Royal Home Improvements

I live in a condo and needed a company that was willing to work within the board rules/regulations. After much searching - I was pleased to find out that Royal worked in condos. The finished product was exactly what I wanted - my dream bathroom and kitchen! Throughout the project - they kept me informed of developments, progress and consulted me every step of the way. It was a job well done!

Mark Davies was my project manager on this initiative (Merek was the lead contractor)- and he did a great job assisting me through the process.

My mother(82) believed all their radio adds on 96.3 saying they "do the best for seniors". "accessible renovation".
We were told the renovation would take two to three weeks. We are now into week 15. We believe they were 'oversold'.
Currently we are waiting a custom shower door because the room is so small. The project manager was very nice, the bathroom looks very nice but it's still been 15 weeks and it is not complete. The 15 weeks is due to their lack of organization and ineffective team. The house was vacant for more than 12 weeks of this period so no home owners present to impede their progress. In the end, I feel they simply over looked the older couple with a small job.
It's definitely NOT worth the premium price going with a large company. Could have had the job done for half the price and a third the time frame .
I

Both of my bathrooms required a total gut as, unbeknownst to me, we had water leaking from the upstairs toilet under the subfloor. When the tiles started falling down in the downstairs bathroom, and we could see black mold, we knew we were in trouble.

I started by thoroughly researching contractors, and made a final list of five to contact. I wanted a company that had been in business a considerable length of time with a solid track record, which had at least $5,000.000.00 in liability insurance with all trades working on the job to have current WSIB clearance certificates. I also wanted professionalism. I chose Royal Home Improvements.

What a delight from the beginning. Aric Bradshaw came to our home. He is cheerful and upbeat, and really knows what he is talking about. He went over “our needs” and “our dreams”. He helped us to work out a budget, and by the end of our first meeting we had a rough estimate in hand to review. I never had any difficulty reaching him to discuss changes and new ideas about the renovations, and within a few days of our first meeting, we had a final estimate and the items we had to choose with the budget for these items.

Marc Davies was our fabulous project manager. Aric brought Marc over to meet us. I liked the professional hand over.

I can give Marc only the highest of praise. He really did work very hard for us. At the beginning we received daily updates from Marc, then as the projects continued further down the road, we received updates about every two to three days. We talked a lot on the telephone, and I never had any difficulty reaching him. When we ran into problems with our shopping, Marc would find what we needed. Marc was wonderful to work with at all times. Figuratively speaking, he held my hand when I needed it, and steered me through my sometime panics. He was a brick and a consummate professional!

Wes and his son Robert did a fine job. Wes possesses a real talent when it comes to laying tile.

My experience with Royal has been very positive, and our two finished bathrooms are gorgeous. We actually came in under budget.

I have other renovations on the horizon, and will definitely have Royal come in to do the work. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND them.

I wish my Mom was still here so I could let her know that, “you can make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear” – well you can if you use Royal Home Improvements to renovate your kitchen. They transformed my small, tired and out of date, condo kitchen into a space that is a pleasure work in. I gained much needed extra counter space and some additional cupboard space. Mark, the Project Manager was a pleasure to work with during the designing stage and the actual renovation, dealing with my many questions and concerns and resolving them all, despite some unexpected problems. Racque and Jason, who completed the majority of the renovation, did a fantastic job. I am very happy with my new kitchen space.

Every renovation is different. My project was no exception.

I needed to completely gut and replace my thirty-year-old bathroom in a sixty-year-old condo in downtown Toronto. I also intended to be at home or in my home office during most of the construction.

From previous renovation experience, advice from designer and architect friends, extensive online research, discussions with manufacturers, and many visits to plumbing supply, specialty, and big box stores in the GTA, I had a good idea of the labor costs, fixture costs, and length of time needed to complete the work. I decided to keep costs down by choosing all the fixtures, accessories, and tiles myself. I selected only ready-made, good-quality fixtures from manufacturers like Toto (toilet), Riobel (shower and sink hardware), Alcove (tub), and Tidal (vanity).

I also made a list of what I wanted from a contractor:
• A structurally sound new bathroom that looked nice and would age well;
• Verification that the fixtures I chose could be installed in my bathroom without moving drains or encountering other major construction problems, especially unexpected ones;
• Someone to purchase all materials from my detailed list, arrange delivery, and deal with broken items, wrong items, and returns;
• A contractor who would keep me informed of problems so we could keep unexpected costs down;
• A contractor who would work well with our condo staff and me, and observe our building renovation agreement;
• Technicians and tradesmen who would show up and clean up every day once the job began;
• Appropriate liability insurance, and
• A detailed contract at the start and a written guarantee at the end.

In exchange, I promised to pay on time and not turn into the customer from hell.

I spoke with a range of contractors recommended by neighbors as well as ones I located online with good recommendations and reputations.

In the end, I chose Royal Home Improvements, a full-service contractor, for two main reasons—flexibility and customer care. They were the only company with the flexibility and size to do the purchasing from my list and meet all of my other requirements at a reasonable cost.

I am pleased with their work. Their staff provided me with friendly and professional advice and service throughout. Dean Eyford, the project consultant, was my initial contact with the company. He took the time to understand what I wanted and needed and didn’t try to push me into making quick decisions. Alex Balm, the project supervisor, Consilio Pace, the primary service technician, and their other tradesmen, and office people carried out the work with care and efficiency. I always had someone to talk to or email when the inevitable surprises turned up.

In the end, Royal Home Improvements produced a beautifully styled, modern, solidly-built new bathroom that I expect to get many years of use out of. I plan to use Royal Home Improvements for my next project, and I have recommended them to friends.

