I saw 1 good review on Mr. Ramirez on yelp so I thought I would give him a try. I had not had a…read moregardener for about 3 years - each gardener I had fired since I just did not think they did a good job. I maintained the garden myself, but lately my kids have had more weekend activities so I wanted to free up more of my weekends for them.
In the past, the gardeners I had typically charged me 80 to 100 dollars a month to maintain by front, back, and side yards on a weekly basis. There was the typical trimming shrubs, trimming my small patch of grass (about 6x4 feet), removing trimmings, and once in a while, trimming trees, including the neighbors' trees which would grow too much towards my property. This was all part of the monthly fee.
When I met Antonio, he made it very clear that he would charge me 100 a month, but only to trim bushes, remove weeds, blower the trimmings, and trim the grass. If I ever needed my trees trimmed or my neighbors' branches trimmed, he would charge me extra. I also asked him if he would not mind spraying some water around my front porch just to get rid of the dirt and dust that build up. He said that would be extra too. I agreed to this.
Before Antonio's 3rd week, I trimmed my trees, including my cypress trees since I had some free time. I cleaned up all the branches myself, and only left the cypress tree leaves for Antonio to clean up. I did not at all think there was anything wrong with this, since we did agree that he would blower any leaves in my backyard and the leaves I left would at most give him an extra 5 minutes of work - as though we had a windy day and more leaves had fallen out.
The day Antonio came, he sent me a text "I now know why no one wants to work for you. Today is my last day, please send me my 75 dollars." I immediately called him to ask "what happened?" He said: "I don't want to work for you. You think guys like me are stupid. You think you can make a mess in your backyard and expect me to clean it all up without extra pay." So I told him I was very surprised he would react this way, stating if my cypress tree trimmings were not on the ground, he would probably have nothing to do for that particular week. Further, I said if he felt there was too much work, he can just let me know and I can pay him extra for that day. He then replied "no, I already know the kind of person you are. I have 35 years of experience and you are the type of person who takes advantage of other people. I don't want to work for someone like you. You expect guys like me to just clean up whatever mess you make with no extra pay." His tone was so condescending.
Anyway. The quality of Antonio's work, is by all means, average. He is not more detailed compared to other gardeners that have worked on my home. His way of dealing with his perceived unfairness was to quit through text. And when I called him to get a clarification, he was severely insulting with regards to my character as a person.
I had actually already referred Antonio to some of my neighbors for their gardening needs as I wanted to help him make some extra income while he was in my neighborhood. Why not help him out since he will be driving to my area anyway? A couple of my neighbors need their trees to be removed, so this could have potentially brought thousands of dollars of income for Antonio.
It is not hard to find another person who can work to the same capacity and ability as what Antonio showed me during his 3 short weeks. Just like all the other gardeners I fired, he lacks attention to detail. I know because each time he left my home, I would still clean up some of the leaves he missed. However, every gardener I had worked with was a lot less calculating, a lot more courteous and a certainly more pleasant. What an absolutely rude person.