Our Fight with Carolina Custom Homes of Burlington

For five years, this company has been in our minds often, and not for good reasons. I want to share our story, especially for local people, who may be looking to build a home in the near future. If you don’t have time to read the whole thing, please just know that we, along with many others, have had really horrible experiences with this company and strongly recommend you look elsewhere. They are extremely dishonest people who do not take responsibility for their own shoddy work. 

In 2020 our family found land and wanted to build a home. Friends told us modular homes were cheaper and even better than stick built, and several people recommended Carolina Custom Homes of Burlington (CCHB) to us. We looked into them and ultimately chose to use them. We chose a house model from another company and customized it to our liking.

In October of 2021, just a couple days before we were supposed to close on our new house and move, our lender called us and said they could no longer give us a loan because Andy McKeown (who was, from our perspective, the owner of CCHB) was on some kind of HUD list as someone not to do loans with. That threw us for a loop and greatly upset us, sending us into a panic of not knowing what to do. We soon found out that Andy was a convicted felon who had defrauded the government out of millions of dollars years before. As we expressed our situation and alarm to Andy, he did let us move into our home early and close after we found another lender.

We hoped we wouldn’t have to deal with Andy much after closing on our home. That was not to be the case. In August 2022, we started noticing major issues with the flooring in the main open areas of our downstairs. We contacted Brittany McKeown, who went through the proper channels to get a professional inspector (hired by the flooring manufacturer, Shaw) to take a closer look. They finally came in December 2022.

The inspector said: Conclusion: -100% of the installed floor has cupping. -No installation issues were found that would cause these issues to affect the entire installation. -The details of the manufacturer’s warranty concerning cupping are to be determined by the manufacturer. -Opened box of the material showed signs of cupping. Material has been sent in for further testing. – Plank in the dining room with delamination at the side joint is a result of cupped plank along with chair damage.

Due to the manufacturing defects, Shaw hired installers used by CCHB to replace the floor under our 1-year warranty. The floors were finally replaced by J+A Home Enterprises, owned by Josh Clapp, in February 2023.

In April 2023, only two months after the floor was installed, our floors started to have cupping issues again. Shaw sent a professional inspector in June 2023. We reached out to Brittany a month later to find out the results of the inspection and she told us that Nationwide told her there were no manufacturing issues found with the floor and that we would have to get another inspector at our own expense if we disagreed. We questioned this result because the inspector told us that the floors definitely had problems and that unlevel conditions under the floor would cause that. We contacted Shaw for more details on the claim, who sent us to Nationwide, who sent us to CCHB for more info. Andy told us to continue to work with Shaw if needed and most likely get another inspection. He did not give us the full details of the inspection, so we thought that maybe the inspection was wrong, even though that didn’t make sense to us.

Because we kept getting passed around and not getting any help, we gave up for a while, not knowing what to do. Our floor kept getting worse and worse. We were finally going to hire our own inspector in November 2023, since the floor was getting so bad, but I felt that we should ask Shaw for a copy of the June inspection first. We got that copy on November 6, 2023. While it’s true (as Brittany said) that the floor did not have manufacturing issues, there were major installation issues found due to the subflooring not being properly prepared.

Here is what the inspection report said:

1. CITATIONS: 1. Shaw Floors, Resilient Installation Guidelines for SPC Products, Page 1, Subfloor Information: All subfloors must be clean, flat, dry, and structurally sound. The correct preparation of the subfloor is a major part of a successful installation. Subfloor must be flat – 3/16″ in 10′ or 1/8″ in 6′. 
2. CONCLUSION: Manufacturer-related issues observed: None Site-related issues observed: None Performance-related issues observed: None Installation-related issues observed: Out-of-flat conditions. Per the manufacturer’s guidelines for sub-floor preparation – it is the responsibility of the installerto make sure that the surface is clean, dry, structurally sound, and flat within a 3/16″ in 10′ or 1/8″ in 6′. High spots should be leveled and low spots should be filled with Cementous patching to ensure the substrate is flat. A flat (within tolerance) substrate is critical for any floating floor. Vinyl tile and plank products do not provide any structural support, thus requiring a flat substrate without undulation for support. When a rigid core vinyl product is installed over a substrate with undulation, it does temporarily bridge across the high points of the substrate. However, over time, and with repetitive foot traffic, the tiles or planks will develop cracks resulting from the undulation – thus resulting in the condition observed. See Citation #1.

