Coastline Homes of Oxford — Local services in Oxford

I have to say that anyone dealing with this business should do their homework first!! I have supporting documentation to any of my claims in this review. Our story started late last fall while shopping for a new custom home. We met with Kristin at Coastline who was sweet as pie to us while at the same time down talking all the other modular home dealers in the area. We decided we wanted to proceed with designing our Apex home and paid a $2500 deposit that we were told and have in writing that it was refundable. We went through the plan design process and then at the last minute before ordering the home Kristin sprung on us that they require a 50% down payment and the other 50% is due the day before the house is set on the foundation. First, it is illegal in the State of ME to require more than a third down without disclosing that fact to the consumer. And second, who in their right mind would pay 100% for an unfinished house. Kristen told us that it is standard practice to collect 100% up front and all other dealers follow this same business model which is an outright lie! We have since found several other dealers that do not follow this business model. Several discussions later Coastline backed off of the payment schedule but then sent us a Non-Negotiable and I repeat Non-Negotiable unfair and unrealistic contract to sign. One of the items on the contract stated that they would try not to crack our foundation but would not be responsible if they did. Are you kidding me!! We decided that Coastline Homes of Oxford was not for us and informed Kristin of our decision. We asked for a partial return of our Refundable deposit, understanding plans were drawn and the line item for them was $1500. Well it turns out that they will not give us back any of our refundable deposit. There are deceptive business practices all through the experience with Kristin at Coastline. We have since found out that Coastline Homes of Oxford is a DBA company of Schiavi Homes, LLC. With a little more research, we learned that Schiavi Homes, LLC had their Better Business Bureau rating revoked by the BBB for failure to address customer complaints. Unfortunately, our story does not end here. We found another modular home dealer and approached him about getting us the same home we had designed. As far as we are concerned, we now own the plans to our home as they were paid for with our Refundable deposit that was never returned. Our new dealer was also an authorized Apex builder was allowed by Apex to order the home. Kristin from Coastline Homes of Oxford found out that Apex was moving forward with our home through another dealer and did everything she could to block the sale, well it turned out that Apex did remove our order from their books. This was an extremely childish act on behalf of Coastline Homes of Oxford. Like I said, BUYER BEWARE, this business is clouded with lies and deceit.

As a rebuttal to Coastlines response I will offer up more information. The deposit contract states it is a refundable deposit less any expenses such as plans, contractor consultations(site visits), plot plans, and septic designs. Coastline did in fact generate building plans and the line item was $1500. Contractor consultations are meetings with your subcontractors on site which Coastline did not have any. Coastline did not generate a plot plan or have a septic design done. I did all that work. You are misrepresenting your payment terms, you required 50% down payment without informing me that Maine Statutes cap it at 1/3 I had to find that information myself. Why would anyone look past a BBB accreditation revocation. Your company should have just followed their rules in the first place. And as a matter of fact, the order with Apex through another builder had gone as far as Apex providing stamped drawings and a production date as well as an estimated delivery date. The only reason the Order was pulled was because Coastline threatened to no longer conduct business with Apex. Lies! Lies! Lies! and smooth talking will not change the...

I gave a 2 star because the one thing that Coastline did do is stay on schedule and they were very accommodating and pleasant for the first part of this process.

We did have some smaller issues: 1- I requested that the stove not be hooked up for gas prior to signing the contract. When the house came in, it was hooked up for gas, I had to have it switch on my dollar because they said I missed that in the final contract, although it should have never been in there. 2- The billed me after the fact on insulation from the basement ceiling. I didn’t have a problem with this, but they came in and put the insulation up when the plumber was clearly still working. The plumber had to tear down the insulation in the areas he still needed to complete his work, which again cost me out of pocket. 3- in the several weeks with workers on site finishing up construction on the interior and exterior we found cigarettes all over our yard, driveway and all around the dumpster. It could have been in the hundreds. We also found a cigarette in the insulation on the unfinished portion of of the 2nd level along with a candy bar wrapper and a juice bottle. They did pick it all up after being asked. 4- I began trying to set a date for Coastline to come back to repair cracks and other things that happen while the house settles. My first call was in May, 2022, they finally allowed me to hire someone to fix the issues one my own dime only to be reimbursed by Coastline, a check I had to wait for until November 25th. 5- When we ordered our home, we asked for the 2nd level to be ready for plumbing, but unfinished because we wanted to customize Borge the 2nd level and basement. We finished the basement with no issues and recently we finished the 2nd level. We went to turn on the water to the 2nd level which caused water to gush down through a light fixture into a bedroom in the basement. We spent hours trying to find the leak and finally found it after we cut 4 holes in the 1st level shower wall and ceiling. A staple from the builders pierced a hole in the hot water line. We did not know about this until now, because we only turned the water on when the 2nd level was complete. We ask Coastline politely if they could help offset some of these cost since ultimately it was their fault and the fault is the builders. Their response was that they were not liable for this mistake on their part solely because of the timeframe. They knew they were in the wrong and just didn’t care.

We will be building another home/summer camp, however we will not be using Coastline or their parent company Schiavi. Although they are helpful at the beginning, once the house is set and they get paid, the customer...

Update (August 2022): While our initial Buying experience was amazing and we continue to be thankful and grateful for that; but that’s where the customer service ends with Coastline. The home is under warranty for a year. We were told they would do a walk through at the one year mark and they would fix any drywall cracking which happens with settling. They also fix anything that is under warranty during that first year. I can’t count the number of emails I’ve exchanged with their staff regarding electrical issues, dry wall cracks etc. we have yet to have them return to our home. When I asked about the walk through I was told that they do not actually walk through, they just want the homeowner to send a list of needed repairs. I’ve done that numerous times. We are still waiting. We recently paid out of our own pocket to have the electrical issues addressed despite the fact that Coastline had known about them for nearly a year now.

Last July we were unexpectedly thrust into the search for a new home after losing our home to a fire. It didn’t take us long to decide that a modular was the best fit for our family given the steep rise in building supplies in the midst of the pandemic. Kristin at Coastline Homes of Oxford was amazing from day one. She helped us get quotes for our insurance company and when we were ready to look she welcomed us like no other dealer had done! She was warm, kind and incredibly responsive! She answered all of my questions, and trust me I had many! Stacy walked us through the final stages of getting our home set and the finish work complete. She was equally amazing to work with! She was onsite for the setting of the home and was happy to answer any questions we had through the finish work process. We expected there would be a few things that needed fixing once the house was on the foundation. You have to anticipate there will be things that need adjusting when a house travels roughly 1/4 of the way across the country. Anytime we made a Stacy aware of something she responded immediately and had her crew address our concerns right away. Everyone at Coastline was as dedicated to getting us into our new home as we were. We could not have chosen a better company to help us through...