I'd ask for however much it will cost to replace the windows now plus additional for estimated inflation.

Because I've seen interior paint windows last 25 years, no flaking.

But I've also seen the coating fail within a matter of months.

No one can know what's going to happen here.

What you do know is they were painted without permission, it's not a professional application, the window vinyl wasn't prepped for paint and I'm guessing the grade of paint used was not top tier either.

Not prepping the vinyl that is subject to effects from weather, climate changes and low tier paint is reason enough to ask for full replacement cost IMO.

As far as the warranty, window warranties usually speak to LRV only. As in you can paint vinyl windows as long as the color has a luminance reflectance (LRV) equal to or higher than the manufactured color. Beyond that many require a 'vinyl safe' specific product.

Might want to have attorney double check warranty wording.

Would you ask for a percentage of the value of the warranty (which was 100% of cost to replace)?

I would not be looking for money. I iwould insist that all new windows be installed. Have your attorney include this issue along with the myriad of other issues in a formal letter to your builder.

Off topic a bit, but how did you wind up with this builder? Is builder licensed? I can't imagine how builder could let this mess happen on his watch. So sorry.

@Lori A. Sawaya

Thanks so much for commenting. We are so worn down by all the damage and repairs… we are just TIRED of it all. I agree that we should ask for the total cost of the windows, but my husband thinks that’s “excessive” and that we’d likely never have to file a claim and use the warranty anyway. My argument is that we paid for new, uncompromised and warrantied windows, but that isn’t what we received. We also know that this builder has/is trying to deceive us with cheap fixes and being dishonest about his costs (he’s never given us receipts and ghosts is when we ask for detailed explanations of the financials). I think you’re right, and I’m going to make sure to ask what the attorney thinks about it. I think my husband just wants to be finished with this builder, but we have paid so much for this custom home, and it we deserve to have custom quality finishes in return.

Might not be 100% dishonest about cost. That can be hard to pin down - to an extent - because of special bulk pricing, vendor incentives, the list goes on. Figuring out how much something cost for your build seems like it should be a straight answer but could be harder than you'd imagine.

I'd go after the money. Put it in safe, hi-yield investment. Wait for the current windows to fail and then replace - hopefully with even better quality because you get some gains on the $$.

@elcieg
Yes, if we weren’t already 14+ months into this build (contract states 9 months and no more than 10), I would demand they be replaced. We have spent the last 3 months literally begging our builder to address our lunch list and fix the correct way… he has ultimately ignored us and tried to cheaply do things that we can no longer communicate with hopes of getting things remedied. Every “fix” looks worse than the last and we’ve recently expressed to him that neither he nor any of his crews are to step foot into our house without notice and/or our permission. Our move in date was supposed to be the first week of August, and now we will not be in our new home by Christmas. We are paying nearly $3K in ONLY interest on our new home loan, as well as our current home’s mortgage. I plan to demand concessions on that as well… esp since we are over 4 months past promised move in. We had zero building delays along the way… the only delays were due to quality control and just overall sloppiness that our builder seemingly refuses to fix properly.

@elcieg
This builder is actually an high level engineer for our state power company. He has built everything from 3/2 garden home subdivisions to multimillion dollar estates in the nicest parts of town. My husband is a landscape contractor and worked for him on several projects and liked him. We also had a neighbor who is a builder who had worked with him previously and had good things to say. We thought we couldn’t go wrong as far as quality and integrity… not were we wrong. He hadn’t built much since 2018, and I don’t believe he plans to build again until he moves to another town about 2 hrs away. We had never built a truly custom home before and didn’t really know what we were doing at first… still trying to navigate this mess we’re in. My husband is still in disbelief about how this has gone down.

Lots of errors in that last post… I hope you can understand what I meant.

Sorry to hear of this. I would be okay with monetary concessions rather than replacing the windows at this point and possibly causing more repairs to need to be done. If the builder is no longer building many homes, you lose one of the big advantages of using a builder... their leverage over contractors. I bet he is having a hard time getting the subs to come back and fix things or to do things in a higher quality finish. Without the promise of repeat business, the subs are not likely to go out of their way to make things right, especially if they've already been paid. It's also possible he wasn't able to hire decent quality subs to begin with because the better ones are fully booked with other builders.

