Description

On November 12,2025 a man knocked on my door and when I answered it, he said his name was Toby and he was in the neighborhood and had been working on a house across the street. He had noticed that I had loose bricks on the top of my chimney and wondered if I would be interested in getting them fixed. I went outside with him and we looked at the chimney together. My chimney is original to my house that was built in 1917 and I was aware that it needed repairs and I liner placed before it would be usable. He pointed out a loose brick at the top of the chimney and several areas that needed to be repointed. I told him that I would be interested in having him inspect the chimney a bit further and then give me a quote. He agreed to do that and then said he was going to get a coffee and walked off down the street. He returned about 30 minutes later with another man who had a ladder the other man climbed up the ladder and inspected the chimney further. He did push a few loose bricks off the top of the chimney. I went back inside for a bit and then Toby knocked on the door again and had me come back outside so he could show me what they had found. He pointed out that the grout holding the bricks together was so old that it was basically just sand. He said the only thing holding the chimney together was a metal rod that was about halfway down the chimney stack. He said the whole chimney could collapse at anytime and that it would probably fall into the bus stop that is across the sidewalk. He asked to go into my basement to look at the part of the chimney//fireplace that is in the basement. I took them down into the basement and they found that the mortar there was also crumbling but since it was in a dry area it would probably be ok. We went back outside and he told me that he would need to take down 2/3 of the chimney, rebuild it , line it, repoint some of the bricks on the lower fireplace part. He could get the work done in about 3 days. Because he would be able to use some of the materials leftover from his last job he could give a discount on the price as long as I would put his business sign in my yard for a few days. He quoted me a price of “42”. I assumed he meant $4,200. I felt that was reasonable and so we went into my house and he had me put my name and address on a proposal form. I asked him at that time if when he said “42” he meant $4,200 rather than $42,000. He just laughed and said that $42,000 would be an absurd amount. I’m not sure that were the exact words he used but I was sure that he meant the price was $4,200. He signed his section of the proposal and the I sat down to sign it as well. He was standing to my left as I was signing and had his hand covering the amount of money that I would owe him. I did sign two copies. He took one and I kept the other but unfortunately I did not look at it closely enough. The next day I discovered he had written down that the payment to be made was $42,000 with a deposit of $24,000. He told that they could get started right now. I asked him if he needed a permit and he said that it was small a job he didn’t need to get a permit. He went back outside and his helper started tearing down my chimney. He came back and knocked on my door about an hour later. He asked if I could step outside and see what they had discovered after the bricks had been removed. He told me that there was extensive damage to the wood on that entire side of my home, that the foundation was cracking, and that the entire chimney and fireplace would have to be removed and replaced. He made it sound like something that should not wait. He told me that he could get his crew out the next morning to start the rest of the work and that they could be done by Thanksgiving. He estimated that I would owe him $147,00 for the job. I would need to pay him with a cashiers check He would go back to his office that afternoon to work out an invoice and final cost of the project. I was kind of in shock at this point so I told him to go ahead and send me an invoice and that he could do the project. I didn’t sign anything else at this point. He did send several more workers that afternoon and they demolished most all of the chimney and fireplace. They did haul away all the old bricks. They left about 4:30 pm. I went to my son’s house at 5 pm to take them dinner and babysit my grandkids. I explained the whole situation. My son and daughter-in-law were very skeptical about the amount of money I was being charged. The next morning the crew showed up and took the siding off the south side of my house. Toby called me several times trying to determine how I was going to pay him $75,000 my noon the next day. I just moved here 8 months ago so I do not have a local bank or credit union. I was working on getting a checking account at a local credit union that I could transfer money into from my Spokane credit union. That turned out to not be possible by noon the next day. I called Toby and let him know that and told him the only way I could think of to get him a cashiers check or money order by noon the next day was to get in my car, drive 5-6 hours to Spokane and then drive back He was ok with that plan. Luckily it was after noon by that time and I couldn’t get to Spokane by driving before my credit union closed. I called Toby and let him know that but I was still trying to set up the wire transfer of the funds. He was upset about having no money to buy the materials that he needed for the project but he would talk to the finance people at his office and explain the situation to them and hopefully we would be ok. I didn’t see Toby in person that day. I was able to ask his crew some questions with the assistance of a language translator on their phones. The crew all spoke Spanish. Toby speaks English and has an Irish accent. I was having doubts about the project so I called my son and asked him to come over and look at my house to see if it really needed $147,000 of work. He came over and agree that there was nowhere that extensive of damage. I called Toby and asked him to send over the invoice so I could see exactly the work he was proposing to do. He did email an invoice but it was lacking much detail. His final cost of the project was $146,850.00. My son reviewed the proposal paperwork that I had. That’s when I discovered that Toby had written down $42,000 as the cost of my original fireplace project rather than $4,200. More alarm bells were going off so I asked Toby to send me a copy of his business license. He texted me a picture of his business license and insurance. My so looked up his business license number and found it did not belong to Greenwood Building contractors LLC. There was no business license of that company in Washington. We also Googled the business address on Google Earth and that looked shady too. I had my son call Toby and ask him to stop work on everything but the fireplace. We told the crew at the house to stop working on the side of the house. They had removed all the siding and were nailing up plywood. (No sign of the insulation that Toby had talked about putting up) I texted Toby at 4:35 pm on Thursday about stopping work except on the fireplace and Chimney. He said would be ok and he would send me a bill the next day. He asked if I wanted his crew to come the next day and I said “no “ since we had determined that he didn’t have a valid business license and was most likely a scammer. I told him that his crew could come pick up anything that they had left behind. They had put several sheets of plywood on my front porch to keep it out of the rain and they had a ladder and some tools in my backyard. Toby then sent me pictures of my house that had been taken that afternoon and said that he had already done a lot of work on my house and he needed to get paid. I did not respond to his text. He then asked if I was trying to scam them. I did not respond to his text. He then texted me, “no problem “ and that I should expect his truck to show up and dump everything back on my front lawn. And he was starting legal proceedings against me to get his $42,000. I texted him back that I would be contacting my lawyer in the morning and I was going to report him to the Better Business Bureau. I also called the police. They thought that this was a civil matter since I did sign a contract and that it would have to be resolved in civil court. The officer told me that if he did come back and dump anything on my lawn and if I felt unsafe, I should call 911. I have not seen or heard from Toby or any of his crew since then. I had a contractor that my son and daughter-in-law parents have worked with and trust come to look at my house. He felt that the side of the house can be repaired for about $20,000 He was not sure about the fireplace/chimney repair since he does do masonry work but proposed replacing the masonsry fireplace with an insert since the weather might be too cold now for masonry work. He thought that would add $10,000 or so. Luckily I never gave Toby any money. I feel stupid and my fireplace and chimney are demolished so I have a hole in the side of my house and no siding on the south side of my house.