I'd suggest you be firm. State your requirement (clean up) with a specific date (say, two days from now). Ask if he thinks he can get that done. Negotiate timing but not mess. Get him to agree that he'll have it cleaned. (Not, "oh, we'll see what we can do...")

Everybody involved knows that it's the GCs mess.

This issue should be addressed in the contract in order to avoid the kind of stress you are experiencing.

An example of AIA standard contract wording is:
"The Contractor shall keep the premises and surrounding area free from accumulation of waste materials or rubbish caused by operations under the Contract."

The contractor is taking advantage of a poorly written contract. You can fight him or you can clean up the site yourself. I can't say which is more to your advantage. But I suggest that you pick your fights carefully on a job site, especially if there is no professional oversight involved. If there are more important issues that need to be resolved, this one could be a costly distraction. Bad contractors can use trivial disputes to justify or obscure more important bad performance.

I've never had to deal with this (quick, find me a piece of wood to knock on).

The only time I've known the folks who were involved with a messy site, they hired a teenage boy to come by each evening and do a sweep-up. Trash bags were placed everywhere for convenience in tossing soda cans. However, even there, dumpsters were used rather than a wired dump-site. Who is going to be responsible for getting that trash out of the wire and into the dumpster? Heavy and potentially dangerous work to move all that stuff.

Somebody -- and I think that means YOU insisting to crew chief, needs to get those "lakes" dried and cleaned. Shovels, squeegees, and wet-dry vacs will be needed. You do NOT want wet, dirty areas enclosed or covered over.

Please read your contract carefully. I'd bet it does have something about keeping it clean because a clean area is safer to work in. As said before, pick your fights carefully, but in my book, safety is a primary issue.

If it is as bad as you say and bothers you extremely, if it was me, I would throw everybody off the jobsite and tell them "You wanna work, clean it up". Any work should always be done in a workmanlike manner, you don.t put up with this at home or work or even where you shop, so why put up with it here.

If you own the land, and just have a contract for the GC to build, then you can be firm about the lot being kept clean.

If you contracted with the GC owning the land until you close, then you don't have the right to insist on the jobsite being kept clean unless it's stated in the contract.

We've been lucky that only a handful of subs have been "messy", but nothing like what you describe.

Personally, you weren't passive aggressive enough. I'd have gone out while the workers are there, gathered trash and dumped it in their work trucks and vans right in front of them. If that didn't work, I'd just get mean - I'd crack open a raw egg and hide it in their van or truck.

I agree with all of MA's comments. I don't think it is even allowed in my area to have a construction site without a dumpster and a port-a-john on the premises. I think it says a lot about your contractor (unfortunately nothing good) that he is giving pushback to your simple request that he keep the job site clean and safe for the workers and you. And, even though it might not be spelled out in your contract, I'd still continue to push him to get the site cleaned up on occasion.
When people fail to keep their word or execute on their assurances (especially on extremely simple items), I then question everything they say or do. I'd be watching him like a hawk to be sure that the actual defined specifications and plans of the contract were being followed to the letter.

Threaten to turn the builder into OSHA. It's an unsafe worksite!

I just realized what else you mentioned:

"...the construction and other debris and general trash is removed from the ________'s lot."

In every state I've been in, not to mention counties and most towns, it's against the law to dump trash on other people's property.

True, if he owns the lot, there isn't anything to be done. But it sounds as though your friends are the owners, and if so, they have grounds for a complaint.

Did you actually contact those folks who gave him a wonderful recommendation? I find it hard to believe that anyone would work in such conditions, although non-English speakers may be sufficiently desperate; and it's harder to believe that the sort of carelessness described would be tolerated by others. IMO [learned in other circumstances], folks who have trashy working conditions don't produce quality results.

I understand your frustration. But cleaning up takes time. That time may result in less work on some other aspect of the project. I fear that whatever you gain by pressing this issue may be lost elsewhere. I have noticed that non-English speaking immigrants really do just drop their trash where they happen to be. Choose your battles, this may be one of the lesser ones.