What a mess. I am so sorry for you both.

@toddinmn
Yes, we are past that with our builder. We are terrified to have him “fix” another thing, because his crews either have limited experience and/or he has instructed them to do a cheap fix. At this point, we just want to move into our home and take a monetary concession to save in the event we need to replace or repair windows. Most of all, we’re worried about any future upkeep/maintenance with the painted areas of the windows. And, yes, I have confirmed with Ply Gem that this did indeed void any and all warranties associated with our windows.

@TT
Agreed, he simply doesn’t care about his reputation if he’s not planning on building in the area anymore. Also, his main sub is in charge of crews for tile, dry wall, painting, and cleaning. It’s likely he has hired a new group of inexperienced ppl that are different from past builds. I KNOW his previous builds were a total 180° from what we’ve experienced. Regardless of what transpired with the sub situation, the builder is responsible for overseeing it all and QC… he hasn’t been to the house except to pass inspections. If he has seen all these things, he doesn’t care enough to have it done correctly.

Thanks everyone for all of your comments and suggestions… Please keep them coming!

As mentioned before, if we weren’t this far in (and already four months past our move-in date, per our builders contract) and didn’t have all the other issues to deal with, we would 100% have him replace the windows. Full stop. We are terrified of mentioning it to him, because we fear he would have his people come back (without our permission or knowledge) and use some kind of chemicals that would actually ruin the windows. The reason we think he would stoop to this level is because after we had met with our new carpentry and painting crew and agreed on everything, including replacing or lowering all the door casings, he had his crew come back and do some kind of painted Styrofoam looking shim piece at the bottom of a few of the casings… Of course it looked terrible! When I sent him a picture and asked him not to have his crew out there at all and that we had already discussed this was not acceptable, he had the audacity to say that it was done before we met with our carpentry and painting crew… It was not. I have photographs with timestamp details.

With regards to the windows, the new crew that we hired said there is really no way to safely and effectively remove the (non-paintable) silicone and cheap paint without risking further damage to the windows. At this point, we just want to wipe our hands clean of him altogether and make the best of this window situation. I do feel we are owed a pretty significant monetary concession for this item alone. Windows are a huge expense!

" I do feel we are owed a pretty significant monetary concession for this item alone. "

Just be careful with how you word and approach hi on this as most jurisdictions have a right to repair, meaning he legally may owe you nothing if you did not give him the opportunity to repair the window finish.

@millworkman
I understand, however, the window cannot be repaired. The silicone and paint cannot be removed… and even if it could, our warranty is still void. The issue here is the warranty and the fact we did not give him permission to paint our windows.

@millworkman
You are definitely right about giving him the opportunity to make it right. That said, since their is no way to repair and/or get back the warranty, the only other solutions are to either give some form of monetary concession or to replace every single window in our house (which would be much more costly than the warranty’s value of the windows alone). We will ask our attorney what is the best verbiage to use, as well as a fair amount to seek as concession.

Make sure you are working with a CONSTRUCTION LAWYER, not a real estate lawyer or jack of all trades. Good luck to you. We too had an awful experience but have been enjoying our home for almost 5 years now. You can search my name and read all our misery on here

@cpartist
Yes, we have been referred to an atty who specializes in this exact type of thing. I will look up your threads. Thanks for the well wishes… we just want to come to an agreement that is fair to both parties and move into our home asap.

Has the manufacturer provided anything in writing stating that "any and all warranties are void"?

I'd second Todd's though that this doesn't make a ton of sense. If a modification(paint in this case) were found to cause a defect, that would be a valid reason to deny that claim. If unrelated, it is generally not. For instance, if you have a glass seal fail (a common warranty claim), it would not be denied because there is paint on the perimeter of the window frame. OTOH, if the frame were to warp (not a common occurrence), that could be denied based on the paint. In all likelihood this won't cause any issues with the windows nor will you have any future claims denied.

With that said, obviously here you are with shabby looking windows in your new home. I think there may be some creative way of addressing this to your satisfaction without completely replacing the windows, I'd agree with the sentiments of trying to work something out with the builder as plan A.