CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — The Troubleshooters get calls weekly about contractors who get paid, but don't do the work they were hired and paid to do.
A man says he paid a contractor to do work at a property he owns, but says he hasn't seen or heard from the contractor since, so he's called Troubleshooters for help.
Tomas Pena bought a home on Coleman as a retirement property 20 years ago.
As you can see, it'll be awhile before anybody can actually live here.
He says he was at a baby shower last year when he met a guy who told him he was a contractor.
"Como se llama ? Juan Villanueva. What convinced you, other than meeting him at a baby shower, that, yeah, this is the guy ? He had a beautiful personality," Pena told us.
JEV Construction is John Eric Villanueva.
The Troubleshooters have left 3 different voicemails on the number listed on his business card, and sent him three emails, since February 6th, offering him the opportunity to give us his side of this story.
He has not responded.
A short time later meeting him, Pena remembers Villanueva stopped by and gave him an estimate. "He gave you an estimate of $7500.00 Did he say "yeah, I specialize in foundation work on lifting houses or anything like that ? I mean anybody can tell you "I'm a contactor. No, he told me he would do the leveling on the house and the renovation of this back room."
Pena does have a receipt showing Pena paid Villanueva a $5500.00 down payment on July 3rd 20-22. Pena say he dropped off some materials last summer, but hasn't been back since. "Tell me specifically what he was supposed to do besides tearing all this down? Level the floor and renovate this back room," Pena told us.
He also says he comes here several times a week to get 'some' work done on his own, but he's got a long way to go to get it looking like he wants it to look.
Remember. always limit your initial payment to a contractor to ten percent of the total cost for the job you've hired them to do and always make sure you both sign a contract laying out a payment plan.
