We hired Stoudt Cabinetry to complete built-ins and cabinets throughout our home in September 2024…read more The promised completion date was November 1, 2024. Stoudt had only done a small percentage of the work by November 1 and, having received $70,000 from us as a deposit, demanded $20,000 more in order to proceed. We compromised at $12,000, bringing the total amount we'd paid to $82,000, and also took several projects off of his plate in an effort to make the job more accessible to him as he was so far behind.
After that payment, we did not see him for 5 weeks. We had a meeting with him and a "mediator" which turned out to be his family member and this resulted in 2 more weeks of work at our home that ended on December 21st, 2024. There were quality control and installation issues that we brought to his attention, but he refused to address or even come see (his employees did the actual work). At this point, he had not completed a single room - everything was just parts and pieces. He again demanded more money, but given that we'd already paid him $82,000, we were not comfortable paying any more until the work was complete and correct. We asked him to please complete the job so we could pay him and he took our installer off of our job and insisted we use his other installer, who we had asked him not to send because he was unprofessional, did not install properly, and used profanity in front of our kids - with Jim present. Jim said if we were unwilling to use this installer, we were "at a crossroads."
We communicated extensively when we hired someone else to complete the work. Our new cabinet person wanted to use the parts Stoudt had and Stoudt refused to give them to us without an additional payment of $20,000. At this point, we'd paid him $82,000 for about $40,000 worth of work and we told him that giving us the parts would bring him a lot closer to having earned what we'd paid him, but he still refused. We gave him multiple chances to give us the parts, even letting him know when our new contractor was ordering parts, at which point anything Stoudt had would no longer be of use to us.
In January 2024 we received a letter from Stoudt's attorney demanding that we pay the remaining $33,000 on our invoice, which would have been due at the time that the project was completed. He had done no additional work. We were forced to hire an attorney to attempt to get a refund for the amounts paid for work that was not completed.
I share our story as a warning. He continuously refused to work without more money and we felt trapped because we'd already paid so much and so little was done. There is no quality control - our game room doesn't match the drawings provided by our designer and isn't lined up properly (see picture), and Stoudt not only wouldn't fix it, he tried to tell us that this is expected and we should accept it. In two of the rooms that he installed, the stain color is not what we agreed on (see picture). Stoudt verbally agreed to have it refinished to fix it, but never made arrangements. We later learned from our new cabinet company that refinishing would not yield the correct result as the veneer is too thin and the stain Stoudt used is too dark, so the only way we can get the color we paid for is to replace it. In one room, the holes for electrical and plumbing were cut too large and the electrician was unable to bring the outlet forward and flush to the back of the cabinet (see picture). The uppers have excessive holes covered in putty that's not smooth or blended and screws at an angle in the corners (see picture); in order to fix this, we're going to have to lose 1/4" of depth and put in a false back.
We would not recommend Stoudt Cabinetry to anyone and highly recommend looking elsewhere. It would have been better for us had we never hired him. This was an expensive mistake and I share this so that others can be spared the same.
