Unacceptable. D+ rating. I'm only writing this because I don't want others to get ripped off. This company has 3 complaints with the attorney general's office in just over 5 months. I work for a local housing department in a municipality. I've worked in acquisition rehabs for many years and deal with all kinds of contractors. Mason contractors are lumped into 2 categories: really good and really bad. CLE belongs to the latter group. This salesman pushed and pushed and pushed to get me scheduled even in January when it is physically too cold for mortar to set. When I finally paid him a deposit, kept postponing. I get it: there's a labor shortage.... but over promising and underdelivering not only looks really bad, it is bad. He worked an hour and a half and charged me over 970 dollars. Never set up a scaffold. I asked about this multiple times before he came out: Are you setting up a scaffold? No. We can we use Ridge ladders and we can tie off onto the chimney. I asked "Are you sure?" Not true. There are exactly three ways to do this and he used none of them. So he shows up after cancelling three times. Half of the time he was on his phone. He left joints unfilled in and called it 'recessed joints'. Not passable per city inspections. Did not grind out a single joint at all after quoting me that's what he would do. Some joints were left over 2 inches deep at the corners of my chimney. Literally worked two sides of the chimney and not even that much. He promised to restore the chimney crown which he sort of did. He just forgot to remove the old mortar, set a chimney cap on top and mortared around it with a very heavy sand mix. NOT AT ALL PROPER INDUSTRY STANDARDS!! Then he tried to tell me they don't sell type S spec mix at home depot. B.S. with a capital B. He had 5 guys on my property and 2 of them were working. To be fair, I sent a 40 year contractor over to get an impartial opinion. And he'll probably respond to this review saying, I couldn't make it because I got called on to do another job or I had a doctor's appt. or you didn't ask me to do this. Or I stand by my product or everything I say is untrue, or I couldnt set up a scaffolding because there was a tree branch in the way. Or everything I'm saying is incorrect. Yet, three other contractors that inspected the work said it was incomplete. That he didn't do anything. Over promised and under delivered and that's putting it mildly. Like WAY underdelivered. $150 job. read more

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Do no use these guys, they did an awful job "fixing" my porch. They damaged the foundation, left their template up guessing they didn't want to come back and show the damage they did. I had to remove everything and fix it myself. I work to much and paid to much to have to do it myself. read more

Zero if that was an option. They will take your money and not return. Poor work, excuses after excuses, will not respond, lie after lie... should I continue? We have taken them to court and they didn't show. They refuse to pay. BBB is now at an F! All in the last year have the same complaints. DO NOT HIRE THIS COMPANY! Do not trust a word the owners claim. Owners Ben and Joe are not trustworthy. read more

One star only because you can't give zero. Worst contractor in North East Ohio. I was cheated out of thousands of dollars.

I hired Joe and Cle Masonry to complete multiple masonry tasks at my home last summer. Joe was provided with the 50% deposit in advance of him showing up to do the work. When Joe and his crew showed up to work, Joe spent most of his time flying a drone around my property while the other crew members worked. They ended their work day around 3pm with the job incomplete. I still gave Joe a check at the end of the day, because he said he would return in a few days to complete the job and I trusted him. Joe proved that he can't be trusted. I followed up with him about a week later to see if he was going to come back to finish the job, because he left a large brick pillar laying in the middle of my walkway and Joe replied that "it was his birthday and he's going to take it easy today". Joe said he would return soon to finish the work, but never did. After 6 months of trying to get Joe to come out and finish the job we decided to give up. Recently I noticed that the work that Joe did do to my retaining wall last summer is all cracked. Per the contract we signed, Joe provides a 5 year warranty for all of his work. I decided to reach out to Joe to see if he would honor the warranty. He sent me a very short email that just said "give me two weeks". Two weeks went by and after several follow ups, I still have not heard back from CLE Masonry. I have noticed that there are many complaints with the BBB and on google reviews all of which share similar experiences to mine. I would not recommend CLE Masonry to anyone. read more

Our company hired CLE Masonry to first do some tuck pointing on a chimney (on a very steep roof). Ben and his team were wonderful on this job so we then picked their brains a bit on a bigger issue. Someone had painted a bunch of random bricks on one of our buildings. We had been struggling to find a company that had a resolution that would not only work but was not awful for the environment. Ben & his team were able to cut out each destroyed brick individually, and then replace them with new bricks that matched, and matched the mortar as well. Their prices are reasonable, their work is wonderful, and their communication never lacked. I can not say enough amazing things about them! CLE Masonry is now the first company we will call for any of our masonry needs! read more

Joe and his team were fantastic to work with. The work was excellent, the team was professional, friendly, and knowledgeable-providing multiple options to help correct an issue with our fireplace. I highly recommend them! read more

I've dealt with a lot of contractors but CLE Masonry by far is the worst of them all. For starters, Ben Flanagan, the talking head of the company is the biggest habitual liar I've ever met. In January 2022 when I signed my contract he told me as long as the weather is above 20 degrees he can complete this project in 2 days. I ask him just about everyday is someone coming out to do the stone and he would always have a excuse of "it's to cold, it's to windy," and on the none cold/windy days when the sun was shining the excuse would be "I checked into the hospital, my dog died, I got gall bladder issue," he even used excuses of someone stole his truck when they was on the way to my house and that he was short staffed. I proceeded to ask well why can't you finish the job yourself and be told me "ohh I accidentally chopped off my thumbs so I can't do it". At this point I was done with him so I asked for the owners number. I called the owner Joe Vega. No answer. I left him a message and got no response. I texted him and the message said delivered but no reply. Meanwhile the shady little bit of stone that he did complete has fell off my house. I found another company to come complete the work. But I Just want to warn anyone whose looking to get this kind of work done to PLEASE STAY CLEAR OF CLE MASONRY. They will steal your money and not complete the work. Ben and Joe will have to see me in court because I'm not letting this go until they pay me back everything they owe me. read more