Our renovation with
On this website we write down our experience of trying to renovate a house in Brussels. Maybe it can help someone to avoid the mistakes we made.
In november 2007, we (a middle class couple)bought a beautiful house in Brussels. It's a well located maison de maitre-like 4-floor building with cellars and a garden, from the beginning of the 20th century. The house was a good state and alrerady habitable, but it needed a 'refresh'. Main works to be done were replacement of electricity, old heating installation, bathroom and kitchen, besides that we wanted to maintain all walls, floors and ceilings.
Click here to see what our house looked like when we bought it.
For the heating and water installation we chose a polish company called Eurinstal who delivered good work. Electrician was done by a electrician. For the rest of the works we choose, out of 6 preselected enterprises, an entrepeneur from Brussels, named Andrzej Wadolowski (TVA/BTW: BE 0870.235.005; click here to find the registration details).
Mr. Wadolowski came up with a good proposal, he was recommended by a collegue of us (Beata Debowska, who works in DG RELEX) and we also visited one house renovated by Wadolowski, as a reference. Despite our efforts to make a good choice, the works by Mr. Wadolowski turned into a complete disaster.
What happened ? Despite the fact that we have a fixed price contract with Wadolowski, after 2 months of work, Wadolowski started to blackmail us - he wanted more money because "the plastering job was more expensive". Otherwise he would leave the site next day. We didn't agree, so he left the site. What has been finished ? Only the demolition works. And of course he left just after we paid the second payment. Click here to read the observation of the bailiff about the situation we got stuck in after Wadolowski broke the contract.
Mr. Wadolowski believes he's an expert on plastering. Instead of just plastering one layer paint-ready and perfectly smooth, he mixes goldband witth sand, uses different types of plaster on one wall, puts more than one layer with materials that are not suitable for that. The endresult is a bizarre patchwork of very rough plastering on your walls, completely useless unless you start over again completely, or finish it in a proper way, which doubles the amount of work and money involved. Click here to see the highlights of Wadolowski's plastering. It was a great source of fun for all plasterers who came to see this miracle, I believe the whole building sector of Brussels knows him for this now.
Despite our protests, Wadolowski didn't stop using our garden for dumping roughly three containers of debris, thus ruining it completely. I think he thought that was funny. And when he left the site, he left us with the garbage. Click here.
Where are we now ? We have a financial problem and we are still struggling to have our renovation finished. Not many building companies want to take the job of correcting and finishing the mess Wadolowski created. We have a delay of almost a year, having to pay both our house and our apartment. So .... be warned and don't get into this kind of misery.
We exist and we reply to mail. We don't like publishing pages like this, but we want to share our experiences with other people like you. If you are in a renovation and want to know more about our experiences in Brussels, the legal side of it, contracts, other not-so-nice entrepreneurs who spoil the Brussels market, or just want to express your support : get in touch !
