No more pictures! It hurts!!!

Yes, a real tile guy can take it out and put in new stuff without wrecking the tub and cabinet. It'll be expensive. You might also want to try to get a quote for just regrouting in a light color. It won't fix it, but it'll look much better and hide the errors more.

For fun Becky, when you have time, do a search for “bad tile job”. Yours is not the worst!

Cleaning up the grout smoodged all over would help a TON.

An opaque shower curtain would, too....

I wouldn't just clean it up. Looks like a bad install job. Look at how poor the job is around the plumbing. Start over. Make sure the super never does another tile job in the building!

" ... we went with the low bid ... we ended up being able to get so much more for our budget than we had planned."

Unfortunately, as is often the case when hiring based solely on "lowest bid," it ends up costing you more in the long run, in time, money, and inconvenience.

Hardened grout is not something that you just wipe off! Regrouting is a PITA. Cement is hard as a rock and has to be scraped out line by line without damaging the edges of the tile. And this grout job is not confined to the joints ... it's all over the tile! While it's true that a bad grout job can pretty much ruin a perfectly good tile installation, this installation has visible issues that make one wonder about what is hidden behind it, as millworkman mentions.

"I got... one ridiculously low bid from my super, and of course we went with the low bid"

As you seem to know, therein lies the problem. He wasn't so super after all. Never do this again, it's a recipe for disaster.

If you want to avoid the inevitable water issues in a short while, you'll get someone else in to rip it all out and re-start. You don't see waterproofing, but it's quite probably as bad or worse as what you're seeing.

It doesn't look so bad from a distance. That tub cut out would bug me every time I looked at it. However...

Did he install waterproofing? If so, I would not bother with a redo. Black grout is no fun to work with. I've had some success carefully scraping messy grout off tile with a razor blade.

Oh, and they make these things called escutcheons for where piping meets the wall. He should have installed one for your sink drain to cover the tile gap. A split escutcheon can be installed without taking apart the drain piping.

"It doesn't look so bad from a distance."

You're right, from half mile away not so bad.............

What is that seeping out from under the toilet? This ding dong is your building's superintendent? That's frightening. He really needs to step away from the grout and caulk. Not his forte.

So, what system DID he use for waterproofing? Where are the in progress pictures? Because I don’t believe that someone who is that incompetent would prove to be any more competent in another area. Did he even change out the valves behind the wall? That powder room is on borrowed time As in it’s gonna have to be redone too, or your downstairs neighbor isn’t going to be very happy with brown stains on their ceiling

You are going to pay a premium to have all of that done correctly the second time. When you could have just hired on of the “expensive” guys who would have done it correct the first time.

Never ever hire a building super for home improvements. He isn’t a licensed contractor, and he didn’t pull permits. Because if he was a licensed contractor, he’d be out there getting 20x pay than lighting people’s pilot lights.

Don’t hire relatives, or acquaintances of propinquity. When they scrw it up, you lose the dollars and the relationship. Or, as gammy used to say, don’t spit where you eat.

From the looks of it, the tile guy was drunk on the job.

And I suppose a neurosurgeon is in charge of the local elementary school health office? Because that would be equally likely that someone who could earn hundreds of thousands was stuck somewhere patching up a old boiler and changing light bulbs in a hall. Maybe if he had his license revoked. With prejudice. Or he had to change his name and enter witness protection In which case, he would still not be legal.

Sorry. but not sorry here. You hired a full blown hack. Intentionally hired a full blown hack. And you want to semi laugh it off as cute that you got ugly tile like it’s a lopsided wedding cake or something.

No, it’s more like you got safety belts in your car made of lasagna noodles. It’s not cute. It actually damages your property in fundamental ways that completely ruins it’s value and functionality.

Your are going to have s MUCH more expensive job the secind time around, after the rot. And after your neighbors below sue you for damage to their unit.

You got what you paid for. And you didn’t get what you didn’t pay for. Mr. Cheapo didn’t do the job correctly. On any level. Sack it up and pay to have it all redone. You won’t be done with finding shortcomings, I guarantee it.

And as the cherry on top, now your relationship with this “super” is damaged and he is going to be hissy about allowing access sad working with someone else to get it redone correctly. Don’t spit where you eat.

Where is the first niche (picture 1)? I somehow didn't notice just how bad that tile job is. Is the marble sill really chipped or is it just the vein pattern? If this is the back shower wall, the entire wall will need to come out to properly space the tile or maybe resize the niche so the cuts work out and that the tile layout was well thought out, much unlike this niche. I think that's where everyone in the "rip it all out" camp is coming from.

The floor tile looks great, imho. Too bad the shower tile is a mini-disaster.

Looking back at the posts, is it really just one person that spoiled this for you? If you've been on these forums for a while, you'll notice that they rub people the wrong way all the time. The advice may be sound sometimes, but the manner it's delivered leaves something to be desired. They probably look at it as 'tough love' but most people consider it rude.

When you're online, you just have to learn to ignore the rude remarks and appreciate the helpful ones. You'll always get both.

I have seen improperly waterproofed jobs that have very tidy tile jobs with even grout lines, and well done waterproof, solid jobs with chipped tiles, uneven grout lines, and terrible layout choices. I don't think looks necessarily tell the entire story.

I have seen a fair share of tile jobs that look like this in older apartment buildings and restaurant lavatories in Manhattan.

Jellytoast, he used a grout-matched caulk and then did a typical elbow caulking job around the toilet.

I have officially given up finding a competent person to caulk and do it all myself. The rest of the work can be perfect...and then I swear some people smooth caulk with their knees.