Contractor no show

Today I finally hit the breaking point with the general contractor. He was supposed to be here 6 weeks, starting March 23. Even allowing for double the amount of time, he should have been done June 23. Instead, we still have holes in the floor, a missing threshold that lets heat out, and unfinished bathroom, no cooktop or oven, etc, etc. He has only been here once in the last month. Last weekend, he said he would be here Tuesday or Wednesday and that the cooktop would be in before Christmas. He called yesterday and said he had to come today (Thursday) after a morning inspection. Today, he didn't even call me (I called him, but he didn't return calls).

We are now looking at some sort of legal action. It's tricky because there are no good options. If we take some action to force him to complete the work, then we have to consider do we really want someone here against their will? I could try to hire other people to finish the work, but I don't know any reliable people and that puts me right back into trying to hire several people which in and of itself takes a lot of time. Also, I couldn't hire someone to finish the work for what is left outstanding on his contract. Due to economies of scale, you pay less in total when someone does a bunch of jobs than when many individuals each do one. One the contractor has a crew out, it is easy to add more work. So, we are kind of stuck, but I have been keeping records for over a month of all his flaky behavior so I do have that. I also did some poking around on the state contractor license site, and one of the first steps in any sort of complaint or action is to notify the contractor in writing that you are disatisfied (I guess my dozens of phone calls stating the obvious isn't enough). So, tomorrow is the deadline. If we don't have satisfactory action by tomorrow I will send him a certified letter outlinining my concerns.

On a positive note, we did meet with the first landscaper today. He was nice, but really thick. I repeated at least 50 times (I'm not exaggerating!) how high the patio was supposed to be and he kept missing the point. This happened with a few other things too. I just don't think I could work with someone who is so thick about simple things. But it was good to meet him, and at least get our feet wet with the landscaping. We learned some things, and now feel that we at least have a scope of work to start with, and we have his bid that we can compare to others.