House Calls Renovation Advisors

A basement flood at the end of 2013 was the impetus for a complete basement and main floor renovation. We had some ideas of what we wanted and set out to find a good company to hire for the job. After extensive research, we interviewed a handful of highly rated contractors and a few of them actually provided quotes. However, we found that most people we spoke to expected us to have a full-blown design while we were looking for a company to help us firm up design options. So, then we met with a couple of architects and quickly discovered that the cost of the designs would eat up a large portion of our budget.

At this point, we started researching renovation consultants and came across the Homestars site for House Calls Renovation Advisors. After reading all the reviews and exploring the House Calls website, we decided to give the owner, Jay, a call. Jay visited, listened to our story and explained his architecture background and the process he follows to make the renovation process as painless as possible for clients.

We liked what we heard and hired House Calls to provide pre-construction design, scoping, and contractor sourcing services for our major reno. Jay took the time to understand our motivations, discuss various design options for all the elements important to us in completely renovating the basement and main floor. He provided multiple drawings to help guide and clarify our vision of living spaces and provided input and expertise on construction materials. For example, Jay's concept of moving the stairs going to the basement was key to re-envisioning the main floor to improve flow and open up the space.

With Jay's assistance, we assembled our project scope documents and went through a competitive bidding process to select a contractor for the job.

The 3 month project started out fine but the contractor soon started missing deadlines and our worst fears were realized when the project went completely off the rails to the extent that we had to fire the person after the job was still not completed 12 months later. Thank God for Jay who provided professional, moral, and emotional support over a period of several months to help us survive and eventually recover from our nightmare of a contractor.

We consider Jay a friend of the family and have no hesitation in recommending House Calls to friends and neighbours.