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This is false advertisement. They want your money upfront even if the project is not finished. Signed a contract almost a year, it took them months to start, always with excuses, don't return your calls, and when ownership needs money, that's when he send someone to collect a check even if the job is not completed. The project is not 75% completed and they are demanding final payment. Owner (Stephen Ferrando) decided to stop the project because he considers an electrical job to be completed when the electrician hangs a fan and connect the outside light. For your information, the electric cables and switches are exposed (no fault to the sub-contractor), no drywalls yet, no air conditioner, still missing a door and windows and he is demanding final payment. He gets one star because that's the lowest. This company should be on the minus side. Warning, they talk a good game and once they have a contract, all bets are off! By the way, when they cause damage to your property, it's never their fault.
If you want proof and more information about the comments from the owner you can call me at [protected] and I will be glad to provide you with photos, dates and facts, phone conversations with Comfort Rooms, suppliers, subcontractors, etc.
Signed contract on August 28, 2008 and today is May 29th, 2009 and the project is not completed. Ferrando received final payment February 27, 2009 and signed a statement where he agreed to have the sunroom (10'x26') completed by March 31, 2009. I have to say it, the guy is a liar and dishonest. It has taken almost two months to get a window and he doesn't care because he already got paid and the hell with the customer. If you need something done, please stay away from Comfort Rooms of Florida. Don't become another victim.
We also are homeowners who contracted with Comfort Rooms of FL, Inc./Sanford, FL. We have been in contact with other homeowners with similar situations. We contracted in May 2008, however after contacting our City officials in mid-July08, as to why building permits not issued. We received correspondence that "no permit had been filed for...they had no drawings". This was after we were led to believe, by Comfort Rooms personnel, throughout the month of June08 into July08 that our drawings "were at the City's Building Dept.". Permits weren't issued until first week of August 08, once we complained to Comfort Rooms of FL, Inc.
It is now January 2009...our project, which consisted of a large open-air, covered veranda "with Tuscan fiberglass pillars as roof supports and tile flooring"...and ...attached block-wall MasterBath off of our existing MasterBedroom...is only about 40 to 50% into progression. We have had consistent problems with this company, with having paid over 85% of funds toward contract's payment schedule. Majority of finishing materials & furnishings, pre-selected at contract signing, NOT PURCHASED to date! Also at present, recently knowing that subcontractors "have not been paid"; contractor eliminated office personnel; is attempting to make un-authorizied changes; and attempting recently to "impose additional charges, that were previously documented as being "at no charge to customers". Attempting to do minimal work, in an effort to try to acquire the final payment. Which "as specfified in contract is not due until the final electrical inspection is done", which means when all electrical fixtures and outlets are finished. We have received confirmation of information from authorities that if there is no drywall up and yet electrical fixtures installed..."the project WILL NOT PASS for the final electrical inspection"!
No further monies/funds will be issued to this company, until they meet all our specifications including our fiberglass pillars/columns (not leaving the temporarily installed aluminum posts), as was originally contracted, and according to our preferences; their responsible repairs completed; we receive confirmation of payment of all funds due to the subcontractors, with waiver and release of lien documentation; and a Final Contractors Affidavit signed and notarized.
Note to other victims/consumers: File a Consumer Fraud Complaint Form with your local County Division (who work in relation to the State Attorney General's office)...also...File a Complaint with the FL Department of Business & Professional Regulations...both departments have their forms online. Also, as advised by our City authorities, contact your County Licensing Dept. We did not know about these measures, until significant people were literally put into our path, with wisdom and guidance to researching everything out. We are grateful to the Lord for them, and to them for their awesome help.
Fellow Consumers...Please take heed to all the Warnings and Complaints, that have been posted on this site and others. We have all been exceedingly stressed out, having lack of sleep, and consistent aggravation, and as with our project..."still unusable in its start & present status".
In all Consideration for all the others victimized and the security of future consumers...We pray "we all" have been of help to you.
