Belknap Builders

Jule S.

We had a pretty terrible experience with Billy Belknap. He was in charge of remodeling our master bathroom. The scope of work included removing old tub and installing a shower in its place, tiling the shower and the bathroom floors, replacing the toilet, replacing the vanity including sinks and faucets, painting walls and ceilings, and adding a new cabinet in the bathroom. We provided all of those materials.
Billy is a very nice guy and treated us very well (at least at the beginning). When I talked to him before hiring, he seemed very knowledgable, stated to be a contractor for 30 years and provided good references. I think those references and the reviews I've read about him are fake. The experience with him was nothing like people described. He also claimed to have employees that have worked for him for over 12 years. Sounded like a great contractor, so we hired him.
First, he said it would take about 2 weeks to complete the job. Well, it took 42 days. It wouldn't be a big deal since we are not in a rush and also understand that there can be discoveries in the project that can cause delays. However, all of the delay was due to his incompetent workers and his inability to manage them.
The problems started when tile work began. We were out of town during it and when we returned 3 days later, we checked the ""finished"" tile work and it was a disaster. They were crooked (cut job was horrible), unevenly placed, raw/unbullnosed edges were sticking out. I could've done a better job than this. I called Billy to let him know about the issue and he was blaming that the tile was not straight. Are you kidding me?! Even if it was true, why would you continue with the job if you know that the final job won't look professional. I don't think he even bothered coming to check on the work and was arguing without even seeing the work. When he came over, he eventually agreed that the tile needed to be ripped out and redone. The tile worker was replaced by another one. Billy also admitted that he has never hired previous guy before. I thought all his employees have been with him for 12 years.......
So we had to purchase a second set of tiles. The second worker wasn't any better. He didn't know how to cut the tile properly. Wasted more than a half of it. Still placed it on the wall crooked and unevenly. He blamed Billy for not having a new built wall straight. Billy blamed tiler, etc. So this tiler quit right in front of us! And Billy just left our house without saying anything, without apologizing, nothing. How professional...
We had to rip this tile out too and purchase a third set. Luckily Billy reimbursed us for all extra tile. Thanks Billy!
The third tile guy was very good. He did an excellent job. He bullnosed the edges of the tiles correctly and finished the job properly. Of course, Billy did give him some ridiculous instructions and did make some of the edges unbullnosed and added baseboards instead. Doesn't look horrible but it's not what we wanted and he didn't consult us.
Next Billy decided to squeeze the vanity into its place. The walls weren't painted yet but he still wanted to install the vanity. The vanity has legs and bare backs, so one can see that walls aren't painted. I told him to get the vanity out and paint the walls first as one should. It's the same thing as me not cleaning below the refrigerator because nobody will see it. Well, I will see it and it's not a work of a professional. As they were reinstalling the vanity, they broke our marble backsplash. Billy didn't tell us anything about it; we noticed it and called him. How unprofessional. No communication to his clients. Luckily he found a similar backsplash to replace the broken one.
Shower glass installation didn't go any better. The sealant was smudged all over the edges. Again, I could've done a better job. But I decided to pay the professional... He said he'll fixed it and never did. I called and texted him and never heard back from him. I guess if we have any other issues with his work (any leaks or breaks, etc), there's no warranty on his work. Once you pay him, you won't hear back from him.
Floor tile is all scratched up because they installed it first and then dragged all other equipment through it. No fix was offered.
Marble vanity counter was scratched. They didn't cover it as they continued other work. No fix was offered.
I really could go on and on about things Billy did wrong. But this review is already long and I hope everyone who reads it gets a pretty clear picture about his work. There's no way he's been doing this job for more than a year. I think we were his first clients, at least for the work that he signed up for at our house. He may have done other remodeling projects but not bathroom. He really had no clue what steps needed to be completed prior to going to next steps. We aren't contractors but we knew that tile was installed incorrectly, we knew that walls need to be painted before installing any fixtures, etc.

Angela M.

We received a referral for ""Peter Belknap"" from a good source. His name and work is even found on houzz dot com. So when he couldn't fit us in my husband turned to his brother, BILLY. Well these brothers are no were alike in the level of quality they will offer. The quote was higher than others bids but we added skim coating to the whole house so that would have increased the quote. The team he brought in was ""David"". I found out from Billy -after the fact- that David is not his preferred crew. I would grade the the finish product as a B, BUT THE MESS AND MISSING TEXTURE areas are why I'm giving this review a grade F- We were promised trash removal but they didn't. 2+ trips to the city dump added to the cost. We are still cleaning up sheet rock mud and texture over spray almost two weeks later because the crew didn't put down any coverings nor did they cover all the light fixtures. They also used spray adhesive to the areas they cover but now all my window frames have sticky residue that requires nail polish remover to get the sticky off. I have 18 foot high windows this is going to be an on going challenge. :-(

Billy came back to correct the several missing texture areas and two other issues (David's crew had forgot to tape and float a seam and also forgot to properly sand down an extra thick skim coat area which left a huge bump in the ceiling).

Unfortunately, Billy's fix efforts made the issues worse as he just re-textured. So now there's double texture to the areas around the areas that originally were missing texture and the ceiling bump is now extra extra thick, plus he didn't tape and float the forgotten seam but just sprayed more texture on the area hoping to hide the seam (WTF??) We had knock down texture but BIlly's sprayed work was more of an orange peal which also clashed. It looked bad. See for yourself and if you want a half way done right job he's your guy with weeks of clean up: Billy Beknap is your guy.