Testimonials

Just wanted to thank you for my beautiful home along with all the extra advice, passion and guidance you provided in helping it come to life.

There are numerous factors I appreciate about working with SCH and the final result. Just a few notable items that I'd like to thank you for:

• Your original bid and the timing estimates were spot on. The home was finished almost to the date you told me it would be done and the budget was managed judiciously with care and pragmatic guidance to keep me focused on the important things.
• I felt that you truly cared about my intent and final outcome, providing great advice and exploring many alternatives along the way and always by my side.
• SCH provided thorough input, complete financial transparency, and timely communication not only throughout the building process, but also upon completion and beyond. You took care of all the little things and treated me like a friend vs. just a client. Truly appreciate all the follow up and care.
• I am delighted and proud of my beautiful home. The quality of construction and design are showcased throughout and the compliments I receive from my guests are overwhelming.

Again, Thank You to you and your team, awesome job!

Vlad Lebedev, VP Enterprise Agreements

It was a pleasure to work with John and Jason of Stackman Custom Homes. The experience was better than I could have hoped for. I love my home. John and his subcontractors built a beautiful, quality home within the timeframe established and within the budget parameters that I targeted. John treated my budget as his own - i.e. he was always thoughtful to cost. I really liked the monthly expense tracking process which included detailed invoices.

In terms of communication, John and his subs were always informative, patient and super responsive to questions or concerns. I would not hesitate to refer Stackman Homes. I also hope to work with John and team again in the near future.

Janet

Stackman Custom Homes, the company in consideration to build your new home, is one that you need to hire if you want a positive experience with this important project. We decided to build our new home in Kirkland in 2016 and interviewed 3 contractors. We decided to hire Stackman Custom Homes after checking on their references from prior clients. The relationship that you will develop with your builder has to be based - first and foremost - on trust. Given the financial and emotional impact of building a home, we did not want someone who would make a lot of promises but yet, fall short of meeting our expectations. John and Jason were great to work with for the following reasons:

• Maintained good communications on a regular basis and always kept us informed throughout the building process.
• Very knowledgeable about all the various city code requirements and worked well with the city inspectors and personnel.
• Their projected costs and timeframe of building our home were detailed and accurate.
• Great follow through during the home build as well as after the completion of the project.
• Provided timely responses to all of our questions and quick to address any concerns we had.
• Established long term good working relationships with their subcontractors.
• Dependable.

We strongly recommend Stackman Custom Homes and feel that your home building process would be greatly enhanced by working with John and Jason.

Dave Faassen & Lina Cho

My wife and I, and our extended family, have just completed a year long project involving the addition of 700 square feet to our home of 44 years on Mercer Island. With little prior experience of this sort, we were, at the start, apprehensive about the choice of a contractor. Through friends, we learned of John Stackman of "Stackman Custom Homes" in Bellevue. After interviewing a number of contractors, we chose John and have never looked back. Our project was completed on time and on budget and John was with us from start to finish. We thoroughly enjoyed all of his subcontractors and their work was of the highest quality.

In short, we are delighted with the performance of John Stackman and would highly recommend him to anyone in search of a talented and truly reliable builder. Both my wife and I would be happy to discuss our experience, if so desired, and can be reached by email or phone through "Stackman Custom Homes" in Bellevue.

John & Evey, Mercer Island

I was asked to give a little testimonial about the building process I went through with John.  Before I talk about the specifics of my building experience, I should give you a little background about me and my involvement in the building process.  My architect gave John a little warning about working with me.  He said I might be a little difficult to work with.  And, I would agree with him.  I would say that I was an opinionated homeowner with high expectations and someone who was going to be actively involved in the building process.  The house John was building for me and my family was about a vision and a lifestyle.  My wife and I wanted many amenities that you would never find in a spec home.  As such, I was involved in numerous aspects of the build process that many homeowners might choose to defer to the builder.  In the end, I believe that involvement paid off.  On a regular basis, my wife and I are just amazed at how great our house turned out.

I took selecting a builder to a level that many of my friends thought was excessive.  My goal was to interview and get bids from approximately 10 different builders.  Additionally, I was only going to talk with builders that were recommended to me by people who had had direct dealings with those builders.  I wanted a builder who I could talk with and work with to achieve my vision.  I knew that building a home would involve budget issues, delays and missteps by subs.  I wanted a builder that would work with me to overcome those issues.  I wanted a builder that would engage me in the decision-making process rather than see me as a client buying the home they were building.

Now on to the build process.  I had some very specific ideas about what I wanted in my house.  The bid I got back from John was very detailed.  It dealt with the basics I wanted to see within my house.  It also gave me a budgetary starting point to build upon.  I changed numerous base specifications and add lots of extra items from my wish list.  On several items, I met directly with John’s subs to hash out the details of how I wanted things done.  For example, my house has a rather complex electrical plan.  By meeting directly with John’s electrical sub, I was able to get an electrical plan that worked for me both functionally and financially.  In the end, the relationship I had with John and the leeway he gave me in our build process allowed me build a truly custom home.

