I had 2,200 sq ft of tile replaced around my existing pool and all walkways in my backyard and front porch this summer, 2026. I needed a true professional with experience to accomplish this enormous job. Juan (owner of Zafire Pools) gave me a fair and firm price, and he was willing to sign up with the tile company here in Austin where I needed to purchase the tile for my project so that I could get a discount price for the tile as only available to the trade, and not to an individual homeowner. This was very nice of Juan which ended up saving me thousands of dollars on this large project.
Juan suggested that I use 2cm porcelain tile pavers with a "grip" surface especially best around wet pool areas and outdoors for safety, strength and stability. His team also used a stronger commercial quick set made for outdoors as well. The key to long term success clearly involves finding a professional who is willing to spend the time performing a thorough preparation and removal of all the old quick set and old tile material down to the slab to avoid future tile separation. Juan actually worked along side his team chipping away and removing the old material and was able to accomplish adequate room for the thicker paver tiles as my original tiles were just regular tile thickness. They achieved a clean and smooth slab surface before they began cementing down the new paver tiles. Juan also used a special plastic spin-cap/screw-down system between each paver tile which assured that the tiles were all placed at the same and even level. Juan definitely shows excellent attention to detail and had his team consistently place each tile in a desirable pattern so as not to place identical tiles next to each other, thus making my slate look-alike porcelain tiles look more like real natural slate, but keeping the benefits of porcelain and no maintenance. He also suggested using a special skimmer tray which ends up flush with the tile surface and it holds one of the actual tiles custom cut to fit into the tray. This is very esthetic and barely noticeable and you no longer have to use or see the usual ugly white and raised skimmer covers normally used on most pool surrounds. Juan checked in with me routinely during the project and always answered my questions and any concerns along the way. When I placed a call to him he promptly answered and kept me informed of arrival times and days his team would be working. They finished the entire job in a timely manner and Juan personally came by and took care of any remaining details that needed attention just before completing the job and even placed a quality sealer on my granite coping as a finishing touch to the overall restoring of my pool tile surround and walkways. Extreme quality and effort was shown. I can't emphasize enough how nice the project turned out!
Juan and his Zafire Pool company is your best choice and option if you need a pool, pool repair or refurbish, pool surround, or tile or paver work. I found Juan to have a friendly and caring attitude and he is dedicated to high quality workmanship.
Philip S. read more