GUTHRIE CONSTRUCTION

The project went extremely smoothly from beginning to end and we are very pleased with the results. Joe is the owner and he was very responsive throughout the entire project. He explained his choice of materials and kept us up to date on when he could begin the work and the job was completed on time. Joe is a great guy and very easy to work with. We plan to use him for other projects we need done as well. We highly recommend him!

All in all, it went very well. Joe was responsive in all cases. Once he began the job, he was there every day, making progress. Subcontractors--plumber, electrician, tiler, plasterer--were also excellent. Except for finishing touches, the work took about 6 weeks, which met our expectations. The finished bathroom is fabulous. My one criticism is that Joe is not very tidy. (I was spoiled by a previous contractor, no longer doing this work, who was extremely neat!) All in all, a good job and I would definitely hire him again.

I hired Joe to do a small renovation of my kitchen which included: lowering kitchen bar to counter height, professionally paint all cabinets in white, remove old countertop and install new one, install new dishwasher, change light fixtures, add a backsplash. Joe did an amazing job in renovating my kitchen. The people he works with are very professional. I really appreciated the communication from Joe always giving me a status every day per my request. Him and his team covered the floor and cleaned after themselves every day. He discussed with me the finish that I wanted and would not hesitate to call his guys back if it wasn’t up to my satisfaction. When I had issues with my new dishwasher ordered from GE and they agreed to deliver a new one but wouldn’t install it, Joe was kind enough to come back even though the rest of the job was done to do what GE should have done. I would definitely recommend hiring Joe as your contractor.

Joseph built a brand new walk-in closet for me and did a fantastic job. The job involved knocking down walls, closing off existing doors, building the closet and shelving, and painting. He was careful to make sure he understood exactly what I was looking for in the closet layout and I am so happy with the result! I would absolutely hire Joseph for another job.

Joe did an excellent job and the work was pretty neat, always looking for the best finish. The budget went up a little bit but it was close to the starting one and the price was very reasonable for the work. Good at listening and always trying to please the customer.

We had ask Joe to leave long before the project was finished - 9 weeks into a project that he promised would take only 6. His costs kept climbing as things that were supposed to be included suddenly were not. He came back to us and asked for more money before the contracted "rough-in" was complete. Turns out he could not find subcontractors to do the work at the bid price. Joe is a messy worker - treking dust and dirt through the house without any attempt to manage this. Using our bed as a sawhorse with the last straw - I moved his tools to the basement and asked him to leave.

We had a major renovation of an old house with multiple units. Joe was great to work with. Honest, reliable and great attention to detail. He always made sure to keep us informed as to where we were in the process and made sure what was being done was exactly what we wanted. All of Joe’s subcontractors were professional and courteous and showed Joe a great deal of respect. We could not be more happy with the job Guthrie Construction completed for us.

We hired Joe for a few projects over the summer of 2017: building a new front staircase, a rear landing and staircase, and rebuilding a deck above our front porch. He also installed new gutters and fascia on our porch, shored up the porch framing, and re-trimmed part of our basement. He had good, inexpensive-but-structurally-solid solutions for various problems that were uncovered during the demo stage (notably a rotting sill). I found him a pleasure to work with, kind and straight forward. He was responsive by text concerning work timing (he didn't always show up when we expected him to, but he usually kept me informed along the way; he was juggling a few projects when he took on ours). He keeps a clean worksite and works quietly. More importantly, he does really fine, careful work. Joe did most of the demo, concrete pouring, rough framing, and painting/staining himself; he works with an excellent finish carpenter on some of the detail work. He's old school: his estimate arrived as a faxed handwritten sheet. As with any renovation work, the more precise your plan (materials, dimensions), the more precise the final cost. In our case Joe ultimately underestimated by about 10%-15% on the work he ended up doing for us: I would say that we "owned" half of that overage, as our plan changed a bit as we moved forward. I also think Joe missed a few details that should have been accounted for in the beginning. But I'm more than willing to accept the additional cost to work with someone who does reliably good work. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend him, and hope we can get him back for some other projects in the future.

We were really pleased with the results of this work. It looks exactly the way we wanted it, and was built with high-quality materials and excellent craftsmanship. Joe was a pleasure to work with, very professional, responsive to phone calls and texts, showed up on time, had highly skilled people working for him. He definitely went the extra mile to make sure we were satisfied!

Great work. Would be my first call every time.

The closets look great and have more storage and access.

Joe was great to work with.  He is professional and talented.  <br>All work was complete and on time. <br> <br>His rates are fair and the work is exactly what I wanted. <br> <br>When he did my roof in the past he was able to come within 2 days to start it and it was completly done in 3 days. <br> <br>I will call Guthrie Construction for all my future projects.