We immediately reached out to CCHB, and after many emails back and forth from November 6-10, 2023 with Andy, we knew that they weren’t going to willingly replace the floors. He told us to seek legal counsel.

Here is a Facebook post I wrote on November 7, 2023:

Please under no circumstances build a home with Carolina Custom Homes of Burlington.

We did and we have regretted it ever since. We could give countless reasons why, but I don’t want to make your head explode.

The most recent reason, though, is because of our flooring issues that have been ongoing since we moved in. Our floors were replaced once but are now having major issues again. An inspection was done over the summer when we started having issues again, and the result was that the sub-flooring was unlevel and not prepared correctly. The results of that inspection were withheld from us and we were told we just had to accept nothing was wrong and pay to replace the flooring again ourselves or pay for our own inspector if we wanted to dispute. Well, yesterday we got a copy of the inspection and found out the truth. We presented it and we got a reply with no accountability or compassion or results but rather whataboutism, condescension, and gaslighting.

We really want to save all of our loved ones from experiences like this (this is only one of the problems we have had). This house is only two years old. We have endured so much stress and frustration from this company. It’s awful! We are probably going to have to sue which is something we have no desire to do.

So, I started looking into how to go to court. I filed a case with Alamance County Small Claims Court. We sued Carolina Custom Homes of Alamance which is the official name of CCHB on the NC Secretary of State website. See below for my Facebook post on January 8, 2024 regarding our experience in Small Claims Court:

Hello, friends and family. Many of you have asked me how court went yesterday. Let me tell you all about it.

Jad and I went together. This was the second time we had taken Carolina Custom Homes of Burlington to court. The first time, only Jad went to state our case, and the defense lawyer wouldn’t let him get a word in. The case was ultimately dismissed because the lawyer said that the company name we were suing was not the same thing as Carolina Custom Homes of Burlington (CCHB). I actually found out that same evening that I had been right all along, so Jad and I both felt the second time we went to court (this time suing them under the name McKeown Properties), that I needed to be there…

I made sure we got to court early. We sat down in the pews. There were several other people in there. We realized as names were called we were probably going to be last in the 2pm window. We looked around for the defense lawyer to come in. Jad saw him walk in first. We felt uncomfortable as we realized this lawyer is well known in the courts. He was talking personably to multiple workers in the courtroom, and even the magistrate. At one point before court started, he walked to the back of the room to talk to someone. I turned around and saw Andy McKeown. We were suing his wife’s company and I was not too happy to see him. It put butterflies in my stomach.

Anyway, we sat back as comfortably as we could and watched the other court cases. The defense lawyer for our case was the plaintiff lawyer for the first case – again, not comfortable at his presence in the courtroom.

It was finally our turn. I said one final prayer, picked up my stuff, and sat down next to Jad at our table. We had to swear to tell the truth on a Bible. Then I started to read our story.

I was nervous only when I first started. After the first objection, I realized that it was going to be okay because even though the defense lawyer wanted to cry “hearsay,” I calmly notified him and the magistrate that I had evidence for everything I was going to say. That’s when I started providing the evidence, and I kept providing more and more evidence.

I got through our story, providing tons of documentation to the magistrate. There were a few objections, but I got through them. I was surprised at my poise and confidence. Jad later told me that I was on fire. He could see a light of truth shining through me the whole case.

When the defense spoke, I was able to speak back. I was able to bring to memory certain points and hone in on them at the right times. I was not overwhelmed by the seasoned defense attorney or Andy McKeown. Jad chimed in at certain times that helped our case as well.

The difficult part of the case was that the magistrate didn’t seem to understand the difference between manufacturing issues and installation issues. He didn’t seem to understand subflooring. He drew conclusions on his own about who was probably responsible for our floor issues (for some reason he was as attacking Shaw who had been most helpful of all). He didn’t read the inspection reports carefully either and if he did, all the confusion would be dissolved.

I had to work really hard to explain things over and over again, with Jad’s help. The defense loved the magistrate’s misunderstandings and confusion because it helped them take responsibility off of themselves. The defense also kept saying the inspections were hearsay but they weren’t – they were done by professionals unrelated to us or the flooring company. I also reminded the court that CCHB accepted the results of the first inspection without issue.

The discussion seemed to go on forever. The magistrate asked Andy and the lawyer about three times if we could come together on this. He knew that we had a strong case but he wasn’t sure who was really responsible.

