Buchmayer Plumbing & Home Repair

Tom R.

First, I asked him to come around to replace one of my bathtub's faucet washers. He came around and replaced the faucet spout, which had a tiny hole in the bottom, and said that would take care of the leaking. It did not, of course, take care of the leaking; it just meant that the leaking water now came from the end of the spout instead of the middle. He charged $38 for the spout and $118 for the service call -- though when I called him a couple of years ago he said he charged $75 for service calls. I was in a reasonably mellow mood, so asked how much he would charge to put in a toilet. He assured me he could get me one I'd like and install it for $400, or $380 if I paid cash. Why in god's name did I trust him to get one for me? The one I liked was a one-piece Swiss Madison Chateau, which cost about $230. The one he showed up with was the cheapest they had at Menard's -- a Briggs Glenwood, a two-piece one that cost $89. His labor charge for removing the old toilet, picking up the new one, and installing it, in other words, came to about $300 -- vastly more than any reputable plumber would have charged. When I asked him about the pricing, he said no, the Briggs toilet was not the cheap one; he claimed there were a wide variety of Briggs toilets, and this one cost $235. After he left, I called Briggs and called Menard's, and I was right: the toilet he installed was the cheapest in the store, $89. I called Buchmayer and told him I needed to see the receipt. He replied that he never shared his receipts, and again insisted that the toilet he'd installed was not the cheapest in the store. This man makes his living by overcharging customers -- especially by preying on those who, like me, he assumes to be too old or gullible to notice. There are plenty of good, honest, reasonably priced plumbers in the Iowa City area. Please do yourself a favor and steer clear of ones like Buchmayer, who is neither honest nor reasonably priced.

Gloria C.

He charged us $80 to come out for 15 minutes and tell us to just pour some bleach in our washing machine drain pipe. He didn't use any tools, just looked over everything for a few minutes, and didn't seem to want to investigate our issue further. We called the next day to tell him our issue still wasn't resolved, and he refused to come back out to take a better look at it, telling us he had no idea what could be wrong with our drain pipe.

Seana P.

We called last week to set up an appointment to have two vanity mirrors hung on the wall, the two vanity lights raised and the trim finished around