Builder/siding company has not installed vinyl siding according to manufacturer specs. What are my options?
We bought a new house from a builder Dec 2017. A few months ago, after a wind storm in Calgary, part of our siding blew off. At first, the builder denied responsibility claiming the issue was weather related however after doing some research of my own, i reached out to the builder and politely made them aware that the siding had not been installed according to manufacturer guidelines. Eventually, they had the siding company repair the damaged siding. Attached pictures of the siding following the storm.
I also requested the builder to take off a couple strips of siding (randomly chosen) around the house to check if the siding was installed according to manufacturer spec in other areas and sure enough both random spots that were chosen had nails greater than 16 inches apart (mittens vinyl siding install guidelines state that fasteners/nails should be installed maximum 16 inches apart) however in the 2 random areas we checked, we found nails roughly 20 or so inches apart.
We are coming up in about 3 weeks to our 1 year warranty on the home and I am considering what my best course of action is at this point since it is likely safe to assume that a good portion of the vinyl siding has not been installed correctly based on the spots that were randomly checked.
My understanding is that the manufacturer for the siding will not cover damage to the siding if the damage is the result of faulty installation - this is a condition of their product warranty - for reference,
https://www.mittensiding.com/blog/how-c ... -correctly
https://www.mittensiding.com/documents/ ... ersion.pdf
I have expressed this concern to the builder - their response was that they (our builder) directly contacted the manufacturer (mittens) and that the manufacturer informed the builder that they (manufacturer) would still honor their material warranty for the siding, even with nails/fasteners used more than 16 inches apart in some areas. This statement from the builder contradicts the info I see on the manufacturers website on the pages I referenced above.
Curious what thoughts are on this matter - should we be asking the builder to remove all of our siding and install it according to manufacturer spec before our 1 yr warranty runs out or should i keep a record (in writing) of the builders claim that the manufacturer will warranty the material even without the installation guidelines not being met?
I also requested the builder to take off a couple strips of siding (randomly chosen) around the house to check if the siding was installed according to manufacturer spec in other areas and sure enough both random spots that were chosen had nails greater than 16 inches apart (mittens vinyl siding install guidelines state that fasteners/nails should be installed maximum 16 inches apart) however in the 2 random areas we checked, we found nails roughly 20 or so inches apart.
We are coming up in about 3 weeks to our 1 year warranty on the home and I am considering what my best course of action is at this point since it is likely safe to assume that a good portion of the vinyl siding has not been installed correctly based on the spots that were randomly checked.
My understanding is that the manufacturer for the siding will not cover damage to the siding if the damage is the result of faulty installation - this is a condition of their product warranty - for reference,
https://www.mittensiding.com/blog/how-c ... -correctly
https://www.mittensiding.com/documents/ ... ersion.pdf
I have expressed this concern to the builder - their response was that they (our builder) directly contacted the manufacturer (mittens) and that the manufacturer informed the builder that they (manufacturer) would still honor their material warranty for the siding, even with nails/fasteners used more than 16 inches apart in some areas. This statement from the builder contradicts the info I see on the manufacturers website on the pages I referenced above.
Curious what thoughts are on this matter - should we be asking the builder to remove all of our siding and install it according to manufacturer spec before our 1 yr warranty runs out or should i keep a record (in writing) of the builders claim that the manufacturer will warranty the material even without the installation guidelines not being met?