Bancroft Custom Homes, Bancroft Homes, Bancroft Construction, Claude Bancroft Homes Custom home project over budget, over timeline and never completed. Poor business practices. Hartville, Ohio
I had Bancroft Custom Homes of Hartville, Ohio build a house. The experience was not good. While Bancroft is a craftsman, and does beautiful construction and woodwork, the business side is lacking. Our home took more than a year over the original timeline. The un-forseen costs were in the tens of thousands of dollars. Ultimately the project was never completed and the builder ended up abandoning it and having to return a minor amount of funds. Not enough to cover the completion of the home and correction of problems however.
We have now been in the house for about 2 years. As it stands right now, we still have multiple leaks in our roof that started during construction. A wet basement. Doors and windows that do not seal or lock, Electrical issues, and an HVAC system that does not work properly. These items are just the beginning of the issues we have experienced.
We chose to go with a local custom home builder because of the horror stories we heard about the big national builders. Clearly that wasn't a good decision, because with a very small builder you have little to no recourse when things go poorly.
If you are considering building a home, and plan to use a custom builder, I strongly recommend you call references. Choose a builder that builds more than 2 or 3 houses a year, and plan at least 20% over budget in terms of time and money because the builder will not be able to see all costs. The way the fine print in their contracts works is that the customer is responsible for all changes, mistakes, and cost over-runs no matter whose oversight it was.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Debbie & Gary
Akron,Ohio,
USA
My comments about Bancroft Custom Homes
#2General Comment
Tue, April 28, 2015
After reading the complaint letter that someone wrote regarding Bancroft Custom Homes of Hartville, Ohio, I felt I must write and tell of the very positive experience that we had with Mr. Claude Bancroft of Bancroft Custom Homes. Last year we decided to add a very large addition to our house to accomodate my mother who was moving in with us. Bancroft Custom Homes was referred to us, and after meeting with him, we decided to have him build our addition. Our experience was very different than the person that wrote the article about Bancroft Custom Homes of Hartville, Ohio.
Claude Bancroft is a high quality custom builder who is also a gentleman who is courteous, professional, and a perfectionist in everything he does. He is a hands-on builder who was on the jobsight each and every day. The people he contracted to do the rough, heating, electric, plumbing, etc. were all very professional, trustworthy, polite, and did excellent work. We were very pleased with all the workers he surrounds himself with.
When I asked Mr. Bancroft who would do our finishing work, he said "I will". He is maticulous in his work and we were very very pleased with the job he did. All of our workwork was sent to finishers to be stained and finished, and Claude himself did all of our workworking, put our solid hickory dining room floor in himself, and built a huge vinyl deck off the back of our home and addition. The result was a beautiful addition on our home for my mom to have "a house of her own" attached to ours!
Claude was polite, trustworthy, punctual, and I never had to worry about him at my house working when I wasn't there. He was very considerate, and also was very thoughtful in doing extra things for my mom that accommodated her in ways I had not thought of, for example, the type of door handles that would be easier for her as she ages, high toilet, large shower, walk-in closet with shelves for her purses and shoes, etc.
The contract we signed with Mr. Bancroft was written exactly as we had discussed. Nothing was changed or hidden. When we added or changed things (and we did quite a bit), everything was discussed and charged exactly as we agreed. He was very fair and honest. As a matter of fact, when I wrote the very first downpayment check, I misread and wrote a check for $16,000.00 instead of $1600.00. Mr. Bancroft called me right away and pointed out that I had written the check for too much money. I knew then that he was a very honest man.
We now have a beautiful addition, and everyone who has seen it has been extremely impressed with the quality of his work. If we ever do anything in the future to our house again, or would ever build again, we would never call anyone else but Claude Bancroft with Bancroft Custom Homes.
I had never met Mr. Bancroft before meeting him to discuss the addition we wanted built. But we feel now that he is not only our builder, but also a friend! I would ABSOLUTELY recommend Bancroft Custom Homes of Hartville, Ohio to anyone who is interested in an addition or a new custom home!
Debbie