Solve It 7: Unfinished Masterpiece

One of the cool things about New England is all of the historic homes like Tony and Cynthia’s.

“The craftsmanship is just so clear,” says 7’s Kris Anderson, walking around the outside of the home on a recent fall afternoon.

“Absolutely,” says Tony. “There’s nothing like that these days.”

Tony and Cynthia have spent the past two decades renovating their home, including a new kitchen, new bathrooms and a lot of landscaping work outside. Their latest project was repainting three bedrooms and the family’s dining room. In January, Tony went online and found a painting company to do the job.

“They got great reviews online,” he says.

The crew showed up and got it done, well most of it.

“They did the baseboard trim,” Tony says, showing the work that was done on an upstairs bedroom. “But they didn’t paint the registers.”

And they painted something they shouldn’t have.

“The windows are just unmovable,” Tony says. They were painted shut.

He called the painters to come back, but they never did.

“At that point,” Tony says. “I was just fed up.”

Feeling like he was being brushed off, Tony called Solve It 7.

We emailed the company and explained the problems that needed to be fixed. We didn’t hear back, but Tony and Cynthia soon did.

“You folks were here on a Friday,” says Tony. “The following Monday I got a call from the painting company.”

The crew came out a few days later to fix the windows and finish up the painting.

“Now as you can see, it opens and closes!” shutting his upstairs windows with ease.

“It wouldn’t have happened without you guys, I’m confident,” Tony says. “That’s what made the difference.”