Custom Remodelers Inc.

We found this company when they were canvasing in our neighborhood. The woman that stopped by our house was very nice, so we decided to meet with them to get a quote for a gutter and window replacement. The salesman showed up on time and was overall friendly. However, it quickly turned into one of those uncomfortable sales pitches that took way too long (he was here for over an hour just to quote one gutter and one window). At one point, he asked my fiancé was he did for a living but did not ask me — felt a little sexist, but whatever. He went on to talk about energy efficient windows, and I brought up how the cost of better U-​factors/​SHGC wasn’t necessarily worth the extra money, as you wouldn’t make it back in energy costs. He was extremely surprised that I, a woman, knew anything about this — I’m an energy engineer that has worked on home performance and weatherization programs for 4 years… He went on to quote us for the work without showing any of his calculations and came up with a random number that seemed quite high. He pushed us to sign right then with a 12% discount, but we said not yet, and he left. The next evening, another salesperson from this company called my fiancé and said that the quote seemed really high (convenient seeing as we didn’t see the calculations the night before). He wanted to come back out the next day to requote, but I was going to be gone, and he refused to come to the house with just my fiancé here (?). Throughout this phone call, he kept referring to me as «The Mrs.», not by my name or Mrs. Last Name or anything respectful.
To sum up: chauvinistic, overpriced, scam.

Multiple high-​pressure sales phone calls from several different local numbers over the last three months. Each time I have told the customer service rep that I am not interested in services and to take my number off of their call list. The last two times I was hung up on immediately. I can promise that when we are ready to do exterior work on our home that I will look elsewhere.

We had a new roof put on a week ago — which went okay except 1. no one told us they were coming that day (it was a Saturday) — we were told it would be the following Tuesday. Well they showed up at 8am on Saturday and we had an Anniversary BBQ planned in our yard that day. We had to cancel it at the last minute. Very disappointing that no one could bother to let us know they were coming out earlier than planned. Our Salesman also told us that they will have the roof done in 5 hours — that they swarm it by sending 10 guys… we got 2 guys and it took them 12 hours to do it. AND (the second issue) — The roof is not done. There are still a few things left to do, and when I called our salesman to ask about it, he basically told me it’s not his problem anymore, and to not call him, that he doesn’t have time to go across the hall to talk to that department, so it’s just better that I call the office to find out why the roof wasn’t completed. We have yet to sign off on anything, because no one has bothered to contact us… I guess the sales guy got his commission so he doesn’t care that the job wasn’t finished. Extremely poor customer service. Well we had originally planned to call them to have more work done in the spring and we had told that to our salesman when he sold us the roof… It was going to be a 2000 to 5000 project. Well we will no longer be using CRI for that project. Extremely disappointed.

OK, CRI came back out to my house… only after I reported them to the BBB and gave them a bad review on Unilocal.They did attempt to fix my roof which we found out was not a roofing issue after all, but a chimney issue causing the leak. They came back at their own expense to figure out where the leak was coming from and they found it and I am satisfied with their help. The only thing I wish was they had offered to do this two years ago after they had put my new roof on. Nonetheless, thank you CRI… finally for finding the leak!

Was looking to replace my roof and was told someone would come give us an estimate, two hours of a sales pitch, wanting us to sign a contract and no written estimate. That would be another person who would come out. They will not get my business.

Do not turn to this company for any of your home remodeling needs. I need new windows and put my number down for a drawing at a local fair. Wrong move on my part… They called several times and didn’t leave a message… When you try to return the call the number is disconnected. Eventually i found a number to call, scheduled an appointment for a few days out, but even after the appt was made they several more calls asking for information about my husband. I reinforced that I was the one inquiring about windows. Not him. Then on the day of the appointment… NO one showed up, no one answered the phones at the office… And when they finally did, I was put on a lengthy hold and then immediately transferred. Finally just gave up and told them to remove my number and that I’d go elsewhere. A company this pushy and then this flaky… and all before even getting a quote? I’m out.

Seedy, high-​pressure Sales Tactics. Continues to call from new phone numbers, despite telling them multiple times that I am no longer interested in getting a quote.
Why do they insist on having your spouse present for a measurement/​quote? Because they are trying to get you to sign on the spot, before you have time to do your homework.
AVOID THIS COMPANY.