The Facts Please: The contract was signed in Oct 08 for a glass room. The customer read the contract (has a copy) and agreed to the payment schedule. The job has progressed as usual and passed all inspections to date. The company was closed during the holidays and were waiting for the customers windows to come in from the manufacturer. The windows came in and the customer was immediately notifed that the windows were in and the company was coming out to install them, install the drywall & complete the project. The customer was notified in advance of the schedule and the work date. The customer was also notified that his next payment was due according to the contract. The customer agreed to make the scheduled payment and when then workers showed up to finish the job there was no payment. The customer was called and asked why he did not leave the payment and he said he forgot. The company then asked if he could get the payment to the job site that was due and he said no. At that time the company decided that the customer was violating the scheduled payment agreement and would have to leave the job as it states in the contract. The electric is exposed because the snap trim that covers it was not installed because of the customers negligence to make his scheduled payment.To this day he has not called the office to make payment arrangements. He owes the company a very large sum of money. The company has sent the customer (3) letters, (2) of which were certified and the customer has refused to sign for them. The company has tried with all of their resources to contact the customer to rectify this situation and complete the job. Instead of contacting the company to make payment arrangements & get the job completed he has chosen to take the time to write lies about the company. These are the facts to the situation. The customer also told me the job was beautiful and he was very satisfied with the work. We have many photos of the job if you would like to view them write to comfortrooms@aol.com I hope this has shed some light on the truth in this situation. We as a company don't get a complaint board for customers but maybe that is food for thought.
The Facts Please: The permit package was delivered to the City in a timely manner. As it states in the contract that the customer reads and initials at each clause that we can not be held liable for the building department or how long they take to issue a permit. We even send a letter out to the customer after signing the contract detailing the constrcution procedure. This job was started in September o8 it is a complete bath addition, plus a patio cover and concrete. To say the job is only 40% to 50% complete is a lie. This is what has been finsished to date. The concrete & footers (passed inspection), the block walls (passed inspection), the roofing, the rough plumbing (passed inspection), the tub & shower installed, the rough electrical (passed inspection), the firring and interior framework (passed inspection), the breakthrough and tear out of the existing closet and drywall, the trim work in the existing tear out, the (3) windows in existing home replaced and the french door replaced in existing home, the patio cover installed, the concrete finished, the door to utility removed and blocked in, the dryer duct relocated. All inspections have passed to date. This job is 85% complete and the customer has told me she is very happy with the work. Now let me explain what we have been going through with
this customer. She has constantly screamed and yelled at my workers and myself. She has had erratic behaviour during the entire process and is very rude at times. She was calling my employess and the company 10 to 15 times a day not including the barrage of e mails she sent on a daily basis.This whole situation started over a tub that she wanted. The tub that was priced in the job that she originally picked out would not work as the inspector would not pass it.The tub that had to be ordered cost $400 more and she wanted us to pay for it. We refused as this was not the tub priced in the job. Mrs A immediately started yelling and screaming that she should not have to pay. This went on for (3) weeks delaying the entire job. She finally relented and paid the difference for the tub. Then we ran into a situation with a roof leak. She insisted that it was our roof leaking. We explained to Mrs A that we believed she had a leak in her existing roof and it was leaking onto our addition. We worked on our roof (3) different times trying to locate the problem. We finally decided to to examine the inside of her existing roof and found an obvious problem.The roof was leaking at her ridge vents. We took pictures from inside her attic of the plywood damaged in her attic and proceeded to show it to her. At that point start started screaming again & yelling saying her roof was not leaking even after seeing the pictures. We advised her to get the roof repaired. She finally did that last week. This delayed the job for almost (6) weeks dealing with this roof situation. We could not complete the next phase of the job because of this (drywall) and had to put the project on hold until this was resolved.
