Lying, *****ing Builders

We started renovating our house in July 2017 and we made use of a company then trading as Chrismar Projects.

The owner of the company Mr. Simon Marais, assured us, as all builders do that the project would run smoothly and there was no need for a project manager.

We were pregnant at the time and had no room for error.

The first few weeks of the project went swimmingly. Until Simon kept asking for more and more money and we couldn’t see where the money was being used.

The project nearly came to a complete standstill when the engineer on the project pointed out shortcuts that he was taking on the house.

From then on there was one lie after another. - He was never registered with the NHBRC which he told us he was - He was not registered with the BIBC which he said he was - His insurance was not in order From there on he started avoiding phone calls and not arriving on site or to appointments made with him.

The project was way behind schedule and it got to a point where we needed to lend him additional money to complete the job.

After this we discovered that he was *****ing material from the site to go and use on other small jobs he had, material that we had bought from suppliers that we had sourced. In hindsight, it makes sense that he doesn’t have any building material suppliers as no one wants to work with him.

Simon Marais has no respect for the work he does or the people that work with him. He sent is workers away the week before Christmas without paying their wages.

Needless to say he never finished the job and disappeared.

He has liquidated his business and will no doubt pop up somewhere else trading under a new name.

We have a civil case against Simon Marais in his personal capacity for money that he owes us. We also have a ******** case against Simon Marais for the material he stole from my property.

My renovation is still not complete and because of all the shortcuts he took, there are tons of snags still to be fixed.

If you every come across Simon Marais or an accomplice of his Mr Clinton Jacoby, please run the other way.

They generally operate in the northern suburbs of Cape Town and Stellenbosch. BEWARE