I am not in your area, I live in NY, but do recommend you look at the BBB site. A pool builder does not necessarily have to be part of the BBB and all it takes for them to join is an annual fee anyway so having the "BBB" sign doesn't hold too much clout in my opinion.

When looking for our pool builder for this Spring, I went down to the County Records Dept to look up any suits against builders. It was helpful. I learned this from a friend of mine who 3 years ago, chose a PB who was 2-3k less than others and she paid for it dearly with having to file a suit herself.

However, I did a quick search for you on Swim-Mor and it did come up with having a few records on file. Hope this links you directly there.

Here is a link that might be useful: BBB

Reggie,

I'm in Western Monmouth Cty and built a pool with swim-mor in 2006. I can't say enough good things about them. Our consultant was Bob Lang and he was outstanding at making sure my questions were answered and fears were addressed. I had never had a pool before so I was very scared about the process (especially after browsing this site). He even talked me out of options that I wanted but he told me to save my money.

I have to say that the process from start to finish was PERFECT. They came when promised. They did what they promised and there were no surprise charges. Even when we had some hiccups with the startup, they came back multiple times and made sure everything was perfect. I really liked that fact that all work was done in house so there was little reliance on sub-contractors and nobody else to blame if something went wrong, even though nothing did.

I recommend them without hesitation.

I did also looked at A&S and got a very bad vibe. Very used care salesman-like and I saw a lot of reports on the BBB website. That being said, we had two neighbors who used them. One is not very pleased, the other was very satisfied.

IanMD86

Thanks for your comments. Very helpful.

If you haven't called Caribbean Blue Pools, do so without delay! I signed up with them about a month ago and to date they have filed and received building permits, designed my entire backyard with a beautiful landscape plan, dug the hole and installed the gunite. They are extremely thorough in their follow ups and very easy to deal with. And their work is just beautiful, go to their website if you have the time.
I also checked into A&S and like the other guy said... they're sales pitch was very used car like. I didn't feel the salesman was looking out for what was best for my backyard, he just wanted to close the deal....Not my kind of contractor.

Hello!

We considered all 3 PB's that are mentioned in your post , Anthony Sylvan, Swim Mor and Caribbean Blu(along with others). We signed our contract with Swim Mor in Dec and they are supposed to begin excavation in Feb (depending on the weather of course). You will undoubtedly see complaints for almost all pool builders but, I spent a ton of time doing my own research on this site and others and I would have been comfortable going with any of these 3.

The reason we went with Swim Mor was simply that we felt we received the best information from them and they gave us the most personalized service. We have been happy with our sales rep so far and when all was said and done (after many tweaks of our budget and what we wanted) they offered us the most competitive price.

Caribbean didn't even want to drive down to meet with us They claimed we were too far a drive if we weren't "serious customers".. which really turned us off from the beginning. As far as we were concerned we were as "serious" as you can get before we had a formal meeting with them. So, we explained to them (over the phone) what we were interested in and we were emailed a general quote that FAR exceeded all the other companies we were considering! So, we crossed them off the list.

We did have a good meeting with A&S but we would have been ok with A&S or Swim Mor. So, we told the A&S guy that he'd need to beat(or match) the price we received from Swim Mor to still be in the running and he told us that it wasn't possible. So, we are moving forward with Swim Mor.

I can't tell you much more until Feb... when the project begins!

I too met with SwimMor, Sylvan and Ashley. All the companies were pretty competitive with their quotes, but I think it comes down to who you feel most comfortable with... All of our meetings went very well.... but we liked our A&S salesman and his bid the best. You will find that EVERY pool builder will have some complaints against them... Do a search here for some info also.

I signed a few months ago, November I think. We have gotten thru every stage (design-dig-rebar-gunite-electrical-plumbing-tile-mosaics) smoothly thus far. We are waiting on the plaster and patio/coping in early spring, then the warm weather !!

Good luck with whoever you choose, go with your gut, it's an exciting process !!

