I had originally written Elmer Zacarias a really good review. Why, because he did get me out of a scheduling jamb when a previous contractor backed out unexpectedly. We just installed a new pool and wanted a finished patio. Also, the price was right but caveat emptor as I explain our experience. He was very responsive in the beginning and throughout the project. For our project he built four retaining walls and a pool patio. The patio could have come out better but at the time we just wanted to use our pool and accepted the inconsistencies with the paver cuts. I am not sure the quality would have been better if I paid more. Within 2-3 days of completion of the patio we noticed the polymeric sand lifting on the patio. It did not bond as it should have. We called Elmer back and he saw the flaws on the patio and also a few on the block retaining wall he built. Said he would return. He did about a month later only to replace the loose sand with new sand in a different color unfortunately. He did repair the wall albeit with some minor bruises here and there-not perfect. He returned again and put down the correct color polymeric sand. Then it rained again about a week later and the repaired areas, as well as other areas, had failed again. The patio was a mess and had sand in the bottom of the pool. The sand was lifting apparently from lack of proper watering. Although this was not the actual case. After having a polymeric sand rep come inspect the work, he concluded the patio was never machine compacted. A crucial step in doing these patios. He clearly rushed the job in the end and/or never planned on compacting the sand to save some money and to get the job. We both agreed to reschedule a time to have full repairs done in the spring the following year as winter conditions were approaching. The next year we struggled to nail down a date. Half the summer went by and we didn't want repairs in the middle of the summer so we waited till the fall before closing the pool to have him return. He did return in the fall only to do the same process over again without compacting the sand. Once again the sand failed and over the winter time the sand lifted. Not sure why he continued to miss this crucial step. We painstakingly tried to schedule an early spring install date and after giving us a very late spring date he never showed up and has now ignored all my calls, emails, and messages. He disappeared and clearly not coming back to finish the job he was paid to complete. Two months later and we are now going into litigation. If you want to avoid yourself this hassle then I would look elsewhere for your your masonry needs. Perhaps this job was too large for him and he can handle smaller jobs but to ignore a very important installation step for a paver patio most likely to have a larger profit, I wouldn't recommend this company. Good luck to you Elmer. Thought you were a stand up guy but see you in court. Didn't have to go this way if you stood by your work. read more