SUMMARY: Stuccospec provided a horrible stucco inspection leading to contractor not honoring warranty on repairs. They reported inaccurate info and that gave contractor a big excuse to deny damages in areas he had repaired. They provided a horrible customer service and caused us a lot of frustration. They were very unprofessional for leaving us in the dark at difficult times when they were paid to do their job right. An inspector's job is to support homeowners who hire them, not line up with contractors. That's a conflict of interest. Around ~$14,000 was spent on repairs already. Their inaccurate report ended up costing us another $13,000+ on top of that to repair the repairs and associated damages. We trusted them; instead they fooled us and did not support us.

DETAILS: We hired Stuccospec to do a post-repair stucco inspection. We needed to check the contractor's repairs because signs of failure were all over the place, worse than pre-repairs. Stuccospec had referred the contractor to us. Objective: in case there's damage after repairs, through their expert opinion, we would utilize warranty. Gregg Morgan of Stuccospec came and did a very quick inspection and said: repaired beam is Firm, meaning no damage, and there's no need to remove any stucco. While leaving, he said: contact me and leave questions, I'll respond. That was a joke. Stuccospec was supposed to deliver report in 3 days; it took them 7 days to provide something and first version was useless. Report made it sound like there's nothing really wrong which was not making sense. Several perimeter and moisture cracks in repaired areas were long and wide-enough that you could see underlying wood through them. No mention of that in first version. After inspection, Gregg Morgan lost detailed photos of repair issues. We told him you can stop by anytime to re-take. He didn't bother to come inside property and re-take. Instead, he used some low-res useless photos taken from a very far distance (street level). New photos were not showing details of issues properly while repairs were falling apart. Disappointing report. We compiled a list of issues and requested a revision. Every time we were asking for it there was some kind of excuse. Onetime, Gregg Morgan had a soccer match to go to and decided not to meet the other 2 inspectors to discuss report; he had confirmed previously. Second time, the other 2, had to go out of town and couldn't meet him. Third, the other 2 lost electricity and couldn't meet him to finalize report. Ridiculous. Meanwhile we were stressing as we were getting very close to expiration of 1-year labor warranty. We had let them know about deadline. After ~30 days of wait, revised report still did not have an acceptable level of detail. No mention of any damage in repaired areas. We sent report to contractor to use warranty, he said: "all I see is few cracks...Stuccospec's report is showing Firm [meaning no damage] substrate [beam]” and he didn’t fix anything under warranty. Unreasonable responses powered by Stuccospec's bad report. We asked Gregg Morgan some follow-up questions on his report via email/phone; he never responded. Online reviews say he does it to other homeowners too. Horrible. What gives you the right to take people's hard-earned money and not respond to their questions about your lousy inspection? We asked Stuccospec: we would like to hire you in consulting mode, please do a detailed inspection, essentially spend more time and pin-point damages. Their response: "we do not like to get involved because the contractor is also a colleague of us". Red flag; inspectors hired by homeowners are supposed to do their job right or line up with contractors? We hired another inspection firm. They said original issues were not fixed; instead made worse and wood in repaired areas including beam, is not Firm. Damaged. We removed stucco and saw firsthand beam was not Firm as Stuccospec had claimed.