I had to keep reminding him of several key points:

1. CCHB was our point of contact for all issues. We were not supposed to work with the builder, Nationwide.

2. CCHB subcontracted the floor installer who installed our floors wrong.

3. The first and second inspections were completely different issues and did not conflict with each other.

4. Brittany McKeown purposely withheld the information about the second inspection from us. If they weren’t responsible at all, she would have sent us the inspection and told us what to do next and who was responsible.

5. In our email conversations with Andy in November, he never once told us who actually was responsible for our flooring issue. He was not helpful and his attitude was that we would have to replace our floor ourselves. He did not have an attitude of helping us and he offered no solution to the issue. The defense attorney actually said that Andy had been really helpful in steering us in the right direction and I had to say that he absolutely had done nothing to help us.

Something that bothered me is that the defense lawyer was so quick to call hearsay on me (who had evidence of everything I talked about) but he and Andy had no problems speaking on hearsay. At one point I even asked, isn’t that hearsay to the magistrate. He hesitantly agreed with me.

When the magistrate asked us about the amount we were suing for, we showed him a quote for replacing the floor and provided receipts for both court costs. I shared my evidence that we actually sued the correct company name the first time and that the case was wrongfully dismissed. No apology or acknowledgement of guilt/dishonesty from either him or the defense interestingly, but they didn’t argue with me.

With all of this information, it should have been obvious to the magistrate what to do – we thought so anyway.

He thought for quite a while and then said that this was a really hard case and we were obviously victims. He even admitted (if not at the end, at one point) that the McKeowns could pay us and then sue others later on if needed. He knew that replacing our floor would be a huge financial burden on us but not the McKeowns. The last thing he said before making his ruling was that he wanted to weigh who would be affected most and that he wanted to make sure he was doing the right thing.

We expected and hoped and prayed that he was going to rule in our favor…and then he didn’t. He dismissed the case. He told us that we needed to find out who paid the installer. That would be the right person to sue. Keep in mind that Andy and the defense lawyer provided no evidence that they didn’t pay the installer and no evidence of who did. The magistrate just believed them when they said they didn’t do it. The magistrate even asked the defense lawyer if he would represent us – wow, that didn’t make sense and was really a blow.

Jad asked Andy who paid the installer, who Andy works with all the time. Jad said he looked scared, looked at his lawyer, and said he didn’t know.

Goodness, I cried. I had spent countless hours preparing for this case. I felt so good and confident about it. We knew (and everyone in the courtroom with their sympathetic eyes) knew we were in the right. We knew the true character and criminal history of the McKeowns – things we couldn’t say in court. Jad got handshakes from a couple of the employees afterwards who said that we had been wronged.

I admit that I lost a little faith for a while last night. I had done everything right – studied everything, prayed, asked for prayers, made sure I had no hate in my heart for the defendants, etc. I asked God why weren’t we blessed when did everything right and we are truly victims?

Of course, I didn’t sit idly by and take the results. I sent an email to Shaw, the flooring company, asking for all of our notes from our claim and who they paid to reinstall our floors. I hope we hear back. I truly hope because I don’t want to get a lawyer, etc. I am hoping for an appeal rather than going to District Court, even if we could get a lot more money that way. I just want this to be over.

Regardless, it was such a hard evening. So so hard. Jad and I couldn’t stop bringing up points from the case and things that didn’t make sense or that weren’t fair or right.

Today I feel a little better. I know that we are still in the right. I feel so strongly we were right all along, just like last time. I feel that we were blessed in many ways yesterday – loving friends and family who prayed for us, friends who watched our kids so willingly, and my ability to stay strong in court.

We will not give up until justice is served. We have faith that God knows more than we do and that all this will be for our experience and for our good. God has a plan. We just need to trust.

Thank you to all of you for your love, prayers, and support.

To be continued…

The next step was to appeal to District Court. We also had to find a lawyer since it’s not advisable to go to District Court without one. I contacted several lawyers, and finally found one with Vernon Law. I also filled out the paperwork and paid the fees to the courts. And then, on January 31, 2024 I wrote this post after getting some news from the courts:

Well our appeal to district court got reassigned to arbitration. I kind of wish we had known that before we signed a contract for a lawyer yesterday…Hopefully the lawyer will be helpful in this setting and get us what we are owed.

