Beware…if it sounds too good, don’t do it, walk away!
Be careful if you decide to sign a contract with this company. I encourage you to do your research on this company. Sort Yelp reviews by; newest first, filter by rating; one star and see all the similar issues and pay attention to the unprofessional business responses. Mr. Elias Mazloum contractor license has been revoked, you can look this up on the Contractor State License Board (license 924081) and the business is now working under Ms. Faten Mazloum’s contractor license, their business model has NOT changed!
We contracted for 12 weeks, complete home remodel, including plumbing repipe. I worked with Richard, the salesperson, for a few months, before signing the contract. Elias and Richard made a lot of promises and commitments to get the contract signed. The company MISREPRESENTED and failed on every level, timeline, promises, commitments, poor quality of materials (Home Depot defect/returns), poor workmanship (handypersons from Craig’s List,), non-license professionals. They do nothing custom as promised, my project looks like a DIY gone wrong.
We were adamant that all cabinets be custom built and made in the USA, this was non-negotiable for us. Richard said that the cabinets would be custom built in their shop in Huntington Beach, CA, they do not have a shop in HB. Cabinets were delivered in boxes from Malaysia. The cabinets are flipper grade or lower, worst cabinets ever! Make sure the contract/SOW clearly states custom cabinets, manufacturer/brand of cabinets, etc. Cabinets are cracked, chipping, dents, marks, non-aligned properly, etc. flooring is failing and everything they touched looks like a DIY project. The poor quality of materials and poor workmanship does not equal the premium price I paid.
Starting with week 1 demo, I should have seen the writing on the wall, workers showed up 2 days the first week, a week or so would go by and no one showed up, this was the pattern for several months. No project manager on-site, Elias rarely physically inspected the project after each phase, approved their employee’s work, only via facetime or photos.
Make sure that permits are pulled as they will take every short cut possible, even if it is a code violation. I am thankful that someone turned our house into the City, as the electrical work in my house was truly unsafe.
Our wonderful experience with CA Kitchens. My wife and I started this journey of a major kitchen remodel last year around June when we started to contact contractor after contractor. We had a general design in mind and a set look and feel. When CA Kitchen stopped by for a look, we showed our general sketch, few model pics, and inspiration. Every contractor before and after that said ok; no suggestions no real comments. When it came to CA Kitchen, they started suggesting some really good concepts that I have never thought of. One was relocating the fridge to the other side of the kitchen to get 11ft countertop rather than breaking it with the fridge. That idea never came to us but it made so much sense and made use of every Ince of space. This incident wasn’t isolated but what I really appreciated right out of the bat, was that they felt like a partner in the design using years of experience to take our ideas to the next level.
We visited CA Kitchens after that to go over the sketch, and look at material. We weren’t 100% ready to pull the trigger thought the sketch-up was exactly what we wanted and price was comparable. Owner noticed we were hesitant and didn’t push to sign or make a decision. He recommended we call a few more contractors and keep that process going until we are ready. That level of confidence and appreciation to our comfort level wasn’t re-expereinced by any other contractor. The rest were generally incredibly pushy to sign right then and there; we also used what we learned from CA Kitchen as the base design for the rest. Sure enough we felt the other 5 or 6 lacked the experience, we dealt with sales people and not experienced designers. A couple months passed we were ready to pull the trigger, with a caveat we wanted to blow out a wall and expand on the design CA kitchen came out with. We called setup another in-house meeting to talk about the wall blowout, the custom subzero fridge cabinet that will be flanked by two navy cabinets across the main. CA Kitchen then modeled nailed the changes. They said they want an engineer out to make sure the load bearing wall that the safety of the family was their number one concern. We signed that night.
Since then anytime CA Kitchen said they were going to come out to work on the project; they were there early and on time. IF anyone worked with contractors you know that is a rarity. Engineer came out ran measurements, every professional they brought were on top of their game. Best Drywaller I have seen and we have a flat no textured wall (very evident if done wrong). The team had an eye for detail, and any issues that arose was dealt with and managed. I will post the pics of where we are at now. Appliances will be installed later in the week. Once the fridge comes, CA Kitchen will add the custom cabinets and will provide additional pictures. Anyone looking for a teammate in the process, who appreciates safety with the build, quality, timely commitment, and contractor who will bring every inch of expertise to design the kitchen of your dream do not look any further.
Included a few pics of the journey the before/during/after(almost complete) Will add more as we complete.
Update Officially complete and couldn’t be happier
We are excited to work with the team here. One of our friend referred to us . Beautiful showroom and amazing collection of all kitchens and bathroom materials.
We are guided and educated by the owners . We were by the knowledge and experience they have . Very satisfied.
