Buyer Beware! Owner Marc Mahowald advertises on Facebook and Craigslist as a granite countertop fabricator and installer. I made the mistake of buying local. Went to his ” place of business “ in lake Elmo, Mn. He gave us an estimate and we selected the granite. He then came to our house to measure and told us he would install in 4 days. After 8 weeks of waiting with no kitchen he finally installed the granite. After he left, I inspected the granite closely and noticed that the sink cut out didn’t match up with the undermount sink, the hole was cut too large and you could see an inch of the lip of the sink. The outside edge of the granite had been patched in one place and glued together where there was a huge crack though the granite. There were many chips along the inside of the sink cutout also. There was also another 4 inch crack in the center of the countertop. The edge of the countertop was also cut crooked the entire length of the countertop, not even close to being straight!
On top of the very poor craftsmanship, he hadn’t mounted the granite to the sink as promised. He did return when I called him to mount the sink. We then discussed his craftsmanship when he arrived. He made many excuses about an employee doing the bad work and a new saw being the problem. He agreed to replace a piece of the granite. During this process which he said would be 2 weeks, which took him 3weeks, he contacted us to say he broke the granite twice. The day he was to reinstall a new piece of granite he texted me a picture of broken granite saying”bad news. Loaded the granite and the ear broke. It wasn’t like I hit it or anything it just broke, was being super careful. I think the only way to prevent this is to put a rod underneath it for strength...option 1, I redo it option 2 I can return your money” Of course I opted for my money back.
During that painful process, he demanded I sign a hand written contract stating I return his granite in 30 days! i finally got a bank check from him. I gave him 48 hours notice to retrieve his granite before my new install by a reputable granite installer. He failed to uninstall his granite, saying he was out of town. My new installer had to uninstall the bad granite before installing the new stuff. My new installer said he had never seen such bad workmanship, everything from the rubber shims underneath to the poorly cut damaged slab he used. The new granite is beautiful and perfect. The seam is hard to notice. The seam before was more like a 1/4 inch grout joint!
Bottom line is marc mahowald is a poor businessman and a liar. We experienced countless times that he didn’t answer our calls or texts for days when he made many promises of install dates. 4 day turnaround turned into 8 weeks of hell.
Stone-Fab & Design, LLC Reviews
Buyer Beware! Owner Marc Mahowald advertises on Facebook and Craigslist as a granite countertop fabricator and installer. I made the mistake of buying local. Went to his ” place of business “ in lake Elmo, Mn. He gave us an estimate and we selected the granite. He then came to our house to measure and told us he would install in 4 days. After 8 weeks of waiting with no kitchen he finally installed the granite. After he left, I inspected the granite closely and noticed that the sink cut out didn’t match up with the undermount sink, the hole was cut too large and you could see an inch of the lip of the sink. The outside edge of the granite had been patched in one place and glued together where there was a huge crack though the granite. There were many chips along the inside of the sink cutout also. There was also another 4 inch crack in the center of the countertop. The edge of the countertop was also cut crooked the entire length of the countertop, not even close to being straight!
On top of the very poor craftsmanship, he hadn’t mounted the granite to the sink as promised. He did return when I called him to mount the sink. We then discussed his craftsmanship when he arrived. He made many excuses about an employee doing the bad work and a new saw being the problem. He agreed to replace a piece of the granite. During this process which he said would be 2 weeks, which took him 3weeks, he contacted us to say he broke the granite twice. The day he was to reinstall a new piece of granite he texted me a picture of broken granite saying”bad news. Loaded the granite and the ear broke. It wasn’t like I hit it or anything it just broke, was being super careful. I think the only way to prevent this is to put a rod underneath it for strength...option 1, I redo it option 2 I can return your money” Of course I opted for my money back.
During that painful process, he demanded I sign a hand written contract stating I return his granite in 30 days! i finally got a bank check from him. I gave him 48 hours notice to retrieve his granite before my new install by a reputable granite installer. He failed to uninstall his granite, saying he was out of town. My new installer had to uninstall the bad granite before installing the new stuff. My new installer said he had never seen such bad workmanship, everything from the rubber shims underneath to the poorly cut damaged slab he used. The new granite is beautiful and perfect. The seam is hard to notice. The seam before was more like a 1/4 inch grout joint!
Bottom line is marc mahowald is a poor businessman and a liar. We experienced countless times that he didn’t answer our calls or texts for days when he made many promises of install dates. 4 day turnaround turned into 8 weeks of hell.