Don’t let Jeff Whitley (Custom Homes of Chattanooga LLC aka Custom Home LLC aka Southeastern Construction LLC) build your home until you read this!

Greetings: My name is John Rewcastle, Jr., Jeff Whitley designed and built our Custom Home. We were sold on the aspect of building

a Custom Home versus a Spec House because we would get exactly what we wanted and Jeff could build it to our specifications.

Read below and see what you think.

Myth # 1 - Since Jeff is a contractor, he has a select group of subcontractors that prefer to work for him instead of an individual like yourself?

Truth – Jeff doesn’t even know some of these contractors when the process starts:

Exterior of house we were quoted the finish for the exterior of the house, when the house was ready to start the subcontractor wanted extra money, by asking a builder supplies vendor Jeff found Steve Mitchell. Steve Mitchell said he would have done the job whether the person was contractor or not, he is interested in the work.

Roof – The roofing subcontractor that started on the house was not the one that finished. For some reason Jeff had another roofing expert look at the roof.

This expert replaced certain shingles and then … then roof started leaking.

Telephone / Network / Alarm / Central Vacuum – As CTS Protective Services – Ringgold GA was installing the wiring they didn’t check the placement of electrical outlets to match them they just put them where they wanted. We were asked where we wanted the wiring box, then they proceeded to install it where it was easiest for them to place it (in the garage). After they had trouble installing the dustpan vent in the kitchen they walked off of the job. A second contractor fixed the Central Vacumm, ADS Security finished the Alarm System, and I had to finish the Network / Telephone wiring.

Concrete – since we were having concrete floors installed (which was new to Jeff) he had the same person do all of the concrete including the driveways. Again he had never worked with ProPattern before which proved to be a lengthy, low quality, painful ordeal.

Myth # 2 - Only check the progress of your house once a week.

Truth – Jeff said would catch anything wrong on a daily basis so that you wouldn’t have to worry about it. WRONG. Several times I saw things wrong and waited for Jeff to take care of it. End result it didn’t get taken care of. Jeff was too busy building a new office to pay any attention to his paying customers.

Exterior of house we told the Stucco / Rock subcontractor Steve Mitchell to only put rock over a couple of windows. That is what they did, we told Jeff that it was wrong, by the time Jeff took care of it, then had already done 8 more windows the WRONG way.

Telephone / Network / Alarm / Central Vacuum – Going back to Myth #1, If I had checked everyday, I would have had the wiring box located somewhere in the house besides the garage.

Insulation Looking at the picture or our very costly investment, there are really two places to blow insulation in the attic (the right side and the left side). Choo Choo Insulation made their blitz into the house and blew insulation into the attic on the right side of the house. They DIDN’T even look at the left side. I had to tell Jeff to get them back out and finish the job. Could this be that he doesn’t communicate with his subcontractors?

Myth # 3 - Jeff Whitley has several subcontractors / suppliers he works with to get you the best price.

Truth – Jeff doesn’t care how much it costs you, only how convenient it is for him.

Building Supplies Jeff uses Chicks Lumber Company on Dodds Avenue not because they are the best price but he says their service is great. We were told that he had some bad luck with some of the other suppliers in town. Everytime we (the owner of the very costly investment) we found Chicks to be about twice as high as a competitor and then Chicks Lumber want to tack on a delivery charge. Example: Pine tongue and groove for the great room ceiling: Chicks Lumber $2 a linear foot, East Brainerd Lumber $1 a linear foot). When we went to build the fence around the yard, Chicks Lumber (which Jeff had already spent over $100K with) was higher than Lowes per piece price. This was for materials to build 600+ feet of fence. Windows Jeff supposedly got us a deal from Chicks Lumber on vinyl windows. The company went out of business before we could get our screens.

Cabinets Jeff’s pick for cabinets (Parker’s Quality Cabinetry) wanted over $20,000 to build all of the cabinets (Kitchen and 3 bathrooms) all without counter tops. We found Cabinetmakers in Collegedale and then built everything with the addition of a Butler’s pantry with custom music dividers for less than $10,000.

