I'm sorry but that looks awful and you are right to protest. It looks like they really scratched the cabinets in a few places too.

He's partially right when he says many counters are shimmed, but it is not common practice to shim that much in the front!

Those counters need to come off and (at LEAST) the visible sides of the cabinets leveled.

My experience is the cabinets are leveled to provide as continuous support for the countertop as possible. When the countertop spans between points where shims occur, this promotes unnecessary stress in the countertop material and encourages fractures.

If it's that's far off, why wouldn't the bottom of the cabinet be shimmed, and then covered with shoe molding? It seems odd to shim it where they did, just because it is so visible.

Note to anyone watching the thread.

If you are building - do yourself a favor and buy a 6' level. Bring it to your homesite. Check things for plumb and level. if you don't - you end up with this kind of stuff for the poor bastard that comes in last - and has to try to come up with a way to do his/her job to any standard (without stopping all work and postponing HIS paycheck to bring back the cabinet guy...)

That's really quite bad.

The little piggies smeared silicone all over everything as well as scratched it. This might pass muster in an apartment complex for a big builder, but this is not what anyone wants for their custom home.

I WOULD BE PISSED!!! this is not acceptable in any way!

Thank you all for the responses, I greatly appreciate it! This is not my area of expertise but besides looking awful it didn't seem right. I am still waiting to hear back from the builder as we are less than two weeks from closing and I won't close until they fix this correctly.

What I don't understand is this is a new build, why is the floor so un-level that it makes the cabinets un-level that makes the counter not level. I would think if the floor was level there wouldn't be this problem. I personally would take a level to the floor to check it out. If the floor isn't level I would have them fix it. I wouldn't accept any of it being new construction.

Good thought functionthenlook, I will bring a level over and check out the floor. I'm not sure why this even happened as it seems like amateur work.

Would I be correct in saying a proper fix for this would be to level the cabinets by shimming the bottom and then reinstalling the countertops?

I would say shimming the cabinets is better than the stone countertops. At least the shims can be hidden by baseboard.

But, really, who bears the responsibility? Should the countertop installers have said, “Hey, this is bad. We are gonna wait until it’s fixed.” Or is it common practice to just proceed?

I would definitely be fighting the builder on this.

You make a good point Hillside House and I have thought about that, I feel its a little of both. I don't have a lot of confidence in the countertop installers as they initially installed countertops that were too short and didn't go all the way to the wall. They tried to hide it but putting up a side splash (which I specifically indicated I did not want multiple times before they installed it). When I addressed the side splash needing to be removed they tried to convince me it would look better with it, then offered to remove it once I'm ready to do my backsplash. I stood my ground and said it needed to be removed before closing and thats when they admitted the countertops were too short.

So, I don't have much confidence in them, but do feel whoever installed the cabinets should have taken the time to ensure they were level.

Needless to say I am definitely fighting this and won't close until it is fixed properly.

You go girl!

Pull the tops and install the cabinets properly.

This isn't always the top installer's fault. I had to install about a 1/4" shim under the right side of [this[(https://www.houzz.com/discussions/dont-look-patrica-dsvw-vd~5162399) top and caulk the gap. My sink wouldn't have drained otherwise and I didn't charge to reset the cabinet.

Thanks for the response Joe, I don't think this was the countertop installers fault as they were only responsible for installing the countertops, the cabinet installers should have insured the cabs were level before leaving. I do however wish that rather the installing the countertops with such a large gap, the countertop installers could have said we cant install until these are level.

The whole countertop/cabinet situation has become such a big hassle for me and I keep having to fight for the right thing to be done.