If you’re a woman, GO ELSEWHERE!
I’ll start off by saying that I own my house, not my fiancé; I own it and I am the decision maker on projects done to my home. A woman owning a home?! That’s crazy! I know! But I managed to retreat from my kitchen around 3:15 when the guy came over to give me a quote.
I greeted (I believe his name was John) outside and immediately he asked me where my fiancé was. I told him he was at work, that I owned the house and that he would only be working with me today. He said, «well when will he be home???» I told him sometime within the hour, but again, he’s here to work with me only. «Ok well then let’s just wait out here until he gets home.» Um. Seriously?
So we waited. Stood in my driveway for almost 45 minutes. And waited for the man to get here… Because God forbid John have to pitch a sale to a woman…
I’d ask him about their products or if he wanted to go ahead and measure the run while we’re waiting but he wouldn’t answer my questions. He’d just ignore me or change the subject. At one point he asked me if I had a mortgage, which I felt was inappropriate. It had nothing to do with what he was here to do, he was just making terribly uncomfortable small talk. I don’t want to talk about my finances with you, sexist stranger!
So fiancé comes home and John gives us his pitch, and we showed interest. Their gutters seemed good but obviously it comes down to price for us. John asked if we could commit to making a deal today. We said no, we need to get a quote first. We can’t commit without a quote (he hadn’t measured or quoted yet and he’s already hard-​selling). He asked if after the quote we could commit, again we said not today because this would be the first quote we have and we like to get 3. After some arguing, he said, «alright, I’m going to go out and measure and I’ll be right back with your quote.»
The guy gets in his car and leaves.
He just left. No measuring. No quote. No «thanks for considering our company» or «I understand that it’s the best choice to get multiple quotes, we will make our best effort to fit your budget and would love to do business with you»… Just a false promise and an escape.
I’m literally baffled. I’m offended, hurt, embarrassed… This company is despicable and John is a total scum bag. Avoid Custom Remodelers Inc at all costs.

The worst experience with ANY company in my lifetime. Terrible communication and follow through. It’s clear that the salesmen, customer service team and installation team do not work together. I have taken off many days of work waiting for a window to be installed. I’ve been promised an installation twice and waited all day with no one ever coming or calling to let me know they wouldn’t be there. Today I was called and told the team went to pick up the window and it wasn’t made yet. I’ve been waiting for this window since early August. Trust me, save the time and go with someone who is worth their word. This business is pathetically managed at best — if a management team even exists? Terrible terrible terrible! I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s some shady work going on with money since there isn’t any service to follow through. I’m going to report this business to the Better Business Bureau next.

Ignored the no soliciting sign at our house while going door to door. Blamed me for not putting it where he thought it should go when I pointed it out.

When they came to our door to offer their services, they pitched themselves as a high-​quality, no-​advertising way to improve our home. When they eventually negotiated a reasonable price to reshingle our house, we thought we had a good solution. When they promptly arrived (albeit in the middle of a cold winter) to do the roofing, we were surprised but optimistic about their response time.
And then they left the roof unfinished, left a yard full of rusty nails for my small child and dogs to be injured with, used what appear to be low-​quality materials, and have never once in six months responded to any of our requests to fix any of these problems.
I repeat: they have left our house partially-​shingled for nearly half a year, and will not so much as return a phone call to explain themselves.
I cannot impress upon you enough to not use CRI. When they come to your door, thank them kindly for their time and send them away. Whatever deal they might cut you is not worth their inattention and irresponsible ethic.

They have door to door sales people knocking at doors. They came to our door and didn’t even introduce their company’s name. They just pressure you to get a «free estimate». They were very pushy and annoying. I would not go with their company just because they were so pushy. That is NOT a good way to build a reputation. They have called multiple times despite us telling them that we are NOT interested and would not like to be bothered. If you are in the market for these services, don’t support a company like this.

If you’ve read any of my previous posts you’d know that I typically don’t like to write bad reviews. It’s my personal opinion that bad business practices speak for themselves and will ultimately lead to a company’s demise. Well… a year and half later and this business is somehow still around and has managed to piss me off enough to write about my experiences dealing with them.
CRI had a few people come to my house and explain about various home improvement projects they could help me with. After speaking with their sales representative about the costs and timeline I needed to work with I told them that I wasn’t interested. My interactions with this company, I thought, would come to end.
Unfortunately over the past year I have received, almost on a daily basis, phone calls from CRI’s sale people asking me if I would be interested in having them do another presentation for me or if I had any new home improvement projects. I have REPEATEDLY told them take me off their calling list but apparently they either don’t care or are too lazy (or some combination of both) and think that maybe… just maybe after calling for the hundredth time that I would change my mind.
I’m not sure what weird world this company thinks it operates in but badgering a potential customer into doing business with you is a sure fire way to piss them off. Bottom-​line; do not give your name, number, or any information to these ass hats unless you’d like a non-​stop phone party for years (hopefully not) to come…

