Thanks so much everyone! I called the CCB who told me that regardless of ANY paperwork or contract that my contractor wants me to sign, I have the state right to file a report with the CCB and get money from his bond if need be. In other words, the contract I'll sign will be meaningless because I can still file a claim in the future, regardless. Whew - that makes things a lot easier! At the same time, the contract - written by he and his partner - shows that they're releasing me or at least that's their intention, in writing. That can't hurt. Lascatx - CCB stands for construction contractor's board. I won't mention the cushion, thank you. If the rest of the work goes of without a problem (not holding my breath) I will consider giving my contractor some much smaller amount of money for any work he did that he didn't goof up. Dianalo - thank you! :) Oldhousegal - yes I've looked into him and he has nothing negative on his record. He's been a contractor for 5 years - those are the only two things they could tell me about him - oh besides that he has a $20k bond. Thank you for all that info as well as the link! Shar-az - thank you for your support. I hear what you're saying. The problem is that even the CCB said they can't guarantee that I'd "win" the case because the issues with his work are mostly aesthetic. They'd be more likely to find a compromise for us and I think his walking out the door, giving up his 1/3 final payment is better for me. I've gone through enough stress and awkward feelings that I honestly don't feel like I have the strength left to pursue this further with him and file a claim, even though I understand your point. I truly believe he's learned a HECK of a lot on this job - to the extent that yes he should be paying me as if I were "contractor's college" - haha. I don't think - under these circumstances - that I'm being unusually nice NOT to report him if I get what I want without having to do so. I believe that in the future, he'll think twice about tackling a job that's beyond his ability. Even though he brought it on himself, this was a real nightmare for him and while he's not a good contractor, he's not that stupid, either. He lost a lot of money on this job. The first 2/3 of the money went almost all to sub-contractors, a new electrical panel, plumbing, permits, etc. Not saying "oh poor guy" necessarily but I just don't think he's willing to lose that much ever again - and I do think he learned a lot -the hard way. Weissman - Thank you. The contract that he wants me to sign has a release of lien written into it (not by a lawyer but I think that's good enough). As others here have pointed out, I think I have enough evidence via emails that he couldn't come after me and really expect to have a positive outcome, and I think he knows that. Johnliu - Thank you for making that list for me! Much of what you wrote, I have done, though not all. I didn't send anything certified mail but I have printed-out copies with concise lists as well as plenty of email exchanges. Haha to needing to turn up my b*tch dial. That dial's well used actually, but admittedly not so much when it comes to using it in these types of situations. I have a friend (who happens to be a lawyer) who is SO quick to be confrontational that I find myself just not wanting to be like that. I don't mind being assertive usually (although I admit I've been a real wuss with this guy, in some ways - not in others obviously) but confrontational people seem so toxic, you know? Generally though I agree with you. I will INDEED be getting and checking references in the future as well as checking with the CCB in advance, etc. ABSOLUTELY! Man oh man have I learned a lesson! The guy I got a good hit off of charges a bit much according to a friend of my mom's who is a contractor/designer (I won't work with him because of his personality - long story - but he's very helpful in many respects). He said I think $3,500-3,800, possibly less (he said a week's work @60.00/hour) to repair all the things my contractor goofed up on, plus to remove the cracked farm sink and replace it with the new one, scribing again but a good job, and painting, etc. So on one hand it's less than what I'd be paying my contractor but I'll still meet with a couple of other contractors so I can know how reasonable the first guy's price is. Athomesewing -thank you! As I wrote at the top, it appears I don't have to worry after all. :) Buehl - I didn't research him well enough. I checked with the CCB and knew he had no complaints. I hired him cause my neighbor who is a pretty close friend (was??!) highly recommended him after he landscaped her back yard and remodeled her basement, which looks nice, at least if you're not going around and looking at details closely. She spoke highly of his work ethic and said how he cares about the environment and how he and his partner-brother are really decent people, etc. etc. Then that same lawyer friend I was talking about above checked on Angie's List and said she saw positive comments (how stupid was I not to ask her to go into more detail?? We were in a hurry when we talked and we never talked further about it!) and THEN my close friend hired him - having heard what I'd heard - to do her small bathroom (it was probably a pre-fab kit job, in retrospect) and she said he did a great job. It was after my contractor had begun work on my kitchen that she called me to say he did a bad job installing windows on a second project...I remember thinking "uh oh." So there's my long-winded answer to whether I researched him ahead of time. Not so much. I went on those two friend-references which usually holds more weight, right? Not enough... As I was saying to someone above here, I think my project was like going to