When 85-year-old Evelyn Renton sits in her covered porch in her home at Fergushill Estates in Oro-Medonte Township, she looks with dismay at the black screws that stick out in an uneven line along the wall.
In total, Renton has spent about $16,000 for renovations on her home, which she paid in full to contracting company More for Less, owned by Calvin Gordon and Lesley Morris. More for Less is based out of the Niagara area, but has recently started advertising services in the Barrie, Orillia and Midland areas.
Renton has lived at Fergushill Estates, a 40-acre manufactured home community near Orillia with 152 sites, for 10 years.
She says she met Gordon and Morris while they were walking around the community looking for work.
“My daughter said it would probably be alright, but it didn’t turn out to be alright,” says Renton.
In November 2017, Renton signed a contract with Gordon to pay $7,800 for new vinyl siding, insulation, supply and installation. She paid the full amount at the beginning of December.
“It was because there was quite a bit of snow at the time,” says Renton. “It was quite a while before they came to do any work.”
Paul Crooks, Renton’s son-in-law, recently retired from the Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre (RVH) in Barrie, but worked for many years as a contractor. Crooks said he felt uneasy about Gordon when he found out Renton had paid in full upfront, but let it go at the time.
“If it had been done properly, $7,800 isn’t a bad price,” he says.
Crooks acknowledges he also didn’t expect work to start right away due to snow, but months passed without any word from Gordon.
In June, Crooks got a call from Renton saying that Gordon had come by her home to ask for $8,300 more despite not having started any work on her property. Renton says he wanted the money because he also wanted to do repairs on her roof he said she needed, which were not part of the original contract. Renton paid him thinking the work was required. According to the receipt provided by Gordon, the amount was also to cover the removal of an old deck.
“It was weird because I had been up there not too long before and I hadn’t noticed anything wrong with the roof at that time,” says Crooks. “After he left, I went up and took pictures and the roof was all solid, front to back.”
After that, Crooks thought something was definitely amiss, so he called Gordon and demanded he come do the contracted work on Renton’s property.
“I told him, ‘I’ve heard stories about you, and I want things rectified. If not, I’m taking this to the Better Business Bureau',” says Crooks.
In mid-July, Gordon showed up and did two days worth of work on Renton’s property. Crooks made sure he was on the property when Gordon came to do the work.
Renton says that when Gordon came to start work in July, she started to think something was amiss when the siding Gordon was installing was falling off almost immediately.
Crooks says exterior siding was applied incorrectly without any kind of bracing and was screwed in improperly. He says when he confronted Gordon, Gordon came back to redo the work but it still wasn’t up to proper standards.
“I told him at that point I wanted him off the property and I didn’t want to see any of them any more,” says Crooks.
Crooks has taken it on himself to fix the siding and other problems with Renton’s home, but says his concern is that most people don’t have a family member or a friend who is a former contractor who can fix these problems or advocate for them on their behalf.
“There’s no use in him coming back because of the workmanship he was doing,” says Crooks, adding that after that, he sent Gordon a note telling him to not bother Renton again.
“It’s intimidating for anyone, let alone a senior who’s 85 and living on their own,” he says. "It’s the intimidation part of it all. That’s the worst of it.”
Looking back, Renton is angry and feels she was taken advantage of, but considers herself lucky to have Crooks who stood up for her. She never received any of the money she gave Gordon back.
“I didn’t feel very good about it. If it wasn’t for my son-in-law, I don’t know what I would have done,” says Renton.
Dave Beeston and Margaret Gomez live down the road from Renton, and say they also had a negative experience with Gordon.
They say their experience was so bad, they have filed a small claims lawsuit against Gordon, Lesley Morris and More for Less Contracting for damage done to their home as a result of the work done.
Beeston first heard about More for Less when he saw some work done on a neighbouring home and liked the look of the new type of vinyl for exteriors, so he reached out to the company himself. Gomez and Gordon came to an agreement in Nov. 2017 that Gomez would pay $17,509 for new exterior vinyl siding and a porch enclosure including new windows, doors, paint, eaves troughs and electrical outlets installed. Gomez alone signed all contracts with Gordon.
At that time, Beeston and Gomez paid a $7,509 as a deposit, with the remaining $10,000 to be paid upon completion of the project, however they ended up paying Gordon $12,862 in January and February to accommodate a siding colour change.
Beeston says that Gordon requested more money beyond what they paid in February, but that he and Gomez were starting to get nervous due to what they say was a lack of regular attendance, poor quality of workmanship and substandard materials.