We had a similar negative experience with CRI coming out to our house to quote us on windows. One thing that CRI did to us that I noticed a lot of people didn’t mention is they LIED to us about the type of product we were buying.
We wanted Lindsay windows. They have 3 different grades of windows, at the time I didn’t know that. The salesman claimed we were getting the highest grade windows. We found out he was selling us the lowest grade windows and charging us well over the price of the highest grade windows.
Unlike some here, our salesman wasn’t too rude or pushy, but you could tell he was bullshitting us and using sleazy sales techniques. He gave us a long tutorial on the company and Lindsay windows. He told us how great the company is and how the company is «raising in the ranks.» He showed us the premium version of Lindsay windows they offer and didn’t mention anything about the other grade windows. He told us we were getting the best and that was it.
The premium version of Lindsay windows is called the pinnacle version. I can’t remember off the top of my head what the lower grade versions are called. He didn’t give us any options. He told us that we should go with single slider windows and go with white because every other option is too expensive. My theory why he wanted us to go with single slider and white is because they already had those windows in stock, were rejects, or customers changed their mind. It was the cheapest route for the company to go.
The guy initially quoted us almost $ 20 000 for 9 windows and 1 sliding door. When we told him we need a new roof too and would be interested if he could give us a discount on both he started to lower the price. First, he said we have a special deal because they haven’t sold enough sliding doors this year. They need to get rid of some and took a small percentage off. Then my Mom told him that Home Depot quoted us $ 7000 for the same thing back in 2004 he started to make more BS discounts and brought the price down to almost $ 14 000. After that my Mom reluctantly said she would do it for $ 13 000 grand and he agreed.
After the salesman left we went on the internet and looked up CRI online and saw all kinds of bad reviews on them. After that I knew we should cancel. The next day my Mom called the salesman and told him about the bad reviews we have read of them online. He again lied to us telling us those were «disgruntled employees». He also said «we should not have done that.» We told him we are canceling. The contract gives you 3 days to cancel. The salesman lied to us again and told us he had already placed the order. He couldn’t have placed the order because the contract gives you 3 days to cancel after signing and they still needed to come out to measure the windows.
The salesman tried to be very warm and assuring to us but he was just a sleaze. He said all kinds of compliments to us and tried to make us feel good but it was all part of the salesman act. We later had Twin City Window come out and they were much better. They told us that they were lying to us about all kinds of things. The salesman for CRI told us there were «lead charges» since our house was built before 1978 and that it was $ 400 an opening added to the price of windows. The representative for Twin City Window said, «anybody who tells you they have to charge for lead is lying.» I don’t know the laws behind lead charges, but in the case of CRI, it is pure bullshit. They use it as an excuse to increase the costs.
Twin City Window gave us an estimate of a little over $ 7000 and that was for everything including the sliding door and we got the pinnacle version. They also gave us info on window the tax credit, something the CRI rep had no interest in showing us. The version that CRI tried to sell us wasn’t even graded for residential housing the Twin City Window rep told us. Who knows if CRI would have even gotten the job done.

They helped my parents remodel their kitchen a few months back and it looks amazing! My mom wanted to make sure I told everyone how much she loved it, so I thought this was the best route!
They are considering a new deck next and will be calling Custom Remodelers again.
Thanks for the great work and for making my parents so happy with the new kitchen.

In 2003, they came to our house in Minneapolis to give us a «presentation» on new siding. There were two sales people who spent an hour or more of my and my (now) wife’s time.
They used a lot of shady high pressure sales tactics, like telling us that they could only give us a great deal that night, and that the guy had to make a sale so he could justify to his own wife and child why he was out late.
Years later we found out that the siding they had suggested was completely unnecessary and would have been a bad idea since we had fairly decent wood siding.
As an alternative we decided to just paint the siding, and its just now showing some signs of wear.

Do not use them! We had a tree fall on our home and used Custom Remodelers. He promised it would not cost us anything and we would get a new deck (with railings). It is now a year later… the work is still not done. They are telling us that railings on the deck are not included, but the insurance company wants them on the stairs — so unless we pay out of pocket… we only have railings on the stairs (looks hideous). They drag their feet and are very difficult to work with. If you use them, GET EVERYTHING IN WRITING… as for me, I will never use them again and am telling all who I know not to use them.