutes!! That's what the neighbor is like.
Obviously I hired Clay.
Clay put absolutely everything he would do and how long it would take in writing, which was extremely helpful, and everything that happened after that matched up with what he said, including the required city inspections.
He didn't leave a mess. He left everything as he found it. He took any leftover materials with him. And he was incredibly careful with my plants. Which I'm pretty touchy about.
I only wish some of the people I work with at my job were this good at communicating clearly.
We had our garage converted to a living space (called an ADU -- accessory dwelling unit) last year. Pretty much the whole time--even though the contractor we went with was a nice guy and did a good job--I wished Clay was doing it.
That's Clay's one and only flaw as a contractor, in my opinion: he doesn't do residential.
Please hire Clay if you have the opportunity to and please do not get his business name, Aaxis Construction, mixed up with the other business called Axis Construction.
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