Among all those 5-star reviews, I feel like I have the obligations to give a fair review and share my traumatic experience dealing with the owner, Eric Kuo.
It's going to be a long review so fair warning.
The owner Eric is a slick talker, posed as a license contractor, later was proved the license he provided was his mom's, told me he was under his mom's supervision but I NEVER once saw his mom on site. His assurance of a profession team would avoid all the hassle of remodeling made me decide to use his service. Unfortunately, I was totally wrong! I did NOT see a professional TEAM - there was only one worker working in my bath, there wasn't an onsite manager nor the so-called contractor was around at all. Most of the time, I had to figure out how to install certain parts with the worker, i.e. the shower unit and the faucet sets for tubs cuz I had to read the manual for him!
Beware! The strategy he used was to ask you pay 35% deposit upon signing, another 35% on 1st day of the job, and he collected the rest on due day. (It's against the law! A deposit cannot be exceeded 10% especially his quote was labor only, nothing else was included) If you were someone like me, noticed something is wrong on the 4th day, you aint gonna get your 70% money back, and the owner only would refund you a barely 15%. Solutions? You can only beg them to fix the errors and compromised and compromised yourself for the overpaying job.
Posed as a licensed contractor with a professional team, he charged a lot on his work, for my tiny little master bath it was $9000 labor only with sending only ONE worker. I had to pay for tiles, tub, mirror, glass door and even the switch! (Which came out my tiny master bath cost a good 15K) I don't mind paying more cuz I want a professional team to give me a peace of mind. But with the money I spent? It was a joke!
As mentioned, he doesn't have a license which explains why his lack of construction knowledge during the remodeling, instead of making things right, his tactics is always being a slick talker to convince you this and that is done right. His eloquence with tons of unbelievably ridiculous excuses happened a lot during my remodel. Whenever a discrepancy occurs, especially something he promised to do but to be undone, again he would try to talk it over to convince you to accept what it is.
Here are all the eloquence/BS during the remodel.
1. Found the tiles was applied with "spot-bonding" which the cement wasn't covered all over the tiles
== Said it has to be done this way cuz if the cement was filled all over the tiles, it's easier to CRACK with thermal expansion and contraction. I couldn't believe what my ears had heard! Immediately I asked him if his theory is right, how about floor tile application? He said the floor tiles have to be filled all the way but the wall tiles DON'T NEED TO.
2. Found 1/3 of the tiles by the tub was laid on drywalls, not cement board.
3. Promised he will move the undersink valves for me so they will look accordingly, but later said moving valves will leak n cost more, so he used copper pipe to make the turn.
4. The worker broke through the wall behind the shower wile working on it
== He said it's just because the wall is old after all. I did not hear an apology or trying to make things better.
5. Hot and cold water valves are reversed on the tub, differ from sink faucets (hot on the left, cold on the right)
== He said it doesn't make any differences but if I wanted to reverse it back he can do it. But again it makes no difference. "If you really wanna change it I can change", but again nothing was done.
6. While all the renovation waste were still in my drive way, he requested the final installment. I refused and told him he should make things right first then he YELLED at my husband over the phone.
7. Shower drain panel was stuck by excess grout, which cannot be removed. This was found before the last installment, Eric still insisted it has no problem and asked me "why are you trying to take it out?" Told me it was part of "warranty issues" he will send someone to fix it "in the future" but the payment cannot be delayed since it's the Completion of job. (Which I had to compromise to pay first, otherwise his worker wouldn't leave my house and waited two weeks for him to send someone to "fix" it)
8. Grout on shower was cracking everywhere and has lots of holes. When using my nails to push the grout, it cracked. ( Bad grout job, I have to find someone to re-grout the whole shower)
== Eric says narrow grout lines are more fragile than thick ones, so I am not supposed to push the grout like this. But the floor has thicker grout so they won't crack?? What a joke!
Picture speaks louder than words. Please look at them carefully and avoid this company, run away from it as fast as possible! read more