The Fritsche's Story

An unfinished story...

In late 1999 we contracted with RDA and Don Shulman to purchase a home from Westchester Modular and install it as our vacation home in Dennis MA. We had no major problems or complaints.  So in 2010 when we decided to buy an older home in Hopkinton to convert to our primary residence, we didn't hesitate to call RDA and Don Shulman to renovate, add a large modular addition and build a three car garage. Wow, were we wrong!  We trusted him from our prior experience, but we now feel like he exploited that trust.  

We signed the contract in mid-December 2010.  The house delivery date was supposed to be late March, and the certificate of occupancy was to be delivered by June 7th. Shulman promised us 'a better place in line’ at the factory if we paid more money up front. By early February 2011, we had paid Shulman and RDA 90% of the value of the contract.  A major permitting oversight (they claim to be experts on that, right?)  pushed the house delivery date to early June and CO to end of August.  After the house was delivered in early June, the button up work was very slow. Many days there were no workers on site at all. The likelihood of receiving CO in August was dropping.   RDA and Don Shulman were continually evasive with respect to schedule commitments. We needed a move in date as the sale of our current house was drawing near. 

Despite the fact that we had paid for 90% of the contract value, the subcontractors continually reported that they had not been paid, or were paid substantially less than they were due.  Yet Shulman continued to ask for more money.  In September he asked for yet another advanced payment. He promised that if we gave him the money he could commit to occupancy in October, 2011. We were desperate for completion because on November 5th we were selling our home and would have no place to live. 

We agreed to give an additional disbursement if Shulman signed a document that had penalty provisions in it should he break his promise.   He signed it, we gave him the money, but it didn’t make a lick of difference. He cashed our check but progress continued to inch along.  Our closing date arrived for our current family home and our worst fears were realized, WE WERE HOMELESS!   We appealed to Westchester Modular for help with no success. They said they had never heard of such difficulties with Don Shulman and RDA before and recommended that we finish the job with them.

All of our belongings were put in storage, our pets were farmed out to family members and we moved into a hotel with our three children and our dog.  Did this matter to RDA? No! They were still unable to establish a firm completion date. 

From this point on I acted like the general contractor. I was at the site every day. I was coordinating services. I was speaking to sub contractors and finding out that many were still unpaid, despite the fact that we had paid RDA. I pleaded our case to the local building inspector for leniency regarding the occupancy permit. We 'celebrated' Thanksgiving in a hotel and as Christmas drew near we were in despair. The house was so far from completion, many things were done incorrectly, and there was just a hole in the ground where there should have been a garage that we had already largely paid for. The hotel bill was exceeding $7,000.  

We finally took occupancy the week before Christmas in 2011.   We had no garage, no air conditioning, no landscaping or final grading, no driveway and no gutters.  We had plywood exterior temporary stairways , incomplete exterior woodwork and serious electrical issues.   Our bathroom pipes leaked and damaged our first floor ceilings the first week we were there. RDA sent someone to stop the leak, but never came back to repair the damaged ceilings.  We had two glass slider doors that didn't open and structural issues that were never addressed. 

We attempted to contact RDA and Don Shulman to no avail. When we finally did get a response from Don Shulman in February of 2012, he said he would complete the job if only we gave him more money!  At that point the total amount we were withholding was approximately $20,000.  We knew the work remaining far exceeded that.   In the following months we gathered independent estimates from two reputable builders that said the completion of the house and garage according to the RDA contract would cost between $160,000 and $180,000.   We spent a thousand dollars in lawyer fees with nothing to show for it.  

Thankfully, a few weeks ago we received a phone call from a group of people who had similar experiences with Don Shulman and RDA. We want to make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else.   We bought our house in 2010 and it is now 2013. We are still living in a mess of unfinished projects, paying storage fees because we still don't have a garage and walking through inches of muck because we don't have a driveway. 

We found a wonderful honest new builder who is doing what RDA was supposed to do which means we are paying for everything twice. What Don Shulman and RDA did to our family was devastating. I believe Westchester Modular homes also bears some responsibility for allowing this to happen to so many people. RDA and Shulman have stolen from me my trust and general belief that most people in this world are good. They have robbed me of my optimism. The house we can eventually fix, the money we can someday recover, but the image of my children living for seven weeks in a hotel can never be replaced or forgiven.