I hate these posts. I don’t even know what I hate the most about them, that there had to be a terrible experience or that I have to document it somewhere it can’t be taken down or erased so that if someone searches any of the identifying information, they can be found before someone else gets screwed over. I’ve gone back and forth over whether or not to put this up, but since we’ve been ghosted after requesting the voiced contract, you could say I’m over this crap and want the information out there in case folks are doing due diligence before hiring.
Really long story as short as possible- we wanted to have a custom gate made for our weird little archway that leads into the courtyard. We wanted to be able to lock up the house basically at that archway. This wasn’t a small amount of prep work; we had to remove brick planters, have new concrete poured, easily about $2k spent just getting to the point that we were READY for a gate. We also added a roof over the courtyard so it could be a fully enclosed structure.
The original courtyard plan, with a little tiny gate that might deter… well, a corgi, shown.
We had started working with Daniel Amezcua in January to discuss the overall plan, let him get measurements, and put down 1600$. 2-3 weeks, he said, and he’d be ready to install. Great, we thought, we’re on our way to the courtyard/sunroom of our dreams by February 10th or so.
February went by, then March. One day, he installed two black panels, so we’re on our way, right? WRONG. We’d asked for a gap to be left at the bottom to let water and debris out while we were pressure washing… that didn’t happen. The panels also bow outward in a weird way, not solidly connected, but we thought it was an unfinished product, let’s wait and see what he has in mind. All stuff we figured we could talk over during the next phase of the project. Well, that’s never happened, Daniel has never been back.
The plywood we supplied on our own not too sturdy, though.
Months go by… no gate, no timeline, a lot of sorry guys, stuff’s happening. But… while I’m sitting here looking at plywood instead of a gate, he’s posting on Facebook and Threads trying to drum up MORE work. And he was using a pic of our half finished project to do it. Meanwhile, we’re having to reach out over and over again to try and find out when our work would be done… the answer was always ‘next weekend’ or ‘by the end of the month’.
He didn’t appreciate my comment on his ad, it has now been deleted. He did manage to respond to my text message pretty quickly, though.
We have done our best to be gracious and patient. All along, we asked for invoices, costs, and progress pictures that we have not received- just pics that are to give more excuses (the plasma cutter messed up and this is really jagged, so don’t think you want to use that, etc). We gave options… $1k back to us, he can remove the materials.. meaning he’d have all the materials and $600 in his pocket for his time.. or.. bring us the gate and we’d have someone else install it.
Radio silence.
So, long story short (too late, I know), make your own decisions about who you want to work with. This has been our experience with Daniel, and I’m sure it’s not universal, but at the same time… I wouldn’t if I were you.
isn’t it interesting how all costs were in perfectly round numbers, and no taxes are mentioned anywhere?
Curiouser and Curiouser 