Backstory - Ike flooded my house.  No flood insurance (by accident).  I cut out the drywall to 4 feet initially  to dry it out.  I was removing it to the ceiling prior to putback and reinsulating with R13exterior and R11 interior.

A couple of months ago someone mentioned a disaster relief fund that could possibly help me out.  They sent a couple of local to the area contractors by to scope out where I was on rebuilding and see what they could provide and bid for the work.  They were able to do the drywall portion of the work (hang, tape, float, texture, prime and paint) and provide the materials necessary including the insulation.  I was ecstatic beyond belief as the funds I had were starting to get low for finishing everything out the way I wanted.  However there were a few things I needed to do before they could start including electrical and plumbing and a little framing.  I had to pay $2800 for the plumbing as I was under the impression that I would not have time to get that before they started.  I would have had the time but I did get the other stuff done as well.

First off, they ( the supposed normal crew for this contractor) started hanging drywall before they ever received any insulation for the exterior walls and just hung some of the old R11 peices I had pulled from some of the walls I moved or took down.  The owner made them tear down the ext walls and put in new insul as promised.  I was happy but it was only 3 walls they had done and one of them they had set the cut edge of the rock on the concrete the full length of the sheet.  Several outlet boxes were pushed in past the stud and the cutout was either way over size, broken or too small.  They started bedding some of the joints (very randomly) in different rooms and the paper tape (not using a banjo) is puckering and seperating all over the place.  I wanted bullnose corners and some of the corners are so far apart that the corners are gonna have to be stretched alot to cover if they reach at all.  There are a few places where scraps have been used and will create way more joints than necessary especially around a few doors.  In one of the ceilings that needed to be insulated ( I bought the R25  because none ever showed up) the crew had rocked 90% of the area and only stuck up 2 peices of insul.  Whats worse is that layed it over the strongbacks and on top of the light can.  I fixed that one evening and installed the rest of it before they could finish screwwing it up and closing the attic space.  This is not all of the screw ups but I will stop here.

I hate to make this too long and can back this up with pics if needed but it has taken them almost 7 days to hang maybe 1500 square feet worth of living space (very little ceiling work, maybe 250 -300 sq ft) and they are not done.  I know how to hang but suck at floating, but know enough to know that any drywaller that is worth his salt would have been done hanging this in 2 days and would not have hung it as to make extra work for himself or his crew.  I talked to the owner, the manager and the drywall crew leader and asked the DW leader if he was training a few guys or if this was his regular crew and he said it was his normal crew (LIE) and when pointing out the flaws in front of him he was silent.   Owner is sending a new crew tomorrow.

My questions are:  Did I over react?     Do these problems sound like easy fixes for the next crew?       Am I looking a gift horse in the mouth?

I know a lot can be hidden with drywall but if the initial work they are doing represents the finished product, free or not, I am skeptical that I will be happy with the end results.


Sorry for the length,
Wes

Seriously, 81 reads and not even one "get the sand out of you mangina" or "fuck'em, its your house"?

Story too long?

Wes

Are you paying this crew or is the disaster relief fund?

Yes.

You get what you pay for.



The owner is trying to find the lowest cost guys he can, likely because he's not getting paid that great.  Also, he doesn't really have to care about the quality, since you're getting it free.  Most people won't bitch, even if it looks like shit.

Personally, going by what you've listed and without pictures to look at, I'd say get them the heck out of your house before they screw anything else up.

You can patch up their mess.  Sounds like a bunch of retards on that crew just throwing it up.

It's not like they're doing it for free. Make them do it right. The Relief Fund doesn't want to pay for bad work.

The releif fund is paying the contractor but the funds are finite and come from contributions from local entities, not a government pool.  The contractors selected to work under the fund are all local, long standing businesses.  The company doing the work at my house has been here for close to 30 years and the owners says that this is one of his normal drywall crews.  What bothers me about that is that he has neither defended nor criticized the work, only accepted that I am not happy and wants to get things back on track.  I guess that is commendable in a way, but there is no denying that some of this crew needs to find another line of work.  There also seems to be a breakdown in communication somewhere between the owner, manager and the laborers.

We will see how the new crew does when they show up.

Wes

I wouldn't want crappy work even if it was free.

Cliff Notes?

Crappy "free" work is usually more costly than just doing the job right in the first place.

They are getting Paid so it should be right!!!  Just think this way, in 5 years when you see it, you are still gonna get pissed everytime you go into that room.  If only it would have been done right the first time.  Make em do it right or get the hell out!

Thats my point!  I had fully intended to hang it all myself and then pay someone to tape, float and texture.  When the fund thing was brought to my attention I thought wow, now I might actually finish everything without taking out another loan.  Not to mention I had to qualify for the help.

I have told the owner how appreciative I am of the help over and over and I truly am, but I want things to look right when its done.

Wes

I don't know anything about hanging DW, apparently you do. It sounds like they are very incompetant and I would suggest you give the new crew a chance and if they fail just fire them all and resign yourself to doing it.
If the work is that bad then you will never be happy with it and when you get ready to sell the house you might have a problem with the obvious flaws and or passing inspection.

Good luck

The entire ceiling should have been rocked first... the rock on the walls give added support for the weight...

Sounds like the relief fund hires people off the street with little knowledge of the art...

Good luck

The areas where ceiling rock was going up did get the walls done after the ceiling was up, but I think they also put the insulation up after the rock was up or at least partly up.  I never saw a staple gun or slap gun out, ever.  I also wondered why they didn't go through and insulate everything prior to the first peice of rock going up.  

Wes

Sounds like you should've just hanged the drywall yourself and then hired an expert to finish it off.  But, that said, at least the owner seems willing to make changes, even if he doesn't explicitly say that yes, they fucked up.

My house flooded in 2007, but not from a hurricane.  Did you ever get any FEMA money?

I have a very low tolerance for shoddy workmanship. Does this crew speak engish? How much money did you have to give them up front? I say cut your losses now and show them the door. One thing I've learned (the hard way) is you have to be very specific with contractors and get everything in writing or they will walk all over you.

sounds like your guy with 30 years in the business has his real crews do normal work and likely he hires cheap help to do the free stuff, cant say I blame him.





I've seen walls where every joint is a good half inch higher then it should be the wall looks all wavy when you look down it.

Good news - The guy they got to redo  the work is a guy that has done work for me in the past.  Also, he owns his own drywall company, so they are hiring him outside of their company to do this work.  This guy does really good work, or at least he has done good work in the past.

Bad news - The new drywall guy is showing me things that the other crew did that I did not catch.  Numerous sheets hung backwards (wrong side out).  Sheets not tight to the walls and/or not shimmed to prevent movement on out of spec walls (he pushed a sheet and the nail heads bucked half an inch).  Joints in closets where a full sheet would prevent a vertical joint.  Basically he said the previous crew had no idea what they were doing.

I hooked the A/C back up for this guy and he will be back tomorrow. YEA!

C6H12O6 - Yes I rec'd FEMA money and took out a loan to do repairs and some remodel work.

SkyFive - I have a low tolerance for poor workmanship as well.  Also, I have no strong financial investment in the work they are doing now I may have to front the $$$ to fix their F#*k ups. And, no, they were mostly non english speaking.

Wes

Good to hear!