It takes 5-10 minutes at the end of the day to do a fast clean-up, organize materials for the next days use, and make sure the site is safe. It shows respect, professionalism, and is a common courtesy. A dumpster onsite or trash cans could help, but no guarantees they would use them!

A site like yours is a reflection of their work and if i were you i would inspect closely. Unfortunately sometimes you have to do the builders job!

A dumpster is a good idea for the demolition phase of a renovation project but it is expensive and neighbors often load it up and cause excess weight charges. Many contractors try to avoid using them over the new construction phase of a project.

I truly appreciate all of the comments! I called the GC the morning after the night I wrote my message. I described what DH and I had seen and what DH had said. GC promised that by the end of this week, his "clean up guy" would be there to empty the wire enclosure, haul off the trash, and that he himself would load the unused lumber to take back to the lumber yard. I asked him if clean up guy would clean out the inside of the house and he said yes. Yesterday GC called to say that clean up guy could not get all of this done this week, but that he would clear off our friend's lot [and no, they've not complained] and the inside of the house, but that he had time this week only to do that and would finish the job next week. I visited today while the crews were there. The water has pretty much evaporated; all the rest was still as I described. I do love the suggestion of being overtly passive aggressive! I think next week, hopefully after the worst of this is gone, I'll bring trash bags out and pick up anything I see and mention to the workers that I'd appreciate their putting their personal trash in the bags and any big stuff out in the enclosure. I have seen MANY house built by this GC, but all of them have been after completion, so I don't know if this is typical for him. His name was the one most often mentioned to me while we were in the design process and were looking for GCs. He's been president of the local builder's association, was chair of this year's Parade of Homes, etc. I've known this man since he was a child and a schoolmate of two of our kids; I knew his parents well. His father was a prominent contractor who died tragically young of cancer; my GC and his brother took over the business after graduating from college. I did tell him that we had had prior experience with working with 3 other contractors, and none of them had allowed their work sites to be so trashy. He didn't say much in response to that. But, anyway, I have hopes of its improving. A cousin of mine from CA toured the house with me today and she said complimentary things about the house and assured me that in the 3 times she's built or remodeled, the work sites looked as bad or worse! I'm in TX, so obviously is not just this state; it must happen elsewhere, too. Frankly I think it was a situation where the framers were unusually messy and when the new crews came in, the were hardly motivated to be better about their trash. Anyway, I'll report back next week on whether or not it's been improved. Oh, and yes, we own the lot. And I confess I read our contract so long ago, I have no idea if anything is in it about this matter; I need to look back over it tomorrow! Oh, and I do like the idea of hiring a teenaged boy to do a trash pick-up every day. I recall now that the man who built next door (different GC) had hired the boy across the street to do just that. I still think, as someone said, that if at the end of every day, the men took 5 min. to throw out their empty cartons and their fast food trash, it would be so easy and then it would never get to the state its in now. Stay tuned for updates next week!

Picking up some loose laying construction materials is one thing...picking up the drinks/food/cigarette butts/etc of the work crews is something entirely different. I'd be seriously concerned that I'd contract Hep C. And, I certainly wouldn't do it in front of the crews. I don't consider that passive aggressive...I consider that enabling. These workers probably have no idea that they are expected to clean up after themselves (because your GC isn't communicating that to them)...they'll probably just assume that they can leave even more trash around b/c now there is hired help to clean up after them. And, your GC obviously doesn't care or seem offended when you call him on the messiness of the site, so he'd probably just be relieved that you're doing it yourself. The bottom line is that your builder made you a promise....make him live up to it.

Hep C is transmitted by blood.

Hire someone at $10 per hour to pick up,
construction trash & trash left by workers.

Pick your battles. Better to have that
$30 per hour guy building than picking up.

There will be bigger battles ahead, this one
can be resolved easily. Hold your ground on
important issues. Although this seems to be
a major issue..it isn't. Offensive yes, but
worth a major battle over..no.

best of luck with your build.

