Approximately nine years ago we hired Becker Enterprises to extensively remodel two bedrooms and bathrooms. In addition we had a separate contract with Becker Enterprises to replace two large sky lights and install a new asphalt shingle roof on the entire house. During our initial consultation we determined Mr. Becker is an experienced and knowledgable licensed general contractor.
Unfortunately after the project commenced Mr. Becker was rarely on the job site to manage the project on a day to day basis. In most cases Mr. Becker didn't show up until after something went wrong often because his employees or sub contractors were careless, didn't pay attention to detail, took little pride in their work product or worse case were incompetent. That resulted in tearing out and redoing work that had just been done in some cases two or three times before it was completed to an acceptable standard. Which significantly extended the projects completion time and in one case required us to do the job we were paying a substantial amount of $ to Mr. Becker to do by finding a competent subcontractor ourselves to install marble in the bathrooms.
Mr. Becker did promise if anything wasn't done right he would fix it. Up until recently he honored his word and despite the trials and tribulations the end product was completed satisfactory...or so we thought.
Last year during a rain storm the asphalt shingle roof installed by Mr. Becker's sub-contractor Falcone's West Valley roofing began to leak in several places. After inspecting the roof Falcone's roofing reported the leaks were caused by "wind damage" which wasn't covered by any warranty.
For a roof only 8 - 9 years old that didn't seem plausible. After inspecting the roof myself I didn't observe any obvious damage. At that point I sent an email to Mr. Becker requesting he intervene with his sub contractor to determine the actual source of the leaks and repair it. On several occasions I requested Mr. Becker inspect the roof himself which he never did.
After a series of emails Mr. Becker sided with his sub contractor saying there was nothing he could do. In addition he cited his roof construction contract warrants workmanship for a period of only 5 years and requires that he be notified within 10 days after a construction defect is discovered.
Strangely enough Mr. Becker later sent another email in which he strongly implied that he had never entered into a contract with us to install the roof in the first place. However after digging through old records I found our copy of the roof contract. Mr. Becker's responses seemed disingenuous and patronizing. Especially considering the typical industry standard warranty on asphalt shingle roofs is 25-30 years or more.
After several other licensed roofing contractors inspected the roof, they didn't find any wind damage but did note Falcone's West Valley roofing did sloppy work reusing the old rusty bent metal flashing from the previous roof instead of new flashing and installed several courses of shingles so crooked they intersected other shingles in diagonal rather than uniform parallel rows.
However the most significant problem they identified was that entire sections of shingles had detached and began to slide down the roof. Upon closer inspection we determined the roof shingles had been incorrectly installed and nailed to the roof in the wrong area of the shingle (above the designated nail line) resulting in the nail head punching cleanly through the shingle. Consequently the only thing that held the shingles to the roof was a small amount of adhesive on the bottom of each shingle. This latent installation defect was present throughout the entire roof but not visible unless the shingle was lifted up to see underneath.
I took extensive photos documenting the defect and sent them with a detailed explanation of our findings to Mr. Becker who insisted that Falcone's roofing be allowed to inspect the roof a second time. Which we allowed. After Larry of Falcone's Roofing saw the defects for himself he got into his truck and drove away without saying a word.
Mr. Becker later sent an email in which he denied there were any latent defects in the roof due to improper installation and then changed his story from wind damage to claiming the roof leaks were a "roof maintenance issue" that could be remedied by simply replacing a few asphalt shingles. Which he was willing to have done at no charge to us.
However by definition, a maintenance issue is something that's expected in the normal course of events, like getting a oil change for your car. Entire sections of asphalt shingles sliding off of an 8 - 9 year old roof is a serious defect NOT normal, expected or a roof maintenance issue!
Consequently, we had to pay a substantial amount of money to replace the defective roof installed by Becker Enterprises and Falcone's West Valley roofing with a new roof that has a 50 year warranty on workmanship and materials.
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