Earlier this spring, my wife and I were looking to have our outdated basement renovated. We were sick of the cold tiles and looking at the 70's wood panelling. While researching contractors on Homestars we discovered The Home Improvement People. We read several outstanding reviews and decided to call them up. To our surprise, Dan came over a few days later to have a look at it. He is very friendly and professional and was able to give us a quote on the spot. We got a good feeling from him and asked him to come back with his contractor, Elia, the following week. We went through the basement with Dan and Elia, telling them what we wanted and they came up with an actual quote that we felt was very reasonable and said they'd be able to start demo the following week and that the whole project would take about 4 weeks.
The actual demo only took 1 day and it was quite surreal to see the basement opened up to bare, concrete walls. There were a lot of people that first day but the workers worked fast and they were very polite. Elia was always available by phone or text to answer any questions and usually responded within 5 minutes. Him always being available helped us to trust that the job was going to be finished on time. Christian had all of the framing done on day 2 and was running speaker wire and setting up the bar area.
We did find a small water leak in one corner of the basement and Elia was on top of it and had his waterproofing guy, Vlad come to look at it that afternoon. The guys from Umbrella Waterproofing did a great job and had the problem fixed within 3 days.
The electrician came to wire the outlets and pot lights but the rest of the reno was done mostly by Mark. He really worked hard, never left for the day until he was satisfied and took a lot of pride in his work. Once the final bit of carpet had been put down, it had been almost 4 weeks exactly. Right on time! We asked to delay putting in the railing for the stairs a week so we would have an easier time getting furniture into the basement. When we were ready we called Elia and they had it put in.
With a big job like this we were a little worried going in, but the Home Improvement People gave us exactly what we wanted and made the whole experience pretty painless. We finally have a place that we can enjoy as a family and entertain friends. We look forward to working with The Home Improvement People again on our next project and would recommend them to anyone (and already have.)