In relation to the doing minimal work to obtain payment. Every job has a certain schedule that the work needs to be completed in. The payments are based on that schedule. So how can you do minimal work to receive payment when the payment schedule is outlined clearly in the contract & related to the work. Yes companies do need to get paid that is how we stay in business. Do you go to work for free? Why is it a sin to want to get paid what you are owed? As far as not paying any more money that is your perogitive as the customer but you cannot expect the company you hired to continue to work on your home if your not abiding by the contract. That is why we write contracts to try and stop these problems from happening. We honor all the agreements we sign but we expect the same from the customer. As far as not paying the subcontractors these are the same subs that work for us all the time i don't think they would be if theyweren't getting paid. We have a different pay schedule with all of our subs some do not get paid until after the job, that is normal. We will also galdly give the customer a release of lien and staisfaction payment after completion of the job and all payments have been made according to the contract. These are the true facts to this job. If you would like to see photos of all phases of this job please e mail us comfortrooms@aol.com and you can judge for yourself. We do over 200 jobs a year to satisfied customers. We receive 6 to 10 referalls a month from satisfied clients. We also have a book over 6 inches thick from satisfied customers rating us 100% excellent. We do not and unfortunately cannot please everyone although we do try. If you have what we feel is a legitimate complaint we will fix it or redo it. Do you notice that not one time in either of these complaints did they mention poor workmanship or terrible quality. Their only complaint is the timeframe of which they themselves propegated by not paying on time or not fixing their own problems with their home. I again hope this sheds some light on the truth to these customer complaints. Thank You
Customers have a problem paying there payments. So they like to lie and play games to attempt to get out of it. We should start a message board for wronged contractors!
Please go to www.myspace.com/comfortroomsofflorida click on photos and then the file MR. VICTIMS LIES to see for yourself that he is a liar. Note the date of the contract which was the end of August not 1 yr ago. Also note the dates the permit was issued and the job started. (more Lies by Mr Victim) Also note the payment schedule agreed to by Mr Victim and he has yet to contact us or make his payment. Check out the (3) letters sent certified mail trying to resolve this and finish the job. Again no reponse at all from Mr. Victim but he has taken the time to write lies on the internet . Shame on you Mr Victim. Who is really the victim. We are out $5650 and are probably going to have to resort to letting our Attorney file suit I would say we are the victim. Thank You for your time and for keeping an open mind.
I know firsthand of Mr. Ferrando's lies and dishonesty. I've heard of bad contractors, but this guy is the worst.
Already May 2009 and still waiting for completion of a sunroom. Comfort Rooms has been paid in full (Feb 28, 2009) and agreed to have it finished by March 31, 2009. This guy will say anything to push the blame on someone else. I don't believe his story about satisfied customers because there is a laundry list of people not satified and I am one of them. About the photos, here is a guy that wants a photo for everything that his people do. He has to have photos of every little thing he does so his 6 inches book keeps getting bigger. A person/company with a good reputation, confident or nothing to hide doesn't need photos to prove any point. I am so disgusted with this project and dealing with this company. The project is put together using lots of caulking to make it look good, but behind all that caulking is sloppy work done. I will end it here because I want to hear his story and I don't want to tell you everything all at once.
We are yet another victim of STEPHEN FERRANDO ...my husband is a sub-contractor and did work for him and we got screwed out of alot of money. This guy knows what he is doing and has made a career out of stepping on people for his own monetary gain. He agrees to a price for work to be done, and then when you are close to being done with the project, he starts picking apart your work, and deducting...or he loses it and throws you off the job so he doesn't have to pay the balance owed to you...and he does it all legally by getting you to sign waiver of lein documents...and you sign whatever because you want to at least get SOME of the money owed to you...this guy needs to be exposed for the deceptive rear ender that he is. He is a bottom feeder. BEWARE OF STEPHEN FERRANDO AND COMFORT ROOMS OF FLORIDA
I am currently fighting with Comfort Rooms over a project that was not completed properly and where he tried to add "upgrade" charges on basic items. He has now placed a lien on the house. Anyone with similar problems, please call me to discuss what happened with your project so that we can determine whether there is a pattern and practice here.
