Remodeling your house is a major investment and a headache. You may spend tens of thousands of dollars to make your bathroom or kitchen appealing and modern. While the work is in progress, you may not have water in your house or quiet during the day to work from your home office.
Still, most of the time, the inconvenience and expenses are well worth it for the homeowners. Not only will those remodeling projects improve your quality of life after their completion, but they will also potentially increase the future asking price on the property when you sell it in the future.
Unfortunately, decisions by the contractors that you hired could diminish the returns that you receive on your remodeling investment. If the contractors substituted cut-rate materials for the high-quality materials you originally agreed on, their work could start showing signs of wear within weeks or may just look low quality. In some cases, you may have grounds to take them to court for changing the supplies.
What does your contract say?
Homeowners who want a particular kind of floor, designer fixtures or prestige countertops often include specific details in the contract that they negotiate with the construction professionals that they hire. Going over your contract and any written communications with the contractor can help you verify that the materials used are not what you agreed upon.
Sometimes, contractors will approach homeowners and ask them to fill out substitution request paperwork because certain materials are unavailable. If you did not approve a major substitution in right, the contractor’s decision to replace materials with something cheaper could be a breach of your contract.
You could seek compensation or replacement work
Homeowners have several options when ruling on major breach of contract issues, like construction defect claims related to the materials a contractor used. Sometimes, the judge can order specific performance and have the contractor redo the work with the right materials at their own cost. Other times, especially if there are concerns that the work would be substandard, they could order damages to the client did not receive what they paid for from a contractor.
Learning more about your rights as someone paying for residential construction work can help you hold a contractor accountable for violations of your contract that diminish the value of your property.
