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Never mess with someone’s home…

It seems like that might be the most obvious statement of all time, but if you spend enough time in the construction game, you’re bound to run into some seriously shady creeps over the years.

The guy who is the star of today’s story learned that his contractor wasn’t exactly on the level…and he made him pay for it BIG TIME.

Get all the details below and see what you think!

My contractor was cheap, so I made sure to get my money’s worth.

“This happened between my father and the contractor who built his house (my childhood home).

In 2000, my parents and their two young children, ages 7 and 5 (that’s me!), and were looking to move into a house big enough for a family of four and that they could stay in for a very long time.

They found a newly constructed street in a quiet neighborhood in a town known for being family friendly. It was perfect. There were only four available lots, so my mother chose the one she liked best.

Now the houses on these lots were still under construction, so they were mostly just framing at this point.

So my parents decided to contact the contractor, let’s call him Alfred, and see if they could have any input into the design, as they had already set up a mortgage agreement on the property.

Alfred agreed, but didn’t let them do too much. Which wasn’t all that bad. My parents were pretty busy trying to sell their old house anyway.

Uh oh…

A few months go by, and the house is finally ready to be moved into. My parents are thrilled, they finally have their family home! We move in and everything’s great…for about 36 hours.

On literally Day 2, the furnace in the basement breaks and spews smoke throughout the whole house, setting off the smoke detectors.

The police and fire department show up, investigate, and tell us that we can return in 72 hours. So we stay in a nearby hotel for the three days.

Everything is great again, until we start noticing a bunch of small details that Alfred seemed to have overlooked.

This guy was a scam artist.

My dad hires a home inspector to look at the house; the inspector finds numerous faults that could cost thousands to fix.

My dad is MAD.

So my dad, being the calm jerk he is (and I love him for it), decides to get some help in paying for these repairs to his 7-month-old house.

You see, Alfred had been the contractor for four houses on the street, of which only one (ours) had been bought. So my dad went to the bank and expressed interest in the other lots.

He asked that a $1,000 lien be placed on each one. This was all legal.

Alfred found out and was rightfully angry. He couldn’t sell these lots because of the liens! He asked my dad to remove them.

Gotcha!

My dad agreed and said he would, IF Alfred paid for the repairs. Alfred refused to pay, so my dad refused to lift the liens.

Alfred then sues my parents. My parents counter sue. The court rules in favor of my parents. My dad had to lift his liens. But Alfred, he had to pay my parents $50,000! Instead of paying $2-3k for repairs.

AND a home inspector looked at the other three lots and made him pay for any repairs on them.”

And here’s what folks had to say about this on Reddit.

This person asked a question.

Another individual weighed in.

This Reddit user shared their thoughts.

Another person spoke up.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about people who have to go to court to get their land back after their neighbor sells it.

And this reader weighed in.

He wasn’t playing around!

And this contractor probably regrets the day he decided to mess with this guy…

This is a serious case of “Mess around and find out!”