Going into this build, I knew that a good communication channel between John and I was critical.  I knew that good communication was key to overcoming the expected budget issues, delays and missteps by subs.  John did a great job keeping me informed about the build process.  We probably spoke by phone at least a couple time a week and I regularly met with him on site to discuss how the build was proceeding and how issues would be handled.  Let’s just say that John was very good at tolerating my involvement in the build process.

Budget wise… We did great!  Some items were under and some went over.  But in the end, we got our house built for an excellent price.  Jason did an excellent job of keeping me up-to-date with all the invoicing.  I also kept him very busy chasing down pricing on change orders.  When I would come up with the latest, greatest idea I wanted incorporated into my home, John and Jason would get bids on the change.  Some changes were pursued and some were not.  However, unlike some builders I talked with, I only paid for the changes I made.  A couple of the builders I interviewed had a fixed cost just for pricing out change orders.  Budget wise… I had money left over in my construction account at the end of the build process.

John made the build process easy.  When we had hiccups in the build process, they were identified and fixed.  For example, when the interior paint job failed to meet the expectations we had discussed with the painting contractor, the house was completely repainted.  There were no arguments or discussions about additional costs.  In fact, the painting contractor was very apologetic about how the paint job turned out.  In short, when John or his subs agreed to a certain standard, the standard was delivered. 

Overall, I am very pleased with my home building experience and the final product delivered by John.  We regularly have guests comment about how nice our house turned out.  The house is all I could have asked for, and then some.  I would definitely use John again if I were to build another house.  I would also recommend him to anybody that is looking for an excellent builder.

Alan Cox, Shoreline, WA

The whole process and experience working with you and your team was very easy and enjoyable. We’ll always recommend you and your company to our friends and acquaintances with the highest score.

We’ll definitely use your help with our future projects.

The whole process has been simple and easy for us, although building a home is never easy and typically not without some surprises and challenges. From the beginning, you provided us with precise specs, pricing and whole information that were required by mortgage company. You also recommended the mortgage company, which worked out as a great combination. All meeting with subcontractors (plumbing, electrical, cabinet, millwork) were informative, everybody made our expectations to our high standards.

Communication
Never had any single issue: it was easy to reach out for you either through phone calls, emails, or texts.

Budget
Yes, you did meet our budget which was so wonderful. Yes, during the construction it is almost impossible not to have change orders. You handled it fast, and the process of changing things was simple.  If something was needed to be changed, you were fast to reach out for us.

Construction
The quality of the house was what we expected, thank you very much! We were expecting higher quality than typical cookie cutters houses. In our old house, we did few projects and discovered several low-quality items. But in house that you built, the quality was much higher. We definitely did not want to save every cent to sacrifice quality as many of the cookie cutters houses constructions sometimes do to maximize profit.

Construction was completed perfectly in time, just as we expected. We appreciate you and Jason kept us informed at all stages. We also appreciate how you were informing our neighbors about upcoming major work on site, so that neighbors could expect and plan for it. Our neighbor also highly regarded you.

We did enjoy working with your team of contractors. Everything was perfect! Millwork, cabinets, lights, paint was excellent! Thank you very much! We also appreciated several advices that you gave us on some finishes – it was perfect practical advices that we followed and we never regretted about that.

We definitely would ask for your help again. And we were already recommending you to some other people. Bottom line, we were very happy with having you building our house! Thank you very much!

Tanya and Eugene

The following was an email we recently received and were asked to include this in our testimonials...

Lukas.  Thanks for reaching out to me. 

Make your life easier and hire John.  He's a good guy and excellent at what he does.  Building a custom home has been a long and hard process.  My wife and I are very particular and very involved and John has been absolutely amazing to work with.   There are 3 things that really stand out for me with John.

1) I use email incessantly and draft a ton of emails at night.  Nearly every night, John is up and still checking email.  His engagement and level of service after normal work hours has been "priceless". 

2) John is extremely trustworthy.  He tells it to you straight up and doesn't add in a ton of fluff. 

3) In any big project there will always be some issue that comes up.  John is a man of integrity.  If he messed up or his sub messes up, he will always get it fixed at no cost to you.

Now to your questions:

1) I hope I never have to do a custom build again.  It's a lot of work. But if I did, I wouldn't even shop around for a GC.  I'd go straight to John.

2) His craftsmanship is the best I've seen.  I've met nearly all of his subs and they're all excellent at what they do.  I've seen Buchan, Burnstead, Conner, Merit, etc. homes over the years.  I have a lot of appreciation for a nice Buchan and Burnstead home but John is second to none of these builders.  If you'd like, have John show you our house. We're building in Kirkland and he can give you a tour.