We ended up going to Arbitration on March 28, 2024. We found out from our lawyer the night before that the defense wasn’t going to show up and was planning to appeal no matter what. Below were my thoughts after Arbitration:

It’s sad when you have to correct and do research for your own lawyer. We had arbitration court today for our appeal for our flooring court case. The defense chose not to show up, which is good for us, but they also said they would appeal no matter what. The process was interesting regardless, and a little sad, as I realized our lawyer wasn’t organized or good at presenting fact. I had to take over for the most part and the arbitrator told me I should go to law school. I have spent the afternoon researching something she said about the award limits and have found where she went wrong and what the real rules are. I have given her advice for the case. Maybe I should go to law school. If nothing else, this infuriating and long process has helped me see that I do have some skills that lawyers need to be successful.

To be continued.

Well, we won Arbitration, but it didn’t matter. The defendants filed an appeal and asked for a trial de novo, which means a completely new trial where the facts from the previous court dates wouldn’t be considered. During this time we found out that our lawyer was leaving Vernon Law. That wasn’t fun to hear, even though we didn’t think she was very helpful to us anyway. She also charged us a lot of money even though she did very little for us. She was a young, newer attorney too. An experienced attorney from the same firm offered to take our case for district court.

The timeline for everything going forward was so incredibly long. We did Arbitration in March 2024, and didn’t end up in District Court until May 5, 2025. There are so many reasons why it took so long, but one was that the defense never calendared the court date, so we eventually had to. Then after we did calendar it, they kept finding ways to delay it. They even filed a motion to dismiss the case just a few days before the trial, saying we didn’t have any expert witness or actual proof that the defendants were responsible for fixing the floors. That actually really worried us. We wondered if we needed to get our inspector to come to court, but there wasn’t time for that. After talking to our lawyer, she felt that the inspection reports would be admissible, and we should be fine.

Of course, the couple days before the trial Jad and I were nervous. I know I had butterflies in my stomach. And then the morning of the trial came. My mother-in-law was so kind to take Asher for us. We had to be in court by 9:30am so we made sure to be early. We asked people to pray for us, and we also prayed (I prayed many times during court.) We talked to our lawyer and asked a few questions to be prepared.

Andy and Brittany McKeown came, as well as Josh Clapp and his assistant. I noticed that they all walked in together, and Josh and his assistant sat behind them rather than on our side, even though they were our witnesses. Earlier on in the planning phases of our trial, our lawyer had recommended adding Josh as a defendant, but I felt we should try to get him as a witness first. He agreed to testify on our behalf but seeing him sit by Andy and Brittany felt gross and worried me.

The judge came in on time, and we had to stand for him. He spoke to all of us about expense and asked how much we wanted to pay to keep this going. He told both parties to see if we could settle out of court. So, we went and spoke to our lawyer in another room. We talked about it and felt that we should only accept the amount of our flooring quote, if not the new one, at least the one from 14 months ago. We would not accept anything less than that and we would not allow their installers to replace our floor since we knew we would have no guarantee of good work and could be back in the courtroom again. Well, the defense had no desire to settle anyway. So, the trial began.

The motion to dismiss was discussed by the defense, and then our lawyer said why the case shouldn’t be dismissed. Then the judge took an hour or more to mull over the arguments before deciding we should continue to trial.

Just to explain a little bit about District Court, everybody has to affirm they will tell the truth. Then, you can only speak if you are called to the stand and are being questioned. You can only answer the exact question and cannot go beyond that question, even if you are trying to give background information. You also can’t react to objections or refute anything the other side says. Everyone is cross-examined and the other side is also able to redirect. Redirections can continue until both lawyers say they have no further questions. Both sides will also try to enter documents into evidence as long as the other side has no objections. There are breaks at specific times and court can take the entire day, even going onto multiple days. We didn’t realize that when we got there so had to make a few arrangements for the kids during a break.

Our lawyer questioned Andy, then Brittany, then Josh, then me. Andy was quite rude. Brittany was poised but played dumb. Both of them lied through their teeth about multiple things. My lawyer told me they had likely been trained on what to say and not say. There sure was a lot they knew nothing about or didn’t remember. Josh is a simple guy, but he told the truth from what we could tell. He did come across as someone who had no idea about how to install Shaw floors specifically, which helped us get our point across that the floors were installed incorrectly. He also testified multiple times that he worked for Andy and that Andy hired him each time he came to our home and that Andy paid him each time. (The reason we lost in Small Claims Court the second time was because the defense lied and said they didn’t hire or pay Josh. They continued to say that in District Court.) He also testified he was a subcontractor for Andy, which helped because the Defense kept calling CCBH a retailer, which they are not.

