Aug 17, 2022 3 min read

Did you ever feel so confident that you were making the right decision, only to be hugely let down later when it all went south? That’s what I’m going through right now.

Let’s go back a few years to when I started contemplating what to do about my circa 1960, crumbling, concrete garage floor, which had seen better days. Decades of road salt, rainwater and who knows what else dripping on it had taken its toll. It was dying a slow, dusty death, and each time I tried to sweep or hose out the dirt, more and more chunks of debris and cement came along with it. The time had come to act.

After exhaustive research, I chose having the floor repaired and covered with a durable epoxy coating. It sounded like a great idea. Here’s what I learned: When someone says, “I got a guy,” that means they have had experience with this person and know they are the “go-to” guy. However, when it’s a friend of a neighbor has a friend who knows a guy who owns a company and then a guy from that company ends up doing your garage floor work on the side … there are only two options. One, it could turn out incredibly beautiful and be done at a fair, affordable price, which leaves you jumping for joy. Two, it could be a disaster, which leaves you wondering how you could have been so naïve as to believe what this guy was selling you in the first place. I wound up somewhere in between.

The poor guy was very nice and certainly did put in hours of hard work grinding, cleaning (or so I thought), applying a waterproofing layer, epoxy coating and clear sealant and finishing it with paint chips in my beloved WVU Mountaineers colors. It looked fantastic!

That was just over a year ago. Several months ago, I noticed a brown spot on the floor. Then another brown, wet, slippery spot, followed by another. I consulted the workman, who informed me it was something to do with, “Aggregate from the concrete seeping through because you must have a water issue in your garage.” I assured him this was not the case and – as the problem spread and got worse – asked him to look at it three more times to no avail. This is when I started kicking myself for choosing him and not getting a warranty or money back guarantee on the product or application. Lesson learned.

We found a new guy to grind off the failed product and repair, patch and properly seal the concrete beneath. Once that’s done, we’ll decide what comes next. The worst of the grinding is done, and I vacuumed up what looked like cobwebs from The Munster’s house all over the garage rafters.

Chalk it up to learning a lesson the hard way and getting a warranty this time around!

Kristin Emery can be reached at kristinemery1@yahoo.com.