Royal Basements Inc.

Thank you Rene and Juan for the great work.
The work was done in July. I called Rene when I saw the work that they have done for a friend - his review with pictures is here as well. He came and saw what needed to be done and gave me a reasonable estimate along with a tentative date which was acceptable. They were true to their words from start to finish and did a lot of things (small and big) with no extra charge for instance: the understanding was that I would provide the materials, still Rene came with his truck and both Rene and Juan helped me carry the drywall, the wood and the engineered wood for the floor in the basement. Anyone who has done this knows that it is hard work but they were smiling all the time and never mentioned a word about this - THANK YOU GUYS!
The work was done in the time that was promised, they were always asking for feedback and Rene proposed some different ways of doing the ceiling that were much better than what I was thinking. He was always friendly and polite and when I was insisting on something to be done as I wanted to, he would always oblige, for instance, the design of the floor layers was unusual because I needed a bit of spring in the floor due to the fact that I want to have the basement as a studio for martial arts and fitness. Again, no extra charge, and the work was done as per my instructions and I am very happy with the way the floor feels to the barefoot touch.
Another note, Rene never insisted on any payment schedule, in fact, I was the one who proposed a payment plan with half the money paid halfway through and the other half after completion and he had no objection.
All the work was done well, in time, they were careful with the materials with no waste and the mess and dust were always kept at a minimum.
I would hire Rene and Juan again in a heartbeat for any renovation big or small (oh, by the way, they also stripped the caulking and foam insulated a window of my house properly to make sure there will be no leak in the basement from that window).
Thank you very much Rene and Juan!
Bogdan
June 2020 - I thought about Rene and Juan a lot while exercising in my basement gym during the quarantine. The weather is good now but in all the cold and windy days before the summer I was able to keep on training and the floor lives up to the expectations, the whole renovation was a good idea and a great execution!

Once again we used Royal Basements for our home renovation projects and were extremely happy with their work. We knew after they had done our basement reno that we would use them again for our future projects. Rene and Juan Carlos are easy to deal with and very polite and professional.
We had our kitchen counters and bathroom counters replaced with Quartz and they are amazing! Price was great and the installation was seamless.
Rene and his team also replaced our old hardwood floors with new hardwood. From ripping out the old flooring to laying down the new floor in our entire 4 bedroom bungalow and putting in new baseboards the entire job took a week and we are extremely happy with the work. We will be hiring them again again for our next project for sure!!

Great experience throughout the whole project. Rene showed up punctually for the estimate and gave me a quote, a start date and a duration. They started on time, finished on time: 3.5 weeks for 600 sq ft, including a large recreation room and a bathroom. They took off the old insulation, sealed 6 cracks of which only 1 was visible during the initial visit, added new insulation and came with great suggestions which improved the usability of the rooms. I loved the positive attitude when I asked for new things and overall I am very happy with the end result.

We purchased a home in the summer and decided we would finish the basement. We wanted a gym, bedroom, bathroom, and kids playroom. I interviewed a few contractors and found that René was the most receptive and helpful of them, and even helped to design the layout of the basement.

We went through the contract and René was pretty open to the changes I made... We actually went through a few iterations, and finally came to an agreement. Actually René was really great about it and even did a few things over and above what we agreed on.

Work started and the guys showed up pretty much every day on time and ready to go. The guys are great and trustworthy and we felt safe with them in our home... We really appreciated all the extra help they did for us, since we fired our bathroom contactor and rene and Juan picked up the work and finished tiling our upstairs bathrooms!

All in all I was very pleased with their work and will hire them again for another project.

The basement turned out great and we love our new gym.

Thank you to Rene, Juan, and the rest of the crew!