Joe is great to work with; he is dependable, does what he says he will do. His prices are very reasonable; he is honest and stays within budget.

Mr. Guthrie was very willing to problem solve and did quality work within our budget.

after a spring and summer of stalling from the insurance company and a summer of unresponsive or fitfully responsive contractors, Joe was a godsend.   He answered every call, every question promptly.  quality of all the work ranged from outstanding to very good.  clean up was from excellent to fair.  communication was off the charts.  highly recommended. <br />

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We've used Guthrie Construction on two separate projects and were very happy with the outcome of both. We found Joe Guthrie to be a hands-on contractor who does a lot of the work himself, works patiently paying close attention to small details, and sets a very high standard for his work. <br /> The first project was the replacement of a section of ceiling after it had been water damaged. Joe said he would preserve the undamaged parts of the existing ceiling and crown molding and he would make the join between new and old seamless. And he was right, the join was and still is undetectable. <br /> Joe did such a great job on that first project, 6 months later we called him for another project. This project was a staircase, flooring and baseboard job. Joe used sub contractors for the stairs and floor, they did a very nice job, no messing about, and the baseboards and paint work was done by Joe and his team. Like the earlier ceiling job, the quoted price was more than fair given the excellent quality of the finished product. <br /> I would highly recommend Joe, he's an experienced professional with many practical solutions, he's a no-nonsense, hard working individual and seems to have a good bunch of sub contractors at the ready for the more specialist aspects of the project. <br />

Joe was the most responsive of all the contractors I called (there were many) and came within a few days to offer a quote. His estimate was reasonable, and he was willing to work with me on the price to help meet our budget, so we went with him. He also worked with our insurance company to help get us additional funds, which allowed us to do some extra remodeling work. The project involved reinforcing joist and beams, replacing a ceiling, erecting a wall with french doors, adding blown-in insulation, flattening a pitched floor, adding new vinyl flooring, electrical work, painting and trim work.  <br /> Joe and his crew showed up when he said they would (and he was honest about letting us know if there was a day he couldn't come, so as to not create false expectations) and completed the project in a very reasonable amount of time. He offered some very good ideas about what to do and not do, and the quality of the work was superb all around. The porch now looks infinitely better than it did before! <br /> Perhaps Joe's best quality is that he is a straight shooter and does not "upsell" or price gouge, which we've experienced multiple times in the past with other contractors. There were several times when Joe could have pushed for a more expensive option or unnecessary work (past contractors in a similar situation would have said "you have to do this or "x" bad thing will happen or "y" will look terrible, and by the way it'll cost $3k and since you've already signed up with me I know you're not going to get another contractor in here to compare that price to see if it's high or not"). Instead, Joe gave us ideas about how to do something in the more cost effective manner, which I very much appreciated. <br /> In sum, Joe is responsive, very reasonably priced, does great work, and honest. Extremely rare to get a contractor with those 4 qualities! <br /> <br />

Joe and his crew were superb. This job was not easy, nor was it small. It was a big one, and it took over a month of their time working through some of the coldest days of the winter. The crew was reliable, friendly, and most importantly they did exemplary work at a much lower cost than the competition. So what exactly did they do:  <br /> My home was built in 1915. It was sided in stucco, which was poorly done and in disrepair. It was a total eyesore. Joe came over to give me a quote, and it came in far below all other offers. I was pleased. They worked day in and day out through all of December and most of January to get this done, installing strapping, wrapping in insulation and Tyvek, installing vinyl siding, and wrapping all of the trim in aluminum. My home now looks brand new, and is by far the nicest looking place on the block.  <br /> Hiring Joe turned out to be one of the best decisions I've made during my significant home renovations. And I'll be sure to hire him again for projects in the future.  <br /> <br /> <br />

All details are contained under "What did the provider do?" <br /> <br />

Our experience with Joe Guthrie went extremely well.  He does excellent work and he's very thoughtful, straightforward, honest, careful and thorough.  As is bound to happen with such jobs, additional needed work was discovered that wasn't evident at the start. His approach gave me complete confidence about asking him to go ahead and take care of this additional work without checking with me about every detail.  I found I could trust him to charge fairly for the additional work and to let me know when any of it might be substantially more than we'd anticipated. <br /> <br /> Recently, we've recommended Joe to two other people, who have also been very satisfied with his work (and that of his two helpers).  We've also had him back to do additional work - something that has been very rare in my experience with contractors.

