COSTA MESA : ‘Dream House’ Plan Turns to Nightmare

Terje Vaage thought he was on his way to his dream house.

Through a city program to upgrade homes of low-income residents, he looked forward to building a back patio, a concrete driveway and a brick and wrought-iron wall to enclose a courtyard. He bought books on home improvement and landscaping and a computer program on achieving the “Dream House.”

Six months after being approved for an interest-free, $10,000 loan to start the work, Vaage, 43, is regretting the day he signed up for the program. Recently, he bought books on how to file a lawsuit in small claims court.

In the initial phase of work done in October, Santa Ana contractor Steve Houghton poured concrete for the new driveway, the courtyard and the back patio, but Vaage was not happy. He said the work was uneven, causing water to run off and hit the house. Another contractor whom Vaage paid to inspect the work said that the concrete also lacked expansion joints, which resulted in cracks, and that it was poured too dry.

Houghton said the work he completed was done to Vaage’s specifications and that Vaage agreed to write a check for $2,372 after he apparently was satisfied with the work.

“He signed a form to pay me after the work was done,” Houghton said.

But Vaage wrote complaint letters to the city and the Contractors State License Board and Houghton returned to dig up the concrete.

On a rainy afternoon last week, Vaage looked out onto the muddy front yard of his home in College Park where he once had a patch of grass, a wood fence and some trees and beyond where streets with names like Princeton and Bowling Green lead to custom tract homes built in the 1960s.

For more than a year, the former engineer has been out of work and on disability after injuring his left ankle in a fall from a tree in his back yard.

Barbara Surges, a city official responsible for Housing and Urban Development programs, said she did not know enough to comment specifically about Vaage’s case. She did say, however, that she refuses to pay for unsatisfactory work more often than property owners reject the work done to their home, as in Vaage’s case.

“You’re dealing, for the most part, with elderly people and people who are afraid of contractors,” she said.

Through the city’s Housing Rehabilitation Loan Program, homeowners can qualify for either interest-free loans, which they do not pay back until they refinance or sell their homes, or low-interest loans.

Upgrading a house to make it meet city housing quality standards is a priority of the program, Sturges said. After that, homeowners can use the money to make other improvements to their home. They cannot use the money to buy luxury items, such as spas, swimming pools and microwave ovens.

Although the city provides a list of contractors to the homeowners, it does not recommend or check the backgrounds of any of them, Sturges said.

“That is a rule of ours,” she said.

Sturges insists that the city will not pay a contractor if it is not satisfied with the completed work. And if the city is satisfied and a homeowner is not?

“Then we’re going to have to have a discussion,” she said.

Vaage said that the city approved the work and issued the check to Houghton without his approval and that the work done so far has decreased the value of his property. He also said the city refuses to release any additional funds until he replaces the concrete Houghton dug up, which he says he can’t afford.

“The irony of the story is that the loan was for my benefit and to upgrade my property,” Vaage said. “Now, I get a muddy driveway and my neighbors have to look at this. I’m at the point now where I wish I had never heard of it.”