I would need to see the contract and how the flooring part is worded but IMO if you have been having issues already my guess is he really does not care about you and you should have let him go a long time ago. A year right now is not the big deal since materials were hard to get . he should go now and check out LVP the prices have droppeddown quite bit. Better yet you go shopping and see what LVP you can find that fits the budget he gave you.

He wants you to dump him. Probably a good idea.

How much have you paid him and how much work has he completed?

The specific language here is important. If your contractor gave you a "budget" for flooring in the form of a cost allowance, then it may be up to you to cover any cost difference between the material you had in mind and reality. If it is a cost allowance, the definition should be included somewhere in the contract documents.

Allowances are mini cost of the work plus a fee contracts within a fixed price. If the material on which they based their allowance has had price increases, which is not unheard of, then you have to shift to a less costly material in order to remain within the allowance amount.

If the material was not done as an allowance and was done as a single Selection, and the builder wasn’t smart enough to write in price increases, then you could *theoretically* force him to lose money and install it. *Practically*, were you to do that, he would cut expenses somewhere invisible to you. You might be very unhappy in the future if that cut was something far more important than a temporary type of inexpensive floor covering that could be replaced easily in a few years.

There are no circumstances where market price increases are *not* paid by the owner. A builder will not pay you to build a home. He isn’t going to lose money. And you really want those transparent and relatively friendly price increases. You do not want your budget maintained at some invisible future cost to you. A builder who is losing money doesn't build a house that you want to own.

@Verbo,

Despite a contractor's best efforts, real and estimated costs aren't always the same. As a contractor, you win some and you lose some. You hope it averages out-- but you don't cheat on other aspects of a project if you are programmed to do right by your clients and your company's "brand" in the marketplace is worth something. When lumber prices spiked in our area due to the pandemic, the better home builders ate cost increases of tens of thousands of dollars on fixed-price contracts--which is why attorneys were subsequently in demand to re-write fixed-price contracts to include cost escalation clauses or to write cost--plus contracts.

As stated if he gave you a budget for flooring - then that is your "Allowance".

You go pick the flooring you want and pay the difference between "Budget" and actual.

You stated he will give you your "budget" back, so obviously this sounds like

the way the contract was written.

He possibly gave you a budget for lighting also - say $500.00.

If you go to lighting shop and your choices total $700.00 then you pay the diff of $200.00

If your lighting choices total $400.00, then you would get a $100.00 credit.

Of course he isn't going to guarantee someone else work, no builder would do that.