Yard The subcontractor that Jeff used for site prep also did the seeding of the yard. He went to Ace Hardware and bought 50 10lb bags of seed. What a deal, not only is the seed that he bought probably old (because it never took), he could have purchased 5 50lb bags from the co-op that is just as close at Ace Hardware? I had to later spend my kid’s spring break reseeding the yard.

Sheetrock Jeff supposedly got us a deal on sheetrock. Then the installers nailed the sheetrock. I didn’t even know people still did that? Needless to say we had a lot of different places that needed to be touched up such as:

Myth # 4 - Jeff Whitley takes into account your preference for a subcontractor.

Truth – WRONG!

Termite Treatment I informed Jeff more than once that we wanted to use the terminate company that treated our previous house. He didn’t even call them.

Myth # 5 - Jeff Whitley gives you a 3 Year Warranty

Truth – The contract is not worth the ink or time used to sign the document.

After trying to get Jeff Whitley to fix our very costly investment, he started not answering his phone and told the BBB that he went out of business 08/31/2009. Not Bankruptcy, just out of business with more than 8 months left on our very costly contract. He did this to keep from fulfilling his contract(s).

He has since started back as Custom Home LLC, Custom Homes of Chattanooga LLC and Southeastern Construction LLC all at a different address and still not honoring his contract:

Myth # 6 - Jeff Whitley is your project manager

Truth – WRONG! If you have read the prior information, you can see that he would get a grade of a D- for a project manager.

The house was over 25% over budget and three months later than he said. Jeff told us to sell our other house when the sheetrock went up. We waited a couple of weeks past that and then it took 6 weeks to sell the house. We still ended up staying in our camper for 3 months.

The spreadsheets that Jeff sends only show the most current variation, not what happened in prior updates. The customer is required to compare all of the sheets to finally find that Jeff’s estimates are off.

This is an example of just the cleanup of the project:

He was paying people $25 dollars an hour to pick up garbage.

Myth # 7 - Jeff is a contractor that can accept criticism on your largest investment

Truth – You definitely have to tiptoe around Jeff’s ego. I called Jeff after one of my weekly inspections and told Jeff ‘ I am tired of people coming over and showing them what my contractor f****ed up.” According to Beverly Whitley (Jeff’s much more knowledgeable half), this comment hurt his feelingsL.

Jeff send this message in response:

I am not sure where your anger comes from or what exactly it is directed at, but I really don't feel like it should be directed at me and my wife, nor my subcontractors.  I can't understand how someone I had dinner with a month ago could call and leave the messages that you do.  Everyone has tried really hard to please you and will continue to do so, if you have any problems with the home.  I do not feel it proper for you to call my home on a Saturday and call me and my wife a "F*** Up" or you yell at me on the other end of the phone.  Respectfully, I must say I do not want to receive another call like that one.  I have had one too many from you.  Respectfully, if you can not speak to me without going off on me, do not call.  Or maybe wait until the next day.  But do not call me and leave such as that on my phone again.

Obviously Jeff can’t hear, I did not call Jeff or Beverly a ‘F*** Up’, even though his middle intial is ‘F’.

Jeff also received some emails text messages about how I am glad that he didn’t sire any children after he supposedly went out of business.

Myth # 8 - Jeff Whitley pays attention to detail on your largest investment.

Truth – WRONG. This is an example of a list of things left to do (three months after Jeff said the house would be finished):

Interior

• There is another leak stain in the ceiling above the stoop at the top of the stairs. Repaint:

• Also in this picture notice the nail sticking out and the paint along the wall that needs a second coat.
• Repaint the water damage in the living room it is all along the wall with the arches as well as the wall against the French doors:

The painting to cover the water damage under the A/C vents was not finished.   It needs to be touched up with something besides a sponge.