I was questioned next. I had to answer many questions to the best of my ability. Cross-examination had been a fear of mine, but it wasn’t that bad. Sometimes I felt myself getting irritated at the questions being asked or the things I was shown. One of the pieces of evidence the defense lawyer showed me was a document about the 10-year structural warranty we have. He was trying to show that the subfloor would be covered under that. He had me read something talking about load-bearing subfloor. My lawyer thankfully looked at the rest of the document and found on the next page where it said that the subfloor is not covered by Centricity. I told the defense that Jad had even called Centricity and they told him the subfloor and floor was not covered but the defense lawyer kept trying to prove me wrong. It was annoying, and he knew all along he was lying.

We were supposed to have another very important witness, Paul Robertson, who was Andy’s partner at CCBH while we were building our home. He was going to testify some important things that would allow the inspection reports to be admitted as evidence. But, he didn’t come. It was so frustrating. So many times during the entire day our lawyer and her associates tried to get in touch with him. The first time he acted like he didn’t know he had to be in court (he did know) and then he kept making excuses and then he never came. We were really disappointed and surprised too because he really wanted to help us.

It is really hard to get everything out that you need to get out in District Court, and on further reflection from yesterday, there are so many things I wanted to say and could have said that would have helped our case, but I couldn’t say it because I wasn’t specifically asked about it. It also was frustrating that so many pieces of evidence, like emails between us and the McKeowns, would have been helpful but weren’t entered into evidence.

After all the questioning was done, the defense once again made their motion to dismiss the case. Our lawyer gave a solid argument on why not to. Then the judge left for quite some time to review the evidence and the case. We were honestly feeling pretty good about it.

And then the judge came back and started to read out his findings. Some of the things he said were correct, some things were missing context, and some things were actually not true. The most important thing that he said that wasn’t true was that we were suing for breach of contract, which we were not. We never said we were. We were suing for negligence regarding the installation. He admitted (even without us being able to use the inspection report) that the floors were installed incorrectly. But then, because we didn’t prove a breach of contract, he dismissed the case. We were very confused and deflated. We couldn’t say anything about the decision. We just had to leave. Jad told me that Josh and his assistant were laughing at us as we walked out. That was upsetting, especially since I had just told our lawyer I felt bad about how he was described in court.

We tried to avoid Andy and Brittany (by the way, Andy testified pretty forcefully that they are divorced which was a surprise to us) while we waited for our lawyer. I was nearly speechless and had no energy or drive left when we spoke. I just felt defeated.

Jad and I both felt terrible, but we had to put on a good face when we got home because it was our son’s 12th birthday. We made the rest of the evening special for him. That night, we both just felt tired as we tried to figure out what to do. We also questioned God and our own faithfulness, if I’m being honest. We just couldn’t understand why God didn’t help us when we have done all we can and are faithful. Also, we know it’s so expensive to keep fighting, but it also feels wrong to just give up, especially because the McKeowns are cheaters and liars who are thriving on our misery. They are absolutely in the wrong, not to mention the judge’s decision was based on false information.

Jad took off work again today, and this morning when I talked to him, he said he barely slept last night. I did sleep but had nightmares. Today I felt like we can’t just let this go. I told my lawyer that. I said that the judge gave an incorrect ruling, and we need to do something. She shared our frustration and said once the judge’s ruling is typed up and sent out, we will see what we can do. I did figure out why the judge talked about breach of contract, though. It’s because in the motion to dismiss, the defense claimed we were suing over negligence (true) and breach of contract (not true). We were never asked by the judge on what grounds we were suing. That’s something I could have clarified had I been asked about it, but nobody asked me. I just hope we can do something about this. It’s not right at all.

Please help me get the word out about the dangers of working with Carolina Custom Homes of Burlington. They are felons and liars and do not take responsibility for their actions or the actions of their subcontractors. We are getting poorer and poorer, but hopefully justice will be served for us and for so many others who are suing them.

**It has been a little over a year since I wrote all this, and unfortunately, we never got justice in our flooring situation.  We have moved forward the best we can (it still churns our stomachs to drive past their business), but we want to make sure that as many people as possible know the risks of building with this company. Please spread the word if you can. Thank you for reading.