Back in December, we told you the story of Angela and Gino Costabile and their horrific experience with a contractor who jilted them for a loss of $50,000.
The Costabiles had waited 37 years before finally being ready to invest in their dream kitchen.
Quy Ly came highly recommended by their tiler, who had been reliable, so when he asked for a second deposit they overcame their misgivings and provided the funds.
From then on all they got was reassurance and pictures of items to be installed. When they finally lost patience, they learned there were no items at all. Ly then became entirely unreachable, his voicemail box permanently full.
After reading the story while working at an Oakville News contributor’s home, Andrew Whitty and Aidan Saffary, two young and capable home renovators who had just joined forces to strike out on their own, starting Cardinal Hills, felt bad for the Costabiles.
Maybe, they wondered, there is a win-win here: the Costabiles need a cost-effective way to get their kitchen finished, and we could use the publicity: we want to be known for our trustworthiness and respect for our customers. And we’d like to do something to restore their, and the general public’s, faith that there are hard-working honest people in the home renovation industry.
What if we were to finish their kitchen for the cost of materials only?
Well, what sounds too good to be true often is, and it took some persuading to get the Costabiles to trust Cardinal Hills. After all, once bitten, twice shy. But they were disarmed by the forthright approach Andrew and Aidan took, and decided to take the chance.
Today, the kitchen is finished, the Costabiles are thrilled, and Oakville News is delighted to show the before and after.
"The kitchen was completed beautifully with so much attention and care!" says Angela Costabile. "Andrew and Aidan were wonderful to work with. They cared about the outcome."
Without the original article by Ben Brown, and the initiative of Andrew and Aidan, this happy ending would not have been possible. No one would have known about the Costabiles’ plight, or if they had, their faith in human nature would have been further eroded by the story.
"When we first read about the Costabiles' problem we knew we wanted to help. Stories like these are unfortunately all too common, ruining the reputation of honest contractors that have their client's best interests in mind."
"Knowing that the Costabiles would be hesitant about bringing in any other company after such an awful experience, we reached out to Oakville News to provide them our number, to allow them to contact us on their own," says Andrew Whitty.
According to Andrew, the required work was a little more than met the eye from the original photos that he had seen. When designing kitchens, he points out, there are hundreds of variables that need to be taken into account.
Everything needs to be planned out in advance regarding drawings, material used for the cabinets and doors, appliances, clearances, the paint type and colour, all the way down to the hardware and types of screws that you will be using to fasten it.
"I quickly realized a lot of these factors were overlooked by the original contractor," says Andrew. "There were countless clearance issues, quite a bit of missing hardware, and the entire kitchen had 3 different tones of white paint, the framing and moulding sticking out like a sore thumb from the painted doors."
"Nonetheless we were determined to make everything work for them without having to tear out and replace or repaint large amounts of the kitchen, which would have driven up the cost of their renovation."
"Matching all of the existing components of the kitchen was the most difficult part. Without knowing where the original materials were sourced from, it became tricky to match the new components that we’d have to install."
"When it comes to matching door style/sizes and paint, it needs to be spot on," he continued. "We went through quite an extensive process to make sure that was the case, making multiple samples from multiple different suppliers to find the perfect match."
"It was an exciting project that presented many new challenges and opportunities for growth," writes Aidan. "Off the bat, we quickly learned that we may have been a little optimistic with our initial timeline. There were a few aspects of the job that would typically be simple, and straightforward to complete."
"Unfortunately, when completing a job for a 'contractor' with little or no work ethic or organization, a simple task can quickly turn arduous. Thankfully with homeowners as patient and accommodating as the Costabiles, we were able to overcome the various challenges and provide them with the kitchen of their dreams."
"We'd like to thank the Costabiles for putting their faith in us to finish this project, as well as Oakville News for connecting us with them, and educating its readers on what to look out for when hiring contractors to do work in their homes."
Cardinal Hills’ Andrew and Aidan are not alone: there are many honest and hard-working tradespeople. But their willingness to work for nothing in this case is going the extra mile. We hope what goes around comes around, and their efforts will signal the beginning of a thriving business venture.