We kept garbage bags in our trunk so we could tidy up when we visited.

The framers were the worst. The threw stuff everywhere. From what I hear, thats just how it works. They are paid quite a bit per hour to frame, builders don't want to pay them that hourly rate to clean up after themselves.

Our builder was going to pay a cleaning crew (her kids) to do it for us but we said heck no, we can do that.

The cleaning fee was deducted from the total cost of the house. I think it was $1500-$2000. I can't really remember.

"From what I hear, thats just how it works"

Which shows the commplete lack of class and unprofessionalism with trades these days. It's not a matter of them being paid to clean up, it's a common courtesy on their part to keep a site clean and safe showing respect for the potential homeonwer that is helping them to make a living. In these times, you'd think there would be a little more appreciation on their part.

Picking battles isn't an option when im footing the bill!

It would be wise to read the contract BEFORE making comments to the contractor about his failure to perform under the terms of that contract. If your contract is inadequate to deal with this situation, you have to accept your share of responsibility since you signed it.

You also need to stop taking this kind of issue personally. It doesn't matter who the contractor is or who his parents are; it has no relevance to this project.

I find that when homeowners get wound up in tangential issues they often get blindsided by a more serous issue. Start focusing on the quality of the work and if you don't know how to do that, hire someone to do it. Don't rely on the GC or the building inspector to do it.

Often homeowners forget that they alone are ultimately responsible for building a house properly and safely. The Owner-Contractor contract assigns much of that responsibility to a general contractor but responsibility for anything not covered in the contract remains, by default, with the homeowner. That is why the terms of the contract are so very important. Rather than enforcing your idea of how the contractor should act, read the contract and enforce it.

Sorry to be so cranky, I don't mean to be rude, but when you got to the father dying young from cancer I lost what little patience I normally have for whining homeowners who don't take their project responsibilities seriously. Perhaps this post should be moved to the "Conversations" side of the forum.

It has nothing to do with contracts, builder vs homeowner, or who is responsible, it's about RESPECT or lack of in the op's case.

I'm willing to bet that if the builder had those framers over at his/her personal house to bang up an addition, the site would be spotless!

In our area where we currently live, there are abatement officers, typically retired senior citizens who volunteer to drive around and look for trashed out sites, excessive water use, junk on personal property, etc and issue fines.

On our build up north, i guess we are lucky, as our subs not only do a daily clean up, they recycle materials. Recycling is important in our life and is a part of building green, though typically not mentioned in the "build green" hype. Often times it's closer and easier to take recyclable materials to the salvage/recycle yard than make the trip out in the county to the landfills. Most landfills are quite a drive. Some landfills seperate recyclables onsite. The only hassle is seperation of trash vs recycle goods which isn't that big a task, imho.

I recently did a garage conversion for some folks who loaded down their trash trailer with all kinds of recyclables. Every night i took them home and stacked them in our recycle piles to turn in. They dug it because it saved them a trip to the landfill sooner than expected and it made me feel good about it not going there. There are many recyclables on a site that end up in the landfill. Bummer!

This is a subject constantly rehashed but I respectfully disagree with mightanvil.

IMO, there are certain professional standards which should be presumed. E.g., the accepted standard for building quality is "construction performed in a workman like manner" and does not have to be specified in a contract (see legal decision at www.herzogcrebs.com/CM/Articles/Articles8.asp). This standard should include general cleaning at the end of each day. The builder I hired spent, at most, 30 minutes at the end of the work day to clean up. That 30 min was far cheaper than the time and aggravation of maneuvering people/tools around piles of scraps/garbage.

There are also safety issues. A messy worksite is a dangerous worksite and increases the chances of a work-related injury. Most GCs I know do everything they can to reduce their injury risk, if for no other reason than the potential impact on their liabiltiy and workmen's comp costs. Also, my own personal productivity decreases whenever I allow a worksite/home office/etc. become overly cluttered/messy.