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Oak Park Illinois Architects
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5
Architectural Design and Builders Inc
“We hired Kim Karger as our general contractor to expand the size of the addition. Since we'd never hired or worked with a contractor before, we did our homework. We interviewed 7 different contractors, checked BBB histories, and called references. We chose ADB-Inc (Architectural Design and Builders - 188 W. Randolph, Chicago, IL 60601) as our contractor. Kim was the only one who was ontime, gave us a written estimate and had exemplary references. \n \nWe signed the contract in May 2006 and expected the project to be completed by the end of September. We were assured by Kim that once the permit was obtained, work would proceed rapidly. He estimated that the renovation would take approximately 6 weeks. We waited for the permit, and waited...and waited...and waited. You can imagine our shock when September came and went, then October, and then November passed. Midway through December of 2006 we were informed that he'd been able to obtain the building permit. \n \nWe continually asked for explanations as to what was causing so many delays in getting our permit. Kim Karger's answer was to blame variances in our property and that the Building Dept. was dragging its feet in issuing our permit. He claimed that he'd never had such a difficult time in getting a permit. Keep in mind that Kim stated that he had 31 years in the building business. We were taken aback that someone with so much experience was having difficulties in getting our project going. It wasn't like we were building from scratch - we were just moving one wall of our addition out 9 feet and vaulting the ceiling. This was to be our first Red Flag. \n \nOther experiences we had with Kim Karger are as follows: \n \nKim claims that he keeps meticulous records. He claims to remember every little detail about his projects but we found that his records aren't as accurate as he would have you believe. \n \nMany times he didn't remember making statements to us (while we were all in the room together) and he didn't recall obvious common-sense items that should have been included in our renovation. An example is insulation. He was stripping our walls down to the brick and installing new drywall. He turned around and wanted to charge us for new insulation. We assumed that that should have been included in the price of the new room. He also put a ceiling fan in. Since the ceiling was now 15 feet high, we assumed that he'd add an additional electrical line to the switch so that we could have a remote control for the fan speed and light. When we noticed that no such line was installed - Kim's response was you can put a long pull chain on the fan. \n \nOne day he called our home and got our answering machine. He left a full 1 minute message for his architect on our voicemail. When we light-heartedly told him what he'd done, he couldn't remember even calling his architect. \n \nDuring the planning stage we made it clear that we wanted to enlarge the entranceway into the new addition. In fact it was one of the few things that we insisted on. We didn't review his drawings very closely and missed that he'd forgotten to include this vital aspect of the project. He then turned around and blamed us for the additional delays. \n \nWhen the roof was raised to the new height, this master builder forgot to include the cost of moving our upstairs bedroom window. \n \nHe initially said he would just eat these additional expenses as they occurred because of his oversight. But then we started to see mysterious charges appearing on work orders that we requested. When we changed the roof support beam from a wooden trellis type to a steel beam, suddenly $900 of engineering costs appeared on the bill. It seemed to us that he was trying to recoup the losses caused by his lack of attention to details in our project. In our opinion it appears that he was padding his bills. \n \nKim Karger has multiple projects going simultaneously. For months we have seen stretches of 4 to 5 days where no one from Kim's crew was working at our home. When confronted on this Kim had a ready answer. He liked to claim weather delays were to blame but his carpenters told us, during an unguarded moment, that Kim had 4 other construction projects going besides our own. Our piddly $60,000 renovation wasn't worth Kim's full attention or energies. \n \nAfter our room was completed, we found that during moderate rains about 1.5 of rainwater accumulated on the floor of our new foundation. The water is now leaching into our basement. Kim refuses to fix this structural defect, and had the audacity to say that the way to solve it was to put a fan down there. \n \nOther less important issues that continue to plague us are: \n \n* Kim installed our bathroom door on backwards. You have to walk all the way into the powder room in order to turn on the light, or use the sink. This is contrary to the architect's drawings for the room. \n \n* We paid to have a spigot installed in the rear of the house. He installed it too low to the pavement and we can't connect a hose to it. When he was putting it in I told him it was too low. He did nothing to correct it. \n \n* He used faulty, incorrect window caulk on the outside seams of our windows. \n \n* He cut out the posts of our driveway fence, moved one side and now the two sides don't line up. I have to secure the gate with a bungee cord. We received an estimate from a fence company of $350 to fix it. Kim initially told us he'd fix the fence after moving the posts. He apparently thinks that having a sawed-off metal post in our grass and gates that don't line up as fixed. \n \n* He used very cheap windows in our new room. They are vinyl frame ones from Home Depot. Comparable ones in the catalog run about $45 per window. \n \n* The pipes under the new addition froze last winter. Kim didn't insulate them properly. \n \n* When the foundation was poured, it was January of 2006. We went out of town for 1 week and Kim had assured me that he'd put heaters down in the foundation area so it cured properly. I assumed that he'd put propane heaters down there. Almost 2 weeks after our return I noticed that Kim never came out to replace the propane tanks on the heaters he had going outside 24/7. It turned out that while we were gone, he'd punched a hole in our basement wall and tapped into our natural gas line. Our gas bill for January and February was $1,000 combined. \n \nIn summary, we cannot recommend Kim Karger nor his company Architectural Design and builders. The reasons are an overall lack of quality, and a failure to follow through on most aspects of the project. He has never given us a punch-list to correct the smaller issues, and refuses to address the large issue of installing a faulty foundation. \n \nKim Karger's personality tends to the abrasive side. He sincerely and full believes that he is always right. He takes great pains to tell us how right he is and is loath to quote the contract when he disagreed with him on an issue. When he had a crane in our backyard for 6 months (well beyond when it's usefulness was over) he claimed that he still needed it back there because the contract says I'm allowed to have a work space. \n \nThe contract we signed (Dummy us!) was very vague and open-ended: All to Kim Karger's advantage when construction started. \n \nOur advise it to get a strong contract with set deadlines and some protections for you. It is your project and you're hiring a contractor to guide you, educate you and bring qualified people in to do the job right. Consider the date that you want the work completed by and get that in writing. Consider getting the permit yourself; I've heard its not very difficult. Go over the plans, designs and aspects of the project meticulously. Get brands you like and make your contractor get those. If left to their own designs they'll default to the cheapest items in order to save money on the job. \n \nIn our naivety we never considered that we'd be taking legal action against this general contractor.”