• The Attic entrance in the Master Bedroom Closet needs to be replaced with wood and painted:

• The fingerprints need to be touched up in the master closet:

• Finish the ceiling around the kitchen light:

• Door stoops need to be cleaned,
• Window sashes and the top of the windows (spackling) need to be cleaned,  No one got their money’s worth for the cleaning people:

• Did we pay for the doors for the fireplace in the master bedroom?   If we did we want them,  If we didn’t we don’t.
• Finish the light fixtures in the detached garage.
• Remove plastic from the door stoop entering the house from the garage.
• The yellow paint on the wall (side of the house towards detached garage) looks like it needs a second coat of paint.
• The sheetrock under the window in the kitchen needs to be touched up:

Exterior

• I’m no roofer but I believe the roof shouldn’t be tacked down like it is with the flashing showing above the dormer where the leak occurred:

• Remove paint from the floor in the screened porch.
• Along the exterior there are quite a few places that need another white coat.  Especially in the corners.
• Finish cedar around the columns.  The wood has been stained and here for 2 weeks.

• When is the front door going to be replaced / stained and weather stripped?   Someone (Clay?) came by from Chicks on 7/4 and said the door was in, he said they needed to see how the hinges were attached.
• Light needs to be moved and shutter installed on detached garage.
• Side door to detached garage needs to be painted (isn’t it part of the project).
• Goof Rings installed (I know they are being ordered).  We wouldn’t need them if the electricians did a better job of cutting holes. 
• The flashing above the garage doors needs to be trimmed.  This was discussed months ago:

• Should the flashing along the dormers be trimmed?
• Is there anything that can clean up the stain (from Tyson) on the driveway?  

• How many cracks to the driveway and patio before they start to crumble? (see “driveway crack” and “patio crack”)

• Can we get some paint or something to cover the concrete “splashes” from Tyson against the stucco?”

There is also something pink probably from the staining of the wood.

I would just like someone to go over the house with a fine tooth comb and FINISH!!!

Myth # 9 - Jeff Whitley takes care of punch list items.

Truth – WRONG. This is an example of how his workers made things worse rather than fix it.

He is quicker to say that the customer messed things up rather than fix them:

Sent 9/1/2008 (Only 16 months into a 36 month warranty)

Kitchen Window

The kitchen window frame on the right inside board had a bubble the size of a racquetball under the paint about half way down.

After about an hour, the bubble drained down the frame and pulled the paint in the middle down as it did so. Would this mean there is some leak we can’t see from the window frame?

The bubble is gone but you can see how it has traveled down the window frame. All of this will need to be scraped or sanded and repainted.

09/01/2008

There are a couple of water spots on the right lower corner of the kitchen window. This is the same place where the ‘bubble’ was repaired in the paint. The bubble or its results were just sanded and painted. Nothing was done to see if there was a leak.

I do not think that this is something that we laid on the window seal or I would not have sent it. Also it looks like it came from the window.

This shows another stain / wet area that is showing through.

The picture here isn’t good, but there is a wet spot showing along the underneath.

You can see where the whole window seal is drooping. It is ¾” lower on the right side than the left.

We need this investigated and FIXED not PAINTED OVER.

The reason that I am negative about this being fixed is because of this next example and other ‘Fixes’ that have been done. After Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumb painted in the master bathroom the floor in front of the master toilet looked like:

This is where paint was spilled or ground into the floor.

Above is a closeup after trying to clean it using floor cleaner. There is no excuse for leaving this, and at the very least acknowledging the SCREW UP.

Since NOTHING has been done about this since February we tried several other solutions. Finally Amy tried Nail Polish remover and this is

How it now looks:

Notice that the paint marks are gone!!!! Since you assure us that you take care of everything, why was this left for us to take care of????

Fireplace in Living Room

There are still paint marks by the fireplace:

That have been there since February.

Do WE need to take care of this or do you think Chris can actually oversee something done to completion?

If you have any questions or want more supporting information John Rewcastle