A Twin Cities association, walked end to end before anybody prices anything. This is how a scope starts.
Twin Cities general contractor. In business since 2003.
You should only have to do this once.
Roofs, siding, windows, decks, and the water damage nobody has been able to trace. We find what is actually wrong, price the whole repair, and hold the schedule.
James Hamilton and Dusty Kaefring, thirty years each, both still in the field.
Who we work for
Pick the one that sounds like you.
A board member, a building owner, and a homeowner are solving three different problems with the same roof. So the site splits here rather than making you read past two thirds that are not yours.
Association boards and property managers
You are responsible for buildings you did not build, on a reserve balance that has to cover them. We walk the property, tell you what is failing and what is holding, and put it in writing. Price comes after that.
Multifamily and commercial →Commercial property owners
Retail strips, offices, and small industrial. The envelope is an asset with a schedule on it, and the schedule is usually later than the leak. We scope the whole envelope, phase it around your tenants, and tell you what holds another season.
Commercial work →Homeowners
It is your house, and you are the one who notices the ceiling stain at two in the morning. Everybody says a man's home is his castle. Fine. A castle is walls and a roof, and ours hold. We fix what is rotting, replace what is finished, and leave the place looking like somebody took care of it.
Residential →Scope
One call instead of four.
A tree comes down on a roof. It takes the gutters and part of the deck with it. That is three trades, and most people end up hiring all three, then spend the next two months standing in the middle of it.
We hold the general contract and run the whole scope on one schedule.
- Capital improvement projectsReserve-funded replacement, phased
- Water intrusion diagnosisFind the path, then fix it
- RoofingAsphalt, flat, and low slope
- SidingFiber cement, engineered wood, vinyl
- Windows and doorsReplacement and new openings
- Gutters and drainageWhere most leaks start
- Decks and balconiesFraming, surface, and rail
- Storm and insurance damageDocumented for the adjuster
How we work
Where the money actually goes.
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Estimating
The estimate is the price.
We price what the job actually takes. If we can see a problem, it goes in the estimate, even when that makes us the high bid. The change orders on our jobs are the ones nobody could have seen coming.
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Installation
We install past code.
Code is the minimum. We install to the manufacturer's printed instructions, which are stricter, and that is what keeps the warranty good and keeps water on the outside of the building.
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Schedule
Your project does not linger.
Crews finish and get off the property. Nobody wants staging up all season, and on an association nobody wants to explain it at three consecutive board meetings.
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Cost over time
The low bid is usually the expensive one.
When a cheap repair fails, you pay to tear it out, buy the material a second time, and then pay for the real fix. The number on the first estimate was never the whole number.
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Ownership
The owners are operators.
James Hamilton and Dusty Kaefring own KAEHAM and both of them still run work. Thirty years each on exteriors. They have seen the failures, which is why they catch them early, and they run the company on a 1950s idea of service where the customer is somebody you expect to see again.
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Engineering
Trade experience first.
We apply our trade experience first, and that usually solves the problem and saves the money. We bring in engineering partners where needed, and only when the project requires the additional investment.
The work
The leak nobody could find.
A downtown building had a leak that had run for years. Several people had already looked at it. The owner was giving away free rent on a top-floor unit the entire time it stayed unsolved.
It was the middle of winter. We built a temporary wood structure over the deck so the leak stayed intact and the work could keep going in the cold. We redid the curb mounts. We found a rotted parapet wall. We found a mispitched deck sitting on a failed gusset and rebuilt it. We finished the unit interior with the resident still living there.
No engineer on it. We read the building ourselves.
We have told a client to hire somebody else.
An association of fourplexes and eightplexes had a contractor working off a cheap observed engineer report. No permits. No general contractor license. Owners getting billed one unit at a time.
The repair in that report was the wrong repair, so we wrote to the owners and told them not to hire us for it, because doing the work as written would take their money and leave the buildings the same. Four years later they called us back.
Financing is available on most projects.
Exterior work is rarely something anyone budgeted for. A roof fails on its own schedule. We can arrange financing on the job and show you what it costs before you sign anything.
Coverage
Where we work.
We are based in Burnsville and we work the whole Twin Cities metro. We also work greater Minnesota, and we travel out of state for the right project. If you are outside the metro, call and ask.
Next
What happens after you call.
We come out and look at the building. You get the findings in writing, including the parts that are fine and the parts that can wait.
If there is work worth doing, the estimate covers the whole scope, line by line, with a number that holds.