Keep fighting the fight Greg buddy

Speaking of exhausting, exhausting clients to the point of hopelessness is a typical tactic in the building and restoration industries.

@@sp1200M3D The parallels of this case and other cases that we see on screen, such as Erin Brocovich and The Rainmaker, are very strong. Make the process of claiming exhausting for the client and the judge, so that your chance of it ever going to court, or surviving the judge's first bad day, is nil. A good attorney will lay out the case simply for the judge, so that every time the defendant tries to obfuscate the issues, the attorney can bring the judge back to a simple point of reference.

@@tlangdon12 Agreed, it’s just unfortunate because many clients are so financially broken afterwards, they can’t afford an attorney. Mold cases can be extremely tough, and I hear one of the best ways to win is proving that you can no longer live inside of the home, hence having to rent another property, now having a mortgage, rent, and legal fees… The defendant can say, “well the mold must not be a problem since you still live there”.

So sorry to hear. Make sure you watch all of Anil’s videos on our channel- there are two

A right of refund works with most other consumer items, so why not buildings. Builders are the experts if there are problems, they are best placed to remediate them, either using a new sub-contractor or forcing the orginal subcontractor to accept their liability.

Awesome, thank you Brantley! Hope all's well with you and your company.

Right on, Captain, thanks for the high five

Its sure is!

Btw when I made my complaint to TDLR, the first person handling my complaint ghosted me, for months. Then like literally 6mnths from my initial complaint a new person was handling my case and over the phone she apologized and actually said the previous person was fired; didnt say why but I can infer.

@@zefrum3 There is a lesson there about not letting issues fester for too long. If the representative can confirm that there is action taking place that needs time, fair enough, but if there is no action, don't wait too long before making a written complaint.

Welcome!

In the UK, we have an organisation called the Royal Instituation of Chartered Surveyors. Members of the organisation are professional building surveyors and are engaged by most property buyers to complete a survey of a property prior to them finalising their offer. Because you have paid for a survey, and the surveyor is working for you, you can sue them if they miss something funamental that they should have seen when inspecting the home. The role of the Realtor in the UK is the same - they represent the seller, and their sole aim is to sell the property for the best price it can acheive.

You have to think that the main contractor is negligent if they don't ensure that all the design elements work together; where is their evidence that they considered the inter-related design elements? Similarly, if there are obvious quality issues with the sub-contractor's workmanship, such as a lack of sealing of ducts, you have to consider that they have been negligent. I would extend this to ensuring that designs are implemented. If the design has one large HVAC unit and the installer arrives with two small units, NOT stopping the installation until the designer confirms that the change is is correct and has been checked, is also negligence.

So sorry to hear, DS- good that you got out, but it sounds like a terrible situation.

Anil and you are right. There are no winners (other than the lawyers), but if the builder pays for most of the remediation, the client has the home they should have had, and can sell it on in good-faith. It's as good a form of winning as you can ever hope for.

Amen Chad

PREACH

I agree completely, but to make this a reality, the tools for measuring performance have to be cost-effective and easy to use. A production house builder, should have the BEST chance of building the best homes because they can amortize the cost of the performance measuring equipment and the professionals who are trained to use it over the largest number of homes.

@@tlangdon12 Preaching to the choir, Mr. Langdon! So many measures of performance come down to a few simple metrics: check the ACH (blower door test), run an air-quality test (a simple $40 sample sent off to a lab that checks for radon, mold, carbon dioxide and sulfur, which indicates escaping gas). Check air exchange in each room (which should be done as a matter of course when commissioning the HVAC system). Check water pressure in the pipes and use a leak detector (expensive, but many plumbers have them and the cost amortises out) to ensure that the plumbing is OK. Some prescriptive codes (ADA accessibility standards, for instance, or safety measures like codes governing gas lines, etc.) are still necessary, but a lot less of them and a lot more creative architecture and new technologies would be adopted.

*AND ALSO THE LIPSTICK*

I'm not surprised that this was your experience. I would have done a lot of due diligence on the project manager before I let them be responsible for the quality of the home they were building for me. But there is a fundamental problem here that affects all site/project managers, which is that they can't be experts in all the different technologies that go into a modern building. This is why design and design verification is important. But the project manager can and should understand the designs/plans and how the work is supposed to accomplised, so that if the sub-contractor tries to make design changes on the fly or change the way the work is being done, they can be pulled up and the implications of the change checked. Too many subcontractors haven't priced in some contingency in case of problems, or in case work has to be halted while a serious issue is worked out.

The Defender Low Level monitor is our recommendation, Michael.

@@HomePerformance Good recommendation. Anything with a display that gives you and indication of the level of CO is much better.

Video coming buddy

I din't think Anil was fiece. I thought he came over as a reasonable guy - he accepted that building a home is a fearsonly complicated business these days - but he also was clear that he was not going to be walked over. If anyone pushed him, I am sure he would push back really politely, but just as hard.

The whole situation in the building industry make me consider that the only way to get a good quality home is to build it myself, using sub-contractors who have been thorougly vetted and who have a track record of producing good designs that work well in practice AND who are prepared to accept that the client has a right to ask them to improve levels of workmanship if they are slipping. Some contractors are too precious about this. If I've hired them because they are the best, I want their best work.

You have a similar issue in the US that we have in the UK. Our building codes are changing anyway as a result of the need to improve energy efficiency and rectify problems that have occred as builders have tried to build houses too cheaply, so it is already getting harder for builders to comply with the codes. The issue is that no-one is checking that builders are building to code or building well. The codes define a minimum standard. Production builders will only build to code, to maximise profit, but they will also build below code if you aren't checking on them. This is what has to change. I think you are wrong about the requirement for checking and the sanctions for non-complianc not being best handled by the Federal Government. I get why many Americans think that Federal control is a bad thing, but good legislation would only set a framework for the country to give all consumers the same legal protection. The standards of evidence required to show that a builder has been negligent could be different in each state. Some states might therefore get a reputation for being more pro-builder than being pro-consumer, but if you can win in court, what ever the standard is, you get your money back! If you want a good example of US Federal government being efficient, take a look at the work of the US Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (USCHB). They have some interesting videos on KZfaq.