Eric D.
1/5
I didn't have enough room here to tell the entire story. I had to remove quite a bit of information but I want to be as complete as I possibly can.
I have lived in Lake Geneva for nearly 40 years and like most people I think, you dream of building a home someday for your family to enjoy for generations to come. Through the years, I had always noticed that the new houses being built that I really liked most seemed to always have a "Jorndt/Fahey" sign in front as construction was happening. So, when the day finally arrived and we were able to move forward with our build, Jorndt Fahey was the first contactor we spoke to. After a few meetings we were ultimately able to put a plan together for the build.
Construction finally started Labor Day weekend of 2018. We were told we'd be moving in by the end of May 2019. I became very concerned about the lack of progress as fall turned to winter. There was absolutely zero sense of urgency to get the house "under roof" with these people. It was snowing all the time, and I had to be the person at the job site constantly clearing the snow off the unprotected subfloor. My concern was a fast melt in the spring and having water soaking into everything. I was assured this is "not a concern" and like everything else I asked about, the response was always "totally normal" or "nothing to worry about".
Weeks turned to months and May came and went, along with the entire summer. It took 1 year exactly from start to (sort of) finish. Months and months late which ended up adding nearly $50,000 additional dollars to the overall project cost.
Thankfully, we moved in and everything looked really good. Then the weather turned cold and it became very clear to us that something was terribly wrong. Our beautiful, custom wood flooring as well as every single piece of painted trim in the entire house began to shrink! This created gaps between floor boards and between the pieces of custom trim, wainscoting, coffered ceiling.. Everything made of wood was pulling apart.
It was very clear what caused these issues. The house was far too wet when they were installing the natural wood floors and trim, it wasn't allowed to acclimate nearly long enough and to add another enormous screw up, the humidifier system that was installed was not nearly sufficient for the square footage. I had to figure all of this out myself by the way. Their answer to these problems was "its normal, give it time to settle in". So we did.
We watched as it got worse and worse and worse through the winter, then into the next.. All the while he has done nothing short of sending some worthless painter over to "touch up" the problem areas. THE ENTIRE THING WAS THE PROBLEM AREA! it was unbelievable! I just couldn't (and still can't) grasp how they could ignore this and not take care of it. That was 6 years ago now and we're NOWHERE! I paid for the humidifier to be changed. I also had an expert with the National Wood Flooring association come to give us a report explaining how this happened and options for correcting it.
As if things couldn't get worse, last summer we noticed some cracking drywall above the patio door to the exterior. After having a different contractor inspect it, what we found was truly unbelievable. You will easily see what I'm referring to in the photos I'm posting here. When they built the "header" for this patio door opening, they must have not had enough material on hand so they decided to use a hacked up piece of dimensional lumber that appeared to have been used as a sacrificial piece of scrap for the saw horses at the job site.
Other issues:
Bug infestation due to improperly insulating around windows.
Porcelain tile floor in master began cracking and needs to be replaced.
They never sealed the concrete floor in the basement. Now it's badly stained and will require grinding to remove.
No shut off valves used for the washing machine supply lines. Had a hose fail and flooded a large area of the main level of the house. the list goes on and on....
"THIS IS NORMAL" Jorndt Fahey
