Complaint Review: Macore Construction

This report is written as a result of frustration as well as to WARN CONSUMERS of home remodeling services in Los Angeles about shady, unethical and probably illegal doings happening in the fore mentioned. Most of the homeowners reading this have probably needed some remodeling service performed on their home in the last couple of years. Most of you have been tricked and taken advantage of. This text is written as a warning to any homeowner from California who is in danger of getting taken advantage of.

Recently, I have had an unpleasant experience of hiring the Macore Construction Company (supposedly from West Hills, CA) to perform a full bathroom remodel. After a somewhat pleasant conversation with a barely-English-speaking office manager, I was sent a sales person by the name of Ben Shlomi, accompanied by his colleague whose name I cannot recall. This is when the hunt started.

As soon as they saw an elderly-looking lady (yours truly), the sweet-talking, pushy salesmen immediately tried upselling me with roofing, electrical and retrofitting services for my house (which had already been retrofitted less than 3 years ago - sic!). Since I consider myself a somewhat intelligent person, ex educator and somewhat up-to-the-times and tech-savvy, I did not fall for this and explained Ben that I am only interested in the services I contacted them for in the first place.

Instead of giving me a straight estimate, I was asked to call my husband in (a bit sexist, no?) since I guess that as a female I am not considered a decision maker in their world. When I told them I live alone, with no children, and my husband has passed away 12 years ago, instead of letting the whole thing go and just giving me an estimate I asked for from the start, they presented me with a bunch of presentations on their computers why I HAVE TO retrofit my home again. At this point I got very annoyed and asked Ben Shlomi to pay me another visit tomorrow, as I would have to talk with his manager.

I easily found their web page - <http://www.macoreconstruction.com/>  - along with the telephone number. I got the same person as when I was requesting an estimate, who notified me that I can’t really get to the owner and that he would connect me to an RMO, which just annoyed and concerned me further.

Since I was notified that Macore Construction was listed on the CSLB, I (with the help of my genius nephew) easily found out that the owner’s name was Bijan Lavi as well as found and dialed his direct line. He picked up the call, I explained the problem. Instead of offering an apology, Mr. Lavi (or someone presenting as him) started talking very rudely and condescending.

At this point, I was 100% sure I will be going with an another general contractor. But as a retiree, I had much time on my hands and wanted to find out more about the whole deal with Macore. After 10 minutes of my nephew’s internet magic, we easily found out that Mr. Bijan Lavi also owns the Affordable-4-U-Construction  from Encino, CA. What really made a shocking discovery was the salesman from that exact company - Affordable-4-U-Construction - showing up on my doorstep a day later, offering free estimates since they were “canvasing the area”. Yeah, right.

Later on, I also found out that the same people were also involved with Dream Builders Remodeling (person in charge pro-forme is Joseph Peretz), Noga Pool - <http://www.nogapools.com/> and many other home remodeling companies in Los Angeles.

So the deal is - 1. Find a gullible elderly person 2. Upsale and exploit the client 3. If you fail, send a salesmen from a different company. After this I have called Macore Construction once again, after denying any connections to the other company, I asked them not to send any more salespeople or I would call the police. They’re other listed salespeople are Meir Sagiv, David Azoulay and Cohen Roy. So, (senior) buyers beware of Macore and do your homework when finding your remodeling contractor.