At around the same time, Beeston says he saw a news article posted on the community events board at Fergushill Estates about legal trouble Gordon got into while running his former business, Home-Tek Exteriors in the Niagara area back in 2015. Beeston says he has no idea who posted the article, but suspects it was someone from the Fergushill Estates board because the events board requires a key.
According to the article and Ontario court documents, Gordon was charged and found guilty back in 2015 of “engaging in an unfair practice by making false, misleading or deceptive representations to consumers" under the Consumer Protection Act between January and September 2013 in relation to his previous business, Home-Tek Exteriors.
At that time, he was ordered to pay $11,200 in restitution to 11 consumers who had paid him deposits for jobs that were never completed. He was also placed on probation for two years and was prohibited from owning, operating or acting as an officer or director in any company that provides home renovation services or other home residential products and services.
By April, Beeston says work slowed at their residence due to Gordon taking on other work around the park. He asked Gordon to return to show him video he and Gomez had taken of water streaming in from the roof of their new enclosure.
The relationship between Beeston, Gomez and Gordon devolved from there, with the three at odds over building permits and quality of work. Beeston says a representative from the Township of Oro-Medonte came to inspect the work and informed him at that time there were no permits in place for the roof work being completed, which was news to him.
According to the law, it is the responsibility of a home owner to get building permits and variances from the township, or make sure it is in the contract with any contractor if it is their responsibility. There is no mention of building permits or variances on the original work order signed by Gomez.
However, Beeston says Gordon knew the permits were his responsibility.
“(Gordon) was supposed to apply for a variance, apply for a surveyor and get a permit. He didn’t do any of that,” says Beeston.
While Beeston says Gordon did return to try to repair the leak, Beeston says he still had to pay to have another contractor come in to do an emergency repair when he says it wasn’t done properly. After that point, Beeston concedes he told Gordon he didn’t want him on his property anymore when Gordon offered to fix his mistakes and offered to hire contractors to fix the work.
“He’s already destroyed it once. There’s no trust there. I need my money back,” says Beeston. “The $25,000 they allow in small claims isn’t going to come close for putting it back together, but it’s a start.”
The list of problems Beeston and Gomez have with the completed work on their property is long, with old windows being installed instead of new, bowed siding, screws poking through exterior walls, eaves troughs that go to nowhere and exterior vinyl siding that is already falling off.
They says they have received quotes ranging from $27,000 to $50,000 to fix the problems they say Gordon has created, which is why he filed his lawsuit.
Wayne Wilson, president of the Fergushill Estates Homeowners Association, says the issue has been completely blown out of proportion.
Wilson and his wife moved to Fergushill Estates in August 2017. He says he met Gordon when he inquired about a Sea Doo Wilson had for sale. When Gordon came to see the Sea Doo, he asked about Wilson’s roof. Wilson agreed to have Gordon to fix the roof over his deck along with adding siding to his home.
“There were a couple of guys who were working for (Gordon) who were doing bad jobs,” says Wilson. “He got rid of them.”
Once the work was completed, Wilson says he was very happy with the quality.
“It’s made a big difference in our home,” he says.
Wilson says there are about 30 different residents in Fergushill Estates he’s aware of who have had their homes worked on by Gordon, however he says he’s only heard complaints from about four or five of them.
“Some people came to me and said they weren’t happy and I said, ‘Look, I like what he did here. I have no complaints. He said he was coming back, he’s not walking away,’” says Wilson. “I know they had problems in the past... but he served his time and did everything correctly.
"We all make mistakes in life but if you corrected the problem and are doing the proper thing now... the past doesn’t mean anything.”
Calvin Gordon refused to be interviewed for this story, however his partner Lesley Morris says there are two sides to every story, especially when it comes to residents of Fergushill Estates.
She also declined to answer questions at the advice of her lawyer, but did provide a statement.
“What they have done and what they’re trying to do is not right,” says Morris, blaming Beeston and Gomez. “We have two really good lawyers and we are not backing down.”
Morris says her lawyers have sent out nine cease and desist letters to various residents of Fergushill Estates this week.
“My phone is exploding... they have made so many people irate,” says Morris. “Yes, Calvin owns the business. Yes, we had some installers that may not have done things right, but the houses we did ourselves were perfect.”
According to the Better Business Bureau, there are two outstanding complaints against More for Less Contracting. Both are anonymous and both are marked as unresolved, giving the business an overall ‘C’ rating.
Beeston and Gordon will next see each other for a mediation meeting on Nov. 22 at Orillia court over the small claims lawsuit.