Joe Guthrie gave estimate in Spring 2011, and we confirmed that work would occur in July 2011.  He and 2 workers began on July 13, then he and 1 worker continued on July 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, and finished on July 22.  We have many large rose bushes climbing the sides of our house, and the workers were careful to cover them with tarps, and not damage them.  We also have large rose of sharon bushes in the front, right up against the housed, and although I trimmed them considerably, they were still a bit in the way, but the workers cheerfully worked around them without damaging them.  Neighbors keep stopping by to compliment us on our new paint job, and we're delighted with how well it went, and how it looks.  On the very first day, the workers were smoking in our yard and some smoke drifted into our house, but when I explained this was not acceptable, they right away agreed to go across the street, downwind, to smoke, and we didn't smell smoke in the house again.  It was extremely hot during much of the work, and although we offered them ice and iced drinks, they politely refused, pointing out their own cooler and supplies.

Joe began the job very courteously and neatly back in mid-March 2010. For most of the job Joe was very timely and came pretty much continuously, unlike our experiences with prior contractors. We greatly appreciated and were impressed by his commitment to minimizing inconveniences to our family during the demo by actually entering and exiting through the second floor window of the bathroom being renovated during the demo, and for as long as possible until the window needed to be sealed up for finish work. As I mentioned, this job was extremely complicated, given the age and condition of our house, as well as the nature of all the alterations that needed to happen. I'd say that our interactions with him and his work were excellent through the rough inspection and up until he subcontracted out the tiling work. Sadly, our relationship with him went very sour toward the end, largely because he broke two major fixtures. When it came time to install the double sink/vanity, he and his plumber caused about 6-7 major gouges in the drawer/cabinet door faces while bringing it up the winding staircase, despite my warnings that they probably needed more than 2 people to transport it. Then he chipped both 10mm tempered glass shower doors upon the first installation. The kicker is, he chipped the replacement pair as well! Thankfully for him, we have amazing warranties on both the sink and the shower doors so that, if you can believe it, the company for the shower doors were willing to send us a third and final pair of shower doors for free albeit with understandable suspicion. We're still waiting for the new cabinet doors and drawers to ship to us. During this time he also chipped about five tiles because he used a regular drill bit to install the shower doors and towel bars, but in the end we let that go. His general response to all of these mistakes was strong defensiveness at best and/or straight out denial (until I found the glass shards on the floor by the shower doors each time). Throughout this stormy period, my husband and I worked very hard to respond with patience for Joe, but this frustration, combined with his expressed resentment that we was not making as much profit from this job as he'd expected (he subcontracted pretty much all of the finish work, which is probably what gouged his budget the most). In retrospect, he probably did underbid for our job, but rather than speaking with us about it, his resentment toward us was too great to hide. In one of our last face-to-face conversations with him at the final inspection, Joe couldn't hold back his fiery temper and said to my face that something I did was "stupid". When I challenged him for such an insulting word and speaking so unprofessionally, he went on to say that we were "such a pain in the a**". Although we gave him most of the final payment, we needed to hold back the cost of the bathroom vanity and shower doors until he could re-install the new parts. We called him about 2 weeks ago when the doors arrived and still haven't heard back from him, which is a bit worrying, and we're still waiting on the vanity parts to arrive. We're hoping for the best ending with Joe with these finishing touches, meaning that he hasn't ditched us. It's unfortunate for him that he has so little control over his emotions, because he has so much potential for building a successful business otherwise. He probably shot himself in the foot by 1. underbidding, 2. subcontracting out too much of the basic carpentry work, 3. becoming careless toward the end, 4. his fiery temper. If you can believe it, we still do wish him well. We were hoping all along that we could give him an unabashedly shining review on here, but we also need to be honest as well. Please see his many positive qualities, too. It might amaze you, but I still think he's worth hiring if you go in prepared to maintain strong boundaries with him, and to keep communication lines open. Also, I think he'd be much more cooperative and respectful working mostly with a male homeowner. Interestingly, all of his disrespectful and offensive interactions were with me, but he was pretty much always respectful with my husband (to be fair, I was the one mostly managing the project day-to-day).

JOE CHANGED HIS MIND ABOUT THE AMOUNT OF WORK HE WOULD DUE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE PROJECT. HE DIDN'T GIVE A WRITTEN ESTIMATE WHEN I ASKED. HE DID NOT FINISH THE WORK BUT DEMANDED TO BE PAID IN FULL. HE TOOK NO PRECAUTIONS TO LIMIT DUST AND MESS. HE DID NOT CLEAN UP. HE DAMAGED MY FRONT PORCH AND BATHROOM GROUT.