Estess Contractors

Review: Estess Contractors built our house on spec and listed it for sale through the MLS and various channels. We submitted an offer to purchase it with a closing date chosen by [redacted] of March 27, 2014. We arranged our move from Charlotte, NC based upon this closing date. When we arrived in Louisiana on March 25th the house was not nearly completed (for instance the electricity and gas were not connected to the house yet) and it was clear that [redacted] could not meet the scheduled closing. We negotiated a contract extension that obligated [redacted] to pay to store our household goods (arranged by our moving company) and a per diem of $300/day to cover our hotel, meals, and incidentals while we did not have the use of the house.Although the house was still not completed, [redacted] provided a Certificate of Occupancy to our mortgage company (dated March 26th) so that our mortgage would be funded and we agreed to close on April 14th. We would later learn that the Certificate of Occupancy had not been issued at that time by St. Tammany Parish and we can only surmise that it was a forgery. We generated a punch list and Estess committed to completing the major items within two weeks and that we should submit a list of other items within 30 days for them to correct. At the closing, [redacted] did not have a certified check to reimburse us for the per diem and storage costs. The title attorney agreed to write two checks for the proceeds of the sale of the house to Estess Contractors. One was for the amount that Estess owed us and the other for the balance due him. [redacted] Estess signed the one for the amount he owed us over to me. When I took it to my bank I found that they have rules preventing them from cashing checks that had been made out to a business and then signed over to an individual. The bank explained that the IRS is suspicious that such checks are an attempt for companies to avoid reporting income. I contacted [redacted] Estess who said he would exchange this check with a certified check. After he missed a previous appointment and repeated phone calls to reschedule, I met him at his bank to make the exchange. His bank would not issue a certified check until 24 hours after the original check cleared. Therefore, I eventually accepted a standard business check for the amount. I took this check to my bank and the next day I was informed that the check had bounced. I informed [redacted] of this and at this point he stopped answering or returning my calls, e-mails, or text messages. Following the procedures provided by the St. Tammany Parish District Attorneys office I sent [redacted] a certified letter to demand payment. I still received no return of my repeated attempts to contact him. I called his bank daily to find out if there were funds to cover the check and about two weeks later I was able to cash it. The certified letter eventually was returned to me unopened as [redacted] had refused to sign for it.St. Tammany sent inspectors into our house shortly after we moved in. On April 28th the Director of the parish Dept. of Development sent Estess Contractors a certified letter regarding permit [redacted] (our house) about a code violation which [redacted] had been previously notified of and that the building final was rejected. This was how learned that the Certificate of Occupancy had not been issued by the parish. We were visited by a Code Enforcement Supervisor who told us that we should never have been allowed to move into the house until after the code violation was corrected and that [redacted] was liable for fines of $100/day until the house passed inspection. [redacted] hired a subcontractor to oversee the completion of our punch list items and the code violation. Work commenced for one week during which the code violation was remediated and some of our punch list items were addressed. St. Tammany Parish did go ahead and issue a Certificate of Occupancy to [redacted] at this point. We asked to receive a copy from him and have had no reply to this request. We contacted the subcontractor to ask when the remainder of our items were scheduled and he put us off for a while. Subsequently he informed us that he no longer worked for [redacted] because the paycheck he received from [redacted] bounced. He also admitted that delays in scheduling repairs/completion of our house were due to tradesmen refusing to do further work for [redacted] until he made good on checks that he had written them. In the meantime, we continue to wait for work to be completed. We have continued to make attempts to contact [redacted] via e-mail and phone calls without a response. Calls to his office invariable get the response that he is out and they will have him call us. Calls to his cell phone go unanswered.On June 6th attorneys for Coburn Supply Company sent a certified letter to Estess and us demanding payment for plumbing fixtures that was past due and threatening to put a lien on our house. We finally got a call through to [redacted] and demanded that he address this issue and our remaining repairs within two. He said he would do so as soon as he has the funds. As stated above, we bought a spec house, not a custom house and we were not involved in specifying any of the plumbing fixtures or what vendors to use. We paid Estess Contractors the full amount for the house and do not feel we should have any liability transferred from them to us for this transaction. Also, [redacted] still hasnt installed the correct fixture in the master shower (one of our punch list items a non-matching handle, valve and escutcheon plate were temporarily installed to pass inspection and the correct items were lost). On June 26th we spoke with the manager of the local branch of Coburns who stated that they are still doing business with[redacted], but the items for our house have not been paid and are the most past due of all of their invoices to them.Desired Settlement: Complete repairs of all remaining punch list items by July 11.

Consumer

Response:

At this time, I have not been contacted by Estess Contractors LLC regarding complaint ID [redacted].

Regards,