How did the pool come out? We are interviewing Swim-Mor now, any opinions?

mooks6

We are in the midst of a Swim-Mor build (they did gunite on Thursday). So far we have been very pleased! As I mentioned above we felt that we got the best priced package from them and they've been very accomodating with a variety of changes (mid build). Obviously I can't comment on the finished project yet. But they have scheduled us pretty quickly for each stage and they show up when they say they will. And, everyone (besides one inside employee) has been very pleasant and helpful. Everyone on site is professional and very easy to deal with!

Mooks6

I went with Swim-Mor and I can't say enough good things about the experience to date.
I mostly have raves about the project but here are my rants (mildly).
Be prepared for a convoy of trucks to invade your construction site at 6 am to do the install, it was a impressive sight, however, I was a little annoyed at the early hour out of concern for my neighbors.
I changed a few things mid project and it hasn't been a problem, however, I will say I skipped the 3 feet of cement in favor of paver decking, unknowingly my landscaper is now responsible for the installation of the hand railing and the diving board jig, I would have preferred to have Swim Mor take responsibility and install these items.

The gas pipe inspection failed for lack of sand in the in the trench, it took 10 days for the correction and approval from the town, it seemed long personally perhaps some of the delays was due to the rain.

Once the paver deck is installed and the fence is up, Swim Mor will come back and do the plaster and complete the finishing details, I hope to be swimming by the July 4.

I have recommended Swim Mor to my neighbors, given the opportunity I would choose them again (I think  final project not done yet, nor the settlement of the land and work) Check back next year for my final opinion. If you want to see pics, IÂll post them.

Thanks

I have been lurking on this site as I went through the process of selecting a PB. It has been very helpful and I owe you all a big Thanks for relaying your experinaces questions and advice.

I am in Monmouth County, we selected Swim-Mor after interviewing 5 PB's. They have been very responsive to our questions. The final design has change several times, but they have been quick to incorporate the changes and the process has not been painful to date. They are also good at keeping us informed on the status of the our project.

We are in the township approval process right now.

Our second choice would have been Carlton Pools, but Swim-Mor was cheaper and my research showed a lot fewer complaints by past customers. Also Carlton is new to the area and I was concerned about our project being part of thier learning curve. The other pb's I meet with had various problems during our discussions serious enough that I would have not used them.

Thank you so much for all your information. It has really helped us to make a decision. The salesman (John) at Nicholas Pools in Toms River was also really helpful, eventhough he does not do gunite. He asked me what I've been quoted so far (one was over $100,000- before extra options) and he said "I hope you threw that guy out of your house". Mind you we are building an 18' x 36' rectangle pool (3.5' - 7' deep) with a 6' x 8' raised spa. This is a brand new experience for us and we really don't have much guidance. Thank goodness for this forum!!

Like many, we too interviewed quite a few PB's and found this site very useful during our selection process. We decided on Swim-mor due to their reputation, the fact that they have very few complaints in comparison to other PB's, and most importantly because they build their own pools; very little work is sub'd out. Even the sub's they use are Grade A. We broke ground early September and are at our final stages just 4 weeks later. So far the entire experience from start to now has gone above and beyond our expectation; we can't say enough good things. If you have any specific questions you'd like to ask, feel free.

I fully reccomend CLC pools in Bridgewater NJ, they do great work and are not like the big chains that shake your hand and dissapear. They do a quality job and their landscape company Chatham Landscape Contractors has their landscape architect work with you to get the design you need. The owner is very knowledgable and has been in business 30 yrs. They can do the job from start to finish, they do grading, walls, raised patios, landscaping, excavating, and cabanas. If you want a quality job handled by one company call them. 7328689100

In the pool business 30 years... Hmmmmm...

Well the landscaping business to my knowledge has been in business roughly 30yrs. but the owner has been involved with the construction of pools for 30yrs. The pool business has been in business 5yrs and the construction business 10yrs. The great thing that is offered by his companies is you can build your project all under one roof. You donÂt have to sub anything out its all taken care of for you. The owner is not like the large national pool builder i used before, that shook my hand and disappeared. Chatham's projects are about quality not quantity

Having served the area south of the Raritan River for over 10 years, I have to admit I haven't seen a Blue Haven pool that wasn't top notch.