Royal Basements were the contractor of choice to renovate our basement which had been destroyed by flooding in July 2013, Rene and his team transformed the basement into very usable space with a fantastic bar. What impressed us so much with Royal Basements and Rene was that commitments were made and always honoured on time and that the work was completed properly and without any hassles. Rene was always punctual, all of his workers were polite and helpful, and if any little extras were required they were completed willingly and quickly. The job was completed in time. Since that huge renovation we have had the confidence to call Rene to complete another smaller bathroom project which again was completed on time and looks great. Having had some previous bad experiences with contractors I would not hesitate to recommend Royal Basements. They do great work!!!
We are happy with the results. Royal Basement team did great job and we called again for minor repairs also and all is perfect.

We had a flood in our basement, Rene came to our house to gave Us quote. Pricing and timing were very fair and they were flexible to work with our schedule.
Royal Basements team did a wonderful Job.

When the time came to renovate our kitchen, Rene came to our minds. I have known Rene for at least 24 years and I knew he was into renovating kitchens, bathrooms, and basements. After knowing Rene for so long I can say that he is a honest, hard working, and all around good person. We had a good idea of what we wanted to do in our kitchen but my wife and I were impressed by the advice Rene could give us from his experience. Rene's advice made sense and was very helpful, he pointed out flaws with what we had originally wanted and suggested ideas which did make our kitchen look bigger and more modern. Rene acted like a very professional consultant, taking us step by step through the renovation process.
We are very happy with the result, the work was done efficiently and on time, we felt that Carlos and Rene tried their best to make the experience as comfortable as possible. Considering renovations can be a very uncomfortable, we feel very satisfied with the workmanship, and cost of the project was excellent for what we got. Rene's associates, who made and installed the kitchen cabinets, were very professional. Just like Rene and Carlos they covered many important details that resulted in an excellent finished product.
Overall, we feel blessed that our money was well spent and we will hire Rene and Carlos without hesitation for any future projects. Rene earned our trust with his honesty, attention to detail, and professional character. We are 110% satisfied and would recommend him to anyone looking to renovate.

Tiling Nightmare! Flooded our laundry room!
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Nice guys -until we refused them a 2nd chance at re-tiling our upscale kitchen after botching the 1st attempt (crooked tiles, unlevel transition) then they threatened to walk off the job.
We had many projects lined up for Rene but his easy going attitude soon disappeared when we told him we did not want to go through all the dust again in our new house! These guys might be ok for basements but according to the professional tilers we talked to “they knew nothing about tiling properly!”
1. Never checked if floor was level (it was), yet tiles went from 0" to over 1" of cement causing 18" tiles to dip & sink!
2. Never checking tile quality (installed crooked curved tiles -not rectified)
3. Failing to add extra screws into the sub-floor for strength & reduce possible squeaking.
4. Rene’s personal method of watering down grout “so it slides beneath tiles” is completely incorrect resulting in washing out all the colour!
5. Rene said he couldn’t help the tripping difference between hardwood and kitchen tiles -yet the professional tiler we had after him succeeded!
6. When we caught them dumping a pail of cement water down the laundry sink,
they said it was “only water” yet you can see from the photo it was cement & clogged our laundry pipes causing 2 floods!
7. Left our backporch full of broken tiles, wire & cement!
I also injured my hand badly trying to drill a hole for a water pipe that Rene had failed to do.

Rene admitted he was unhappy with his tiling & told the tile store he would right the problem -but he refuses to honour his work & reimburse us for his damage ($3072.80 bad tiling job -$1760.54 his garage work = $1312.26 . When I said my wife & I would seek reimbursement from the court, His last comment was “lets go to court.”
We will see Rene in court if he does not want to reimburse us for the damage he caused. Homeowners should not be worse off from the contractors they hire!.

1. Get project details in writing with deadlines. 2. Don’t use them by the hour even if Rene claims “it is a better deal” as it was $670 more! The only freebies came from us: cases of water, cookies, cds, posters...

Rene and Juan of Royal Basements are highly recommended. They are so detailed and fast not sacrificing quality. Shedule is spot on. They know what they are doing. Very courteous and easy to deal with. They go the extra mile in doing "small" things free of charge. Payment is not an issue. They will collect once they have done their work. We will definitely hire their services on our next project. 10 -star rating definitely!!!