I wrote a detailed 2-page review of my (horrendous, to put it mildly) experience with Bob Gibbins / Sunset Company then decided to spare the public lashing and give a higher level review, but please feel free to PM me if you want to talk details, there are plenty.
For context, I had a $100k budget for a kitchen/LR reno plus a large back porch cover. High level I wonder if Bob has done this before. We had a fixed-price/fixed-scope agreement but on day 1 (literally) Bob eluded to potentially wanting more money (red flag #1). Over the 3 weeks I worked with Bob, before firing him, he wanted to change the price on 2 items and wanted to reduce scope. Last i knew, fixed meant fixed. He also later said his "contingency" wasn't part of our fixed price. Interesting logic. Fixed means fixed unless I change what i want the contractor to do. Regarding the kitchen/LR, when we made the agreement I asked if he wanted to talk details before he agreed on a price and he said "no, I've done this for 30 years and know what it'll take" (a mantra he reiterated many times over the first week or 2), but when the time came to do the work, many details weren't included in his mind (obvious things like kitchen backsplash). Regarding money, he wanted a $10k draw per week, and when i asked what it was for each week, besides going into a name-calling tirade, the items he told me he doubled the cost for, so he was either adding 100% to the cost for his own profit or he wasn't being honest (i know these costs with 100% certainty, because his main sub quit him and continued to work for me, another example is for the dumpster charge, which i paid for myself after Bob left). Another thing Bob touted was how clean he keeps the work site. I asked him to clean my back porch/yard 4-5 times, and only after my wife stepped on a nail that went through her shoe and into her foot, did I get my family out back to clean the yard ourselves. Bob was in our yard watching his workers when we were cleaning the yard - some nerve, eh? Hard to believe i know, unfortunately it's true. To Bob's credit though, he does have good subs - i know because they continue to work for me to this day. Another point of serious frustration was i hired Bob to offload the details & scheduling all the tasks in an efficient manner, but i was having to do that myself anyway, so Bob added zero value on that front. I had to tell Bob he'd need the roofer in a couple days, then to get demo labor & drywall folks in a couple days, I had to tell Bob to order certain lumber and i even had to tell Bob to get a dumpster to my house. Had i not intervened, he would have done quite a few things way out of order. As an example, i'll spare the details of why/how, but he was going to expose about 1/3 of my living room/kitchen to the attic (think insulation!) and leave it that way for upwards of a week before it could be sheet-rocked. That was absurd planning/coordination.
In the end, thankfully i managed Bob so that work was done before i gave him more money in a way that prevented me from incurring much of a loss, then i cut him loose. And to say he went absolutely ballistic would be an understatement - I'll spare the details but suffice it to say that a Sheriff had to get involved.
I'll bring this to a close now, but just wanted to get this info out there to hopefully prevent others from having a similarly nightmarish experience. As Bob did with me about other negative reviews you can find about him & his company (Sunset Company), I'm sure he'll reply to this review with a bunch of disparaging stuff about me, and he might even say it's a fake review, but again, I'm willing to talk details if you'd like - someone simply couldn't make this stuff up, and there's always the WillCo Sheriff's report to back my experience). And after all this, with the Sheriff present, after i asked Bob if he was was going to follow through on his threats to my house & family, his parting words were "at least i can walk away with my integrity, i hope we don't have any hard feelings and you're not allowed to leave me a review". That cracked me up.
I guess this went longer than anticipated, but in summary stay away from Bob Gibbins & Sunset Company unless you have infinite money, infinite time and infinite patience.
*** UPDATE *** As expected, Bob comes up with a response that's complete nonsense. I'm happy to talk details and give more examples (can even provide the text message transcript of his rant/threats), and i can also put you in touch with the subs he didn't even pay with what i paid Bob (which is why they quit him), and according to the subs this is common with Bob. Just stay clear of him. Thankfully the Sheriff intervened and laid the groundwork for dealing with Bob legally should he approach me or continue the threats, which are documented in the Sheriff's report as well as text messages. Bob has no project management skills, so beware of simply handing out money and trusting him. read more