Thank you.
comfortroomsproblems@hotmail.com
I am a subcontractor that has worked for Comfort Rooms of Florida, Inc for over 5 years and have always been paid on time and in full. He does have strict standards and has all subs sign an agreement detailing these standards including the quality of the work. I have also witnessed him telling the subs that they need to be professional and do the work correctly or they won't get paid. I have seen alot of the work that these subs are saying is done correctly and i can personally vouch that if they didn't get paid it's because they did lousy work. I also saw the work Tile Mac, Inc did and if they call that professional I would beg to differ. I was also present working at the job when the tile work they did had to be torn out and replaced it was so bad. I know Mr Ferrando has taken pictures of the bad workmanship and pictures of the tile after it was installed properly. He also showed me checks for $5500 that he paid Tile Mac, Inc. for thier substandard work. The pay that Tile Mac is saying they didn't get paid was for defective tile that they "the professionals" shouldn't have laid to begin with. These guys come on here and tear a company and individual down with lies and don't tell the whole story. I have seen these subs do lousy work and then still want paid. Then they try to threaten with these web sites to try and extort money out of him. If they would just do the work correctly to begin with they would get paid. Shame on them for the lies and inferior work. Beware of them.
The problem here is not so much the subcontractors. Ferrando will try to get the cheapest labor possible and expect miracles from them. Two different subcontractors started their job and it was completed by someone else because they had problem getting paid. Ferrando sent two young kids to finish the unfinished jobs and also to put some drywall and it was real sloppy making the holes too big for the electrical outlets and the same guys came back to put tape around the oversize holes. One of these two guys installed a crown molding that at the end of the walls, a short piece had to be added and it was sticking out. I told the young kid to leave it the way it was that I was getting somebody to fix it. Everytime I saw these two young guys, I would worry because they had no clue of what they were doing. They and Ferrando left garbage inside the sunroom and around the yard, which I had to pick up after them.
The comment made by comfortroomsproblems is made by Ferrando himself. There is no subcontractor that worked that long for him. I can recognize the write up from miles away. Ferrando will not pay for lousy work, he said that, not me, but expect homeowners to pay him even if the work/job is substandard or completed. Ferrando was paid almost 75% of the cost for the project and not even 50% of the work was completed and he was demanding final payment. I refused to pay and 3 days later, he liened my house. It took a year to finished a 10'x26' sunroom and if it wasn't for the State, I would probably be without the sunroom. I can't say that I was pleased with this company; too many problems, lies, unreturned phone calls or documents. I would like to know who is this subcontractor that's been so lucky with Ferrando.
Anyone who wants to confirm any suspicions about Mr. Ferrando can probably just pay $9.95 for an internet search of his past and you'll see where all he has moved around. Just find all the outstanding judgements against him from his stops in North Carolina before he fled to Florida. His wife Debbie assists his scams. He demands payment in full when the job wasn't half complete (sound familiar?), he was always robbing Peter to pay Paul. Sometimes he would take the advance from the next job and complete the work (usually half-assed... he would hang out at the drywall section of Home Depot and wait for someone to come by that he could strike up a conversation with and offer day wages to do drywall work... a complete stranger!), but many times the work was never completed because the customer took him to small claims court. He was vandalized twice here (that I know of) by former subs who he stiffed. He ripped off a husband and wife attorney in South Charlotte, they decided he was not collectable and not worth the disruption to their lives. He ripped off another family who took him to court, and the first judge assigned couldn't hear the case because THE JUDGE had a claim pending against Ferrando! He moved north of Charlotte and again found controversy when he ripped someone off in a development deal, then he moved to Florida. He's lived in Casselberry, FL, Altamonte Springs, FL Winter Park, FL State Road, NC Debary, FL Huntersville, NC Terrell, NC Charlotte, NC Winter Springs, FL... he'll move along soon, he knows he can't stay long in one place.
The strangest thing? It almost seems like it would be less effort to just fly right and treat people fairly and do a good job. He always lies, is very dramatic about how its always the other person's fault, and goes to great lengths to stay ahead of the game.
I am one of the people from North of Charlotte that got screwed over. Won in court against him, but judgements are only as good as the paper they are written on. Lost my house, my wife and sense of self thanks to him. Sucks to see he is still up to his games. I hope all works out well for you guys.