Trademasters Handyman

Charlie Knupp is a “handyman” that duped us into letting him take on a project he wasn’t even legally allowed to do. We wanted to enclose a small open back patio to make it a little work studio, and Charlie told us he could do it for $40,000. He made us sign a paper saying he’s “unlicensed”, but nothing on that paper reported the actual law we have since found out from the California State License Board, which is that no unlicensed individual can take a job worth more than $500, nor anywhere in the scope of a room enclosure. In less than two weeks, Charlie asked us for three different checks, totaling $20,000 which he cashed. During their “demo”, they improperly removed stucco by beating it with hammers causing severe cracking to the master bathroom INSIDE our house that they never fixed. They tore apart our patio, nothing was done properly or to code. He submitted “engineering plans” to the City of Burbank that were literally drawn on a piece of paper with a pen with wiggly lines (not even a ruler). These were immediately denied by the city and we had to fork out another $4K to have another professional company draw up our plans. Once those plans were properly drawn up and given to Charlie Knupp, he then sent us an email stating they’d now need to “blow off the roof” and that would be an ADDITIONAL $60,000 for labor ONLY. We confirmed both with the engineer and three separate licensed/bonded contractors that nothing on these plans diverted from the original project we had hired Charlie Knupp for. All Charlie Knupp did was demo which cracked our inside wall, put in rebar and footers that we’ve now been told by actual professionals was not done anywhere near properly or to code. We literally have to pay to UNDO what he did. They also verified that even IF the amount of work they did was done properly, that $3,000 MAX is what it would have cost, and that’s estimating for a higher end licensed contractor. Charlie Knupp cashed $20,000 of our money to destroy our back patio. It has been sitting open to the elements for months. I have posted evidence documents under Trademasters Handyman’s page on Yelp if you want to see the proof. It is morally (and financially) unethical for anyone to do this. We may never see any of our money back because this man is incapable of taking responsibility for his own incompetence, but the least I can do is let everyone else know what he did to us so they can avoid the same nightmare. I am currently helping the Contractors State License Board investigate him and his company. They saw the evidence and deemed it a high priority. We tried to resolve this with him like morally responsible adults, even going as far as asking for just $10,000 of our money back to avoid having to deal with it anymore as it’s been so taxing on our family. But alas, he can’t even do that. Instead he drew up an “invoice” after the fact for $10,000 that he continues to state proves the work he did, but not only is it laughable, it also doesn’t then explain where the OTHER $10,000 went that he cashed of ours! He thereby (albeit unintentionally) admits in his OWN invoice that he at least stole $10,000. But that’s not all, folks. He then said he would give us $8,000 back contingent on us taking down our negative reviews. This is what we’re dealing with. He cashes $20,000 of our money for AT MAX $3,000 worth of work that we have to have redone (along with fixing the cracks to our master bathroom), then shows an invoice that only accounts for $10,000 of that $20,000, and then says he’ll give us $8,000 back, thus walking away with $12,000 of our money after all that AND we’d have to take down any negative reviews. At some point, you have to have some integrity about it all.