school for him. I think he learned a lot, the hard way. I feel better about his work in the future for other people, actually, though you might think that's me just being in big-time denial. My assumption is that he's done projects for friends and family prior to my neighbor's basement but who knows. Artemis78 - BINGO. I totally agree. And in fact - in his defense (oh no there she goes again, defending him! ;) he was originally only supposed to take my ugly, pre-existing and non-original lower cabinets and make them look better by making the doors stay on better and repainting, etc. (much less removing and installing essentially custom-made cabinets with inset doors, yes) and then neither he nor I discussed which type of sink I'd be getting until after the contract was signed. I didn't have enough experience to know it would be an issue (do now). Furthermore, neither he nor I realized i'd be picking a wall-mounted faucet, and that therefor the farm sink would have to sit back more rather than stand out proud (the latter case of which would result in a much easier job, and for which he'd done in the past he said) so he'd end up having to do 3-dimensional scribing. Then to top it all off, neither he nor I realized I'd be picking out an integrated dishwasher door, sure enough. So basically he walked into the project thinking it would be a much easier job, though when I told him I wanted to do these upgrades, he never said he couldn't do it. He said it would be a little tougher and would take a bit longer in some cases (more money) but that he's good - he can do it. That's where things went south. :( How was I to know he was challenging himself to figure it out and was actually too inexperienced when it came to these complications? I didn't even know enough about kitchen remodels to know these things could be a problem at all. Thank you. Morgne - Thanks for having sympathy. Crazy huh? I didn't know I was having issues with the cabinetry in general either (!) until I had other carpenters come in - when my contractor was out of town - to give me an idea of what it could cost to remove the sink without damaging (hopefully) areas around it, and then to reinstall the new sink. I was worried my contractor would deny having cracked the sink and could possibly refuse to be accountable and fix it himself, so I wanted to get ahead of the game to save time. It was when these carpenters showed up that they looked at the rest of the cabinetry and said things like "what happened here?" and "why is the dishwasher framed in so that it can't be removed?" and "I'm really sorry to have to tell you this but this is pretty shoddy work" and "who did your cabinetry?" and "your doors and drawers aren't on evenly and have no reveals - they're on too tight - these should be 1/8 of an inch" and "this scribing is - hehehea (awkward laugh) pretty awful (wince) ." One guy said right off the bat that he wouldn't touch this guy's work with a ten-foot pole and another guy said I should report him to the CCB and tear it all out and start from scratch. So there you have it - that's what's been going on! :-/ I will post pics, thanks. The old pics will show some of it, though the bad scribing probably can't be seen closely enough and the dishwasher door which looks terrible may not have been installed yet either. Also - since last taking pics - my contractor put hand-made lightrails in (just strips of wood cause I didn't want anything fancy looking to go with my simple shaker hundred-year-old upper cabs) and when he nailed them in place, he didn't have them attached flush. Why oh why is beyond me. They're almost flush, but enough not that he had to try to putty it in (probably the wrong kind of putty too) but that didn't hide the off-ness. I'll take pics soon, thanks. Oy! Ci lantro - I agree. I'd asked him if he could handle that (it was actually he who suggested inset with the face frame to match the look of the original uppers more). I remember asking with some concern about the scribing job and he said something to the effect of "no it's not a problem - I'm actually really good at this type of work, though it's time-consuming due to it being 3-dimensional..." I didn't even know what scribing was before he introduced it to me! I will DEFINITELY make sure the new person knows how to do this type of work, thank you!! Chrisk327 - that's why I'm okay with paying more (e.g. the $3,500-3,800 guy, if need be). I'm not screwing around anymore and I'll take full advantage of this opportunity to pay the same or less, but to have it done right. Not everyone gets such a second chance, you know? I agree that ripping it out is extreme. I'm assuming the general plumbing and electrical is okay (though truth be told, there's a leak under the sink which is the reason the sink got hairline cracks in the first place: because my contractor was trying to fix the leak and tightened the flange! And then a few days later the leak came back, regardless). The only concern about the cabinets is that they're a bit uneven. E.g. if you measure the left side of one cab's opening in height, then measure the right side of that cab's opening in hight, there's a discrepancy, which makes the cab doors uneven. So the new guy will have to remove the doors and carefully cut them to fit the opening unevenness. I am being very specific about what needs to be fixed, and have a very detailed list based on the comments from the various guys who came in to see the kitchen. I also agree that he's at least on the surface entitled to come back and fix the problems himself - even the CCB more or less said as much (they're not allowed to say much at all, without a case being opened). Davidro1 - hahaha thanks! :) Lascatx - yes I see your point - but the good news is that