Joe in downtown Toronto

I had my main floor (living room, dining room, hall, powder room and kitchen) renovated. The team from Royal Home improvements were fantastic. Work was done on time and I was always updated on what would be taking place. Workmanship was exceptional. Would highly recommend this company and the team (Mark, Wes, Robert and Andy)

A wish list to upgrade my townhouse basement, staircases and bedrooms from carpets to hardwood flooring finally came true. I met with project advisor Aric Bagshaw who provided me the quotes. It was quite an amazing experience to follow through the renovation process. I told myself to exercise patience and the work flow would come through smoothly. It finally did and for that, I’m happy with the professionalism, craftsmanship and most importantly great attitude of project manager Mark Davies’ team namely Richard (flooring), Gent (painting) and their crew. An awesome and hardworking team indeed. Thanks guys.

Royal Home Improvements gave us their best teams to produce a reno that was on time and on budget, and which transformed our home into the space we really wanted to suit our new life style.

Paul Napolitano listened to our entire wish list and then walked us through all the rooms to really understand our vision. He prompted us with questions and made suggestions and provided a very thorough quote. The project scope included more than we originally considered, but it was a 'now or never' renovation. In hind sight we have no regrets as all the work was handled by professionals and took much less time than most other renos of our friends.

Mark Davies was the perfect project manager. He listened, supported our vision, had good rapport with all the trades and kept things moving along. Mark kept us informed of next steps and the scheduled arrival of various people. (I kept track of all who came to the house - over thirty - and was glad I was not having to manage them.) The general contractor, another Mark, and Stephan were excellent. They were hard working, cheerful, professional and did whatever was needed to complete the work, and had a sense of humour. They took care to protect the rest of our home and left the work area clean and safe at the end of each day.

It was not all smooth sailing, in fact things got very dusty when it came to removing the field stone fireplace and solid cement hearth, but the team knew what we wanted and found solutions. To keep the project on schedule, the trades worked late and even worked at the weekend.

The team of electricians, decorators and the tiler were also excellent and cheerfully worked around each other when necessary.

RHI also provider the services of a designer - Emily who took time to understand our style and future needs, then guided us and narrowed down options for our selection. She accompanied us to showrooms to help us select plumbing fixtures, tiles and furniture. I think it would have been overwhelming without Emily and we may have made the wrong choices.

At the end of the project Stephan spent a whole day just making sure everything was finished and taken care of. There were no little touch ups or other items left hanging as he went area by area, examining the all the work. He kept asking what else? There was nothing left to finish or fix. We had no hesitation in signing off on the renovation.

We were able to test the 'guarantee' six months later when we bought a new bbq and couldn't hook it up to the new gas line that was installed as part of the reno. No problem, Mark Davies came out then called the gas contractors who came to make the safe hook up. No extra charge.

We may have been able to find a company to do our reno for less, but I doubt anyone could have completed it on time (it was actually completed a few days early!), on budget and with such a high degree of professionalism and customer satisfaction.

We were glad that we selected RHI and are delighted every day with our new, light, warm and modern space.

I never do online reviews, but my experience with this company was so awful I had to comment.

A two month reno took a year due to their mistakes. My three kids and I lived in a hotel for two weeks because of their delays. They told me at 7 pm Sunday night that the condo wasn't ready for the 9 am move scheduled the next morning! .

Their shower installation caused a flood for my downstairs neighbour. They forgot to remove the transport bolts when installing my clothes washer, causing it to shake uncontrollably and requiring emergency shut off.

They mis-measured and installed the wrong kitchen (it didn't fit and wasn't to code, and was the wrong colour). So my three kids and I lived without a kitchen for over 6 months. There were still a ton of problems with the kitchen when it was finally installed. They left a water pipe dripping, almost causing an apartment flood.

They didn't provide me with designer services, as per my contract. When I complained and asked for a rebate, they offered me only $350 off my $100,000 contract (only a 0.35% refund!), although the lack of designer cost me days of work trying to source and design things myself.

They scratched my marble floor by dragging the toilet out, and ruined two sets of silk drapes by tying them back with electrical tape. They let me live for a month without a toilet seat because they installed the bolts wrong and didn't manage to get back to fix it. They convinced me to spend an extra $1000 on bathroom vanities because they were in-stock and could be delivered immediately (since we were living without any vanities), and then once I had agreed to pay for them told me they were back-ordered and would be delayed a month. Extra $1000 down the drain.

They didn't follow condo board rules on noise (using a hammer drill on weekends) or mess (not putting down drop cloths), causing me to get in trouble with my new condo board.

They even spray painted my apartment, getting spray paint all over my brand new hardwood floors and windows. I'm still dealing with Royal to try to get them to fix my hardwood floor because they didn't prepare the subfloor properly, which visibly moves (to the point where furniture moves that is placed on it).

And believe it or not, this isn't the full list of problems - just the most egregious ones. I had to be on them constantly to make sure the project progressed at all, and to get them to address deficiencies. The only thing I didn't have to get on them for was payment - they were ridiculously prompt with asking for money. They were rude, unresponsive, and tried to overcharge me because they had erred in their contract. They even charged my credit card without authorization.

I thought that the problem might have been the project manager, but he quit (because he was probably going to be fired) halfway through the project. The new project manager (Alex) was no better. Neither was his boss, Marco. My experience with this company is that Paul (the owner) is a smooth talker, who comes and does the sales pitch and says they will take care of everything. And then once the contract is signed, all of the service disappears and it becomes an exercise in "do the minimum, charge the maximum."

Save yourself the torture and stay away from this company.