Home & Garden Construction Group - Concord, California

Brenda Q.

Mike Mikolajcik was referred by a neighbor whose yard he had done. After meeting with him and seeing a depiction of what our yar d could look like, we hired him. There would be a travertine patio, counter with stone veneer and porcelain tiles, retaining walls with stone veneer and travertine caps, turf, a fountain, a drip system, plants and mulch. etc). A big project. Mike set up a weekly payment schedule for the five week project with a larger payment being at the beginning because he had to buy the travertine and materials. He said we would meet once a week on Thursdays to discuss what is going on and what the next step is and at that time he would take a payment. The project started June 7. Only half of the travertine was delivered. He said the rest was in his warehouse in Hayward and would be delivered later. There were only two workers and after just a week or so the more skilled worker stop coming. The person that was left, a family friend, never worked a full day and much of what he did had to be done over. He didn’t work weekends. He talked on the phone almost continuously, only a problem b/c he held it in his hand. He was tiling our countertop with one hand and no focus. He told me he said had no experience tiling. I don’t blame him for anything. He just needed the supervision that Mike wasn’t providing. Mike had him start one project, get a little more than halfway through then start another. Mike came in the 4th wk and was expecting another payment but only the final payment was due (at completion.) What kind of business owner loses track of that kind of money? Then he asked for some of the final payment to be paid in advance making it sound like it was fair because he said he was doing some extra work. We unwisely gave him more money and that’s when the real problems began. Mike knew he wasn’t getting any more money until the project was done and he knew (although we didn’t) that there was a lot left to do. He became slow to respond to our text messages regarding the slow pace with which our project was going and almost completely stopped coming to the site. Mike kept assuring us that there would be more people coming to work and he withstood our fiery remarks, always ready with a quick explanation and a two week projection for completion. Finally about 10 weeks into a five week project two skilled workers showed up. But there was a conflict on the project site. The family friend wanted to be in charge and he was distracting the skilled workers. So we told Mike we don’t want him to come back, only the two skilled workers. The next work day only one of the skilled workers showed up and after several days with only one worker we asked Mike what happened. He said the other had messed up too much but the the remaining worker said Mike didn’t want to pay the guy. He said Mike owed three of them a lot of money. That would explain why only what’s the family friend was working. We decided that since we still had the final payment in reserve we would just pay the worker directly so that he wouldn’t have to worry about getting paid. When we suggested that to Mike he said we could do that if it makes us more “comfortable .” He also told the guy we would pay his backpay! We finally told Mike he was not welcome on our property anymore. Now we are learning how to manage a construction job, purchasing the rest of the travertine and such at retail prices as we have no license. We know that we will end up paying even more for our project than the amount that we anticipated at the beginning. Most frustrating, we had big plans for the summer.

Kailshnath R.

Does any one know how to reach Mike. If I don't hear from him this week, I will launch a formal complaint with City of Benicia and Concord.

Dallin M.

Anne L.