In short, while I am satisfied with the final product, Jim made what I had expected to be a simple kitchen island installation more painful than I could ever have possibly imagined in what ultimately became a 6+ month saga.
We were referred to Jim through family and friends who had used him and had been impressed with his quality work (literally given him I am sure, tens of thousands of dollars for various custom work), though they warned that we would need to keep on top of him. We said OK but had not idea what we were in for.
Ultimately it was over 6 months of missed deadlines, chasing via phone and leaving voicemails and emails, and unacceptable work product before our project was complete. We put down a 1/3 deposit in May, was told project would take 8-9 weeks, after 8 weeks we hadn't heard anything so we called and after repeated attempts reached Jim at week 9 and was told it would be another 3-4 weeks (he had another large project going on that was delayed but neglected to tell us this until we chased him once the original deadline had come and gone without a peep, and he never ordered the counter top and then when he finally did it was supposedly backordered which pushed timing out further). After much further chasing, including a conversation that this project NEEDED to completed before my wife gave birth (due date late October--5 months from when we signed up, should never have been an issue for a kitchen island) and that I understood delays happen but I needed him to communicate with him so I wasn't in the dark, it wasn't until October 13 that the island was delivered and sadly it was wrong--the color wasn't even close (he admitted as much), and some of the drawers/panels didn't match the rest of the kitchen (see photos, this was the whole reason to pay for custom cabinetry in the first place). After another attempt and miss on the color, the island and counter were finally installed but we were still waiting on panels and a drawer front and fix to a gap in the backsplash.
My wife gave birth soon after and we were busy with new parent stuff but after another 6 weeks when we hadn't heard anything about completion we reached out Jim via email (no response) and then again (no response) before he suddenly emailed my wife to ask if he could come by that day to finish. He ultimately finished the installation on Nov 30, a full 6 1/2 months after we signed the contract and gave him a deposit.
Despite all the time wasted chasing Jim, my wife putting off work (she works from home) to be available for him, canceling and rescheduling our electrician (hired to run power to the island) when the project was finally complete we gave Jim a check for the full amount and moved on--we didn't ask for a discount, and he absolutely did not offer one for our troubles or do anything to acknowledge / compensate us for the trouble.
I hate leaving bad reviews, and Jim seems like a nice guy (he apologized at points through the process and I think was embarrassed about how poorly everything went), and despite the repeated mistakes I am happy to say that the final product looks good, but I really don't think this is how a professional should handle his clients and so I would struggle to ever recommend him. read more