Most of the Sylvans and Swim Mor pools have been very good too in terms of quality. There are a couple of other builders in this neck of the wood that build some nice pools but have been very difficult for homeowners to work with.

I can say the same things about liner and fiberglass installers. By and large though, most of the builders are Tier 1 and 2 in terms of quality. Service, or the lack there of, and dedication to ensuring a positive experience for the homeowner is what separates the better builders from the schnooks of the market.

There is turnover in our local market because many shut down in the winter here. This means what was good today may not have been yesterday or tomorrow.

Scott

yea chatham landscape contractors are very good my friend used them to do their pool. it turned out so good i have to say. The funny thing is their neighbor used one of the big pool builders and they still havent finished after 10 months. But thats common with them, the do quantity not quality

5 years .. 30 years... almost the same... LOL... Best of luck!

i dont think they need any luck if you want my honest opinion they do quality work and stand behind it. and if you read the post which i did it would say hes been involved in pool construction for 30 yrs. but if you cant read its ok. yea blue haven pools has some forums talking about some of its quality jobs but easily has double talking about its bad jobs.

I was reading this thread and noticed someone posted about calling Caribbean Blue Pools and Spas without delay. I too was shopping for a pool, started to do some research, and came across their internet advertisement claiming they are the number 1 landscape architecture firm in New Jersey. What I can't understand though is when I started looking at Caribbean Blue Pool's and Spas landscaping pictures, I found that they were showing landscaping pictures done by scenic landscaping.If you go to the bottom of Caribbean Blue Pools and Spa�s landscaping page which just so happens to be titled Scenic Landscaping Outdoor living:http://www.caribbeanpoolsspas.com/gallery.html and open up any of the landscaping pictures you will see they give credit to Scenic Landscaping. I don't understand why Caribbean Blue Pools and Spas who "does it all" include landscaping featuring a competitors portfolio on their web site?

I also googled their so called staffed landscape architect (NJ Landscape Architect Marc Nissim RLA CLA NJS50096900) and found out he owns his own design firm
www.hdglandscape.com/information.html.

I've found there are several swimming pool companies in New Jersey who actually do it all. If you live in Central New Jersey including Mendham NJ You can try calling Ivy Construction, Inc./Ehrich & Ehrich Landscape Architects, Inc. in Cranbury, NJ or Beechwood Landscape Architecture and Construction, LLC in Southampton, NJ
From Northern New Jersey there is B & B Pool and Spa in Chestnut Ridge, NY, Stephen J. Miller Enterprises in Mahwah New Jersey or Cipriano Custom Swimming Pools & Landscaping also in Mahwah NJ. I live in Mendham New Jersey and I know all of these swimming pool companies service my area.

Old thread but I would like to thank those who recommended Swim-Mor. We used them and the build process was great. Pool just finished. We dug in September, they worked on a great schedule, gunnite in just before temps went below freezing. They started right up again in April and we are just about complete.

One minor issue- We chose bluestone coping, and I thought we requested true blue, but alas the contract said some other kind, so there is more color variation than I would have preferred.

All emails and phone calls were returned promptly. We dealt with the Englishtown office.

Work was done amazingly fast without compromising quality. Workers were very conscientious and professional. I liked that everything other than the gas installation is done by their own employees, not random sub-contractors. There was always someone on site that spoke English.

I am so glad your project went well. I used both Stephen J. Miller Enterprises in Mahwah New Jersey and Cipriano Custom Swimming Pools & Landscaping also in Mahwah NJ. Cipriano did the original work - STAY AWAY FROM CIPRIANO. We built a very high end pool and spent a ton of money - we had nothing but problems and Cipriano did not stand behind it. We had to hire another company to fix all the problems from Cipriano. Stephen J. Miller was like an oasis in the desert. He was awesome at getting companies to stand behind their products. He knew had to fix all the things Cipriano did wrong. Steve went so far above and beyond the call of duty I could not believe it. I would select Steve in a second. Run from cipriano as fast as you can.