You might want to research libel laws in your state and how to defend against them. The best defense is that everything you report or publish must be true and you must be able to prove it.

I don't see a problem with the blog, but I don't think I'd link to the builder's site. I don't think there's a problem if you absolutely state fact.

So long as what you write is factual or clearly stated as your opinion then there is likely little the builder can do, unless there is language in the contract to prevent it (I doubt even that would hold up in court, but you are getting into the realm of not worth the effort then).

Make sure you qualify your assessment of the results as your opinion, and then present the factual data that led to that opinion. So don't say things like, "the floors were not installed properly." Instead say something like, "I don't understand how these floors could be considered satisfactory." Then provide evidence to support your case.

You can be sued (really you can be sued for just about anything), so there is some danger of a lawsuit, however, I suspect it unlikely. The last thing a builder who did a poor job wants, is a court hearing the case and deciding he did a poor job. Right now you are probably a mostly toothless dog nipping at their ankles, the court room is just as likely to be a big set of teeth as it is to be a leash. I suspect you will get a few cease and desist letters rather than a full blown court case, but anything is possible.

I advise you to have your attorney spend a few minutes looking over the blog before you post it, just to make sure. I wouldn't bother linking to their site, and you can even avoid naming them on the blog if you want, if stuff you post as evidence has their name on it.

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If this is for the good of other people who are considering this builder, then I celebrate your wanting to do it. It is good to put this out there to inform others who might be considering this builder. However, make sure your expectations were reasonable, if you accepted a low bid then you must accept a lower quality work.

If you have a legal question, ask an attorney; most trapeze artists know little about case law.

So, you want some sort of revenge...

And you think is somewhat funny.

Be careful with karma. I second Mrs S suggestion: Use yelp as I think creating a blog just to damage someone seems vindictive.

Thank you all. I must admit it was cathartic to write it all out. It is all saved as drafts and not published. I can go back and edit done things out.

I do want info out there for sure about mid hones in general and how they compare to site built. I don’t think there is much out there like that. I would also like to steer people away from him but I could probably do so without actually naming him or linking to the business.

I dont one know that I have pictures that have his business info in them.

I am a practicing attorney. I agree with the above suggestion that "if you have a legal question, ask an attorney" - and not over the internet.

I don’t know that revenge would be the correct term. I think I did want revenge early on when all this first happened. But I have moved forward and on with things. What I want to do now is make people aware. When I tried to research mod homes I didn’t find anything out there other than their own advertisements.

here locally he is the main one around. So if someone is going to go the mod home route they will be likely to call him. I feel bad for anyone that would use his services. So yes I want the word out there. I don’t think there is anything wrong with that.

I don’t think this is at all funny. Sorry if I gave that impression. I looked back at my post to see why you felt that. I see I put “lol” after I asked if it was legal. All I meant was that I just typed out my experience to get all my thoughts somewhat organized and determine what is necessary info and what is not. But then I realized I hadn’t really thought about legalities. It was simply a little chuckle at myself that I probably should have thoughts about that first and glad I thought before I published any of it.

I try not to be a vindictive person. We tried to give this guy the benefit of the doubt. He took advantage of us and many other people and continues to do so.

Bry911. We didn’t pay a low amount. That’s my point. We ended up paying what we would have with a custom hone builder with far less quality. But in the beginning he said we would pay less but get good quality. I knew we wouldn’t have super high end but did at least expect what he told us and samples he showed us, which was solid quality items and workmanship.

Instead of initiating possible libel problems, maybe just document the build in blog form while mentioning the builder name but not in a hostile way. Likely, you would be contacted by future customers for a personal review and you could mention the build problems to the specific individual customer and not in a forever, national way that could come back to haunt you.

You could also mention some of the build problems in the blog without directly impugning the builder and how they were resolved. It could be informative to others facing the same problems.

Bad businesses always work around the system so even directly naming the builder would likely result in them closing down and reopening under a new name anyway. There is a carpet store near me that has done that 5 times; each time they kept all carpet deposits when they went "bankrupt' and opened under a new business entity a short time later.