now I don't have to give up my CCB rights! Yahoo! Igloochick - I see your point too! Thank you for your frankness. I only wish I didn't feel pushed into the corner of having to defend him - haha. As I wrote in one of the paragraphs above (you may not each be reading what I've written to every one of you) - I do honestly believe he'll never make this mistake again. I think that the changes we made once started were not anything he predicted (the original plan was something much, much simpler) and he thought he could handle it but found out he couldn't. Next thing he knew he was in over his head. I think he knows that now and won't make the mistake again of allowing difficult scribing or anything else too challenging. He even said next time he'd pay someone else to help him if it came to that (like a sub-contractor). He lost a LOT of money on this job, as most of the money I've already paid went to the sub-contractors or materials. It's also not every day that someone asks you to push back a Shaws farm sink with rounded front corners. Usually they stand out proud - I'd say 95% of the time if not more. He also learned a lot from my job - even though yes, at my expense. He's robbed me of my time, yes, I won't argue with you there - but not my money at this point. I don't feel guilty about what he'll do in the future because both he and his partner were very humbled by this experience, and embarrassed even and I just don't think he's going to make the same mistakes again. He had a clean record before this and he wants to keep it clean and doesn't want to trick people. He just made a huge mistake and is dealing with it now. People aren't all black or white. I'm NOT defending him as much as it might sound like I am - I think he did me a terrible disservice but I don't think he meant to and I know he'd never put himself or the client in this position again. I simply don't perceive him as a villain. If I really thought he was capable of doing this a second time, I wouldn't think twice about reporting him, honestly. I can tell by the way it panned out that he's never gone through anything like this before. Now all that said, I wouldn't be able to refer him, if I were to get a phone call in the future or if a friend wondered how I liked him. I'm just not going to file a claim over this since he - in the end - was willing to work with me.

Can I please just thank EVERYONE that replied to this?!! So...it does make me feel so much better that you all too have experienced the Total Freak Outs. I've gone away for a couple of days to make myself halfway normal again, and it worked. For now. And yes, AYERG73, "It's unnerving to trust someone about a choice you might not fully understand all the details of and pay them only to have them change it" yes yes yes it actually is a matter of "can I trust this person that has a lot of my money" and I don't know the why's of everything that he does...wish he would explain things better, but there you go. I hate to be such a cynical skeptic, but you do hear horror stories. And yes, macybaby, my husband has indeed gently and not-so-gently brought me back to earth with "call someone and ask for a therapist--you have GOT to trust this KD...he works for a reputable company and comes well-recommended, so stop trying to think he's trying to screw with you. Now go see a therapist!" HA too funny. Thank you all so much!

Sure, it's possible to self GC, but it will take a lot more time to do, and you really won't save that much money overall. The research that needs to go into this really cannot be accomplished by a novice in 5 months time, even with devoting full time to it. If you were talking 2016, then yes, you might be better prepared. But, I guess part of the fun for many owner builders is jumping off the high dive and not knowing the depth of the water. I self GC'd a major home addition that took forever, and I've got building experience and contacts in the trade. Didn't matter. Still took forever. Nevertheless, the best book that anyone can recomend is What Your Contractor Can't Tell You, by Amy Johnston. This IS a full time job, and you won't know what you don't know until the time for that decision is past, and you made the wrong decision. So, you'll spend some time correcting mistakes. Whether that's more or less mistakes than you'd have with a builder, that depends on the choice of builder. A good builder adds value to the equation. You don't have to spend every waking moment focused on the small details of the build. You can just focus on the bigger picture. If you don't have construction experience, and the ability to do quality control, and some existing relationships with some trades, it becomes that much harder. Construction has really picked up, prices have gone up, and if a sub is available quickly, it probably means you don't want to use him. The good ones are scheduled out about 2-3 months right now. That's going to be your most difficult challenge. Subs do not like working for owner builders because of the lack of construction knowledge and sequencing, and they do not give them their best bids. They reserve those for the contractors who give them repeat business, and who won't have them backtracking or performing another trades's job just so they can get started on theirs. Good luck with that high dive! The water is colder and more dangerous than you know right now. :) Here is a link that might be useful: What Your Contractor Can't Tell You This post was edited by GreenDesigns on Thu, Jan 15, 15 at 10:02

Jhvrga, please excuse my ignorance but what is it about this house that makes it difficult to build? (you said in one of your earlier comments that it is not considered an easy build). Your house looks beautiful by the way. Perfect setting too.