3) Budget - This is a tough one.  We've changed our specs so much over the course of the process that we definitely exceeded our budget.  With that said, John will be up front and work with you to nail down specs first.  Then you'll find that certain subs may go over while others go under.  For the most part, the overages and underages seem to offset each other.  I will say that utilities is definitely something that's exceeded our budget but John was upfront from the beginning and said that was something that we wouldn't know until we start to dig. 

4) Communication - I love that John responds to my emails late at night.  The one thing to note is that he's usually short on email.  So just don't take that personally.  If you really want to know the details about something, it's best to talk in person or over the phone.   

Lastly, John has a person by the name of Jason Corea working for him.  He's been in the industry for many many years and is excellent at what he does.  He's a great asset for John and we've come to work closely with Jason on everything.  Jason is the business manager that helps ensure everything is being addressed and getting done. 

I've written a novel.  Let me know if there are any other additional questions.  Also, I'd be happy to talk to you in person and walk you through my house.  John's that good and it's the least I can do for him. Thanks.

Hyo

John Stackman has mastered the art of building custom homes for demanding clients, in the luxury and upper middle range of our market. When building spec homes, he has consistently put up exceptional homes in good locations, and they sell first for more money than those of his competitors. His company has withstood even the most difficult markets because of his judgement and business sense. As an agent who deals with lots of builders, I can say he is also just a heck of a nice guy, a good citizen, and his long list of happy clients shows his commitment to successful relationships

Richard D. Willard

We have been living in our new house for about five months and we could have not been happier, all our friends and neighbors who came over said the same thing: " This is so nice, who was the builder?".

It has been a great experience working with John and Jason who are very organized and great schedulers. The crews were working in the house all the time and there has hardly been any down time.

It was very easy to work with John, Jason, and all the subcontractors who have been very experienced and professional. Everybody was on board and very cooperative during the construction process. They provided us with good specifications and kept us involved with every stage of work (framing, plumbing, electrical, roofing, stucco siding, cabinet, lighting, mil work, painting, flooring, counter tops, etc..).

The communication we had was very timely and informative during different stages of construction. The change orders were dealt easily and they kept us updated on the cost and timing.

From the demolishing of the old house to moving to the new house took fourteen months which was promised.

We really enjoyed working with the whole construction team and the suppliers -Truly great people.

We are very happy and pleased with the outcome and quality of our beautiful house.

We will take this opportunity to thank you all for doing a great job and will use Stackman Custom Homes again any time.

Job well done.

Farzin Sabetian and Mandana Ahmadian

We love our new home. The folks at Encore made the involved construction process enjoyable with their professionalism, flexibility and can-do attitude.

Jeff and Beth Day

We’ve worked with John Stackman on not one but two homes, and would gladly work with him again. We have been delighted with the results every time. John is a true “homeowner’s builder" - he is focused on our needs, building the house we want to live in. He has helped us envision our home and select an architect, pointed out ways we might improve the design or function of the home while maximizing the value of our construction budget, and made sure each of our homes was finished on time and on-budget. John has a great relationship with everyone from architects to city permit officials to material suppliers and construction laborers - which has definitely been a factor in helping our projects run smoothly from start to finish. We highly recommend him and Stackman Custom Homes.

John & Angela Traynor

Having been in our home for over 5 years now, we’ve been sadly behind in formally telling you how pleased we are: pleased with the results, and with the wonderful customer service we have received before, during and after the construction of our home.

The entire process, from planning, designing, building, and the numerous choices involved in putting together a custom home were made so much easier by you and all your staff. You guided us every step of the way, providing insight on how best to fulfill our wishes and maintain our budget (no easy task!). All of your staff was patient with our (often uniformed) questions, concerns and odd requests – doing their best to help us through what can be a confusing process. Having dealt with other builders in the past, we cannot praise you and your staff enough.

There are few builders who truly stand behind their product like you do. And there are even fewer whom you can truly trust. And trust is (without a doubt) the operative word. Knowing we could count on you and your staff to have our best interests at heart made everything easier. And we now have a beautiful custom home that meets our needs and suits our tastes.We will turn to Encore Custom Homes and Newhall Jones & Stackman for any construction, remodeling, or addition plans in the future. We couldn’t even think of using anyone else!

Janet Politte & Larry Murphy

Quality design, quality construction, quality care and quality service. We built a great relationship of trust working with Encore. We are happy to have chosen them as our builder and are happy to recommend them.

Brian & Lisa Woodruff - Microsoft

Every finished home shows the pride of the entire organization. We couldn’t be happier with the overall design and quality of our home and with the value for our investment. It has been a pleasure working with you and your staff and with many of the subcontractors we are now acquainted with.

Trudy Sayler

It’s a privilege to work with you. The level of care you put into your homes is only surpassed by the expression in your hearts

Dave Nelson

I was talking to a realtor today about my house. We talked about many things in regard to the value of my house and one of the things that I mentioned to him was how pleased I am with my builder. I noted that you were here just today even though you are paid in full. His response to me was that you are a well known and well respected builder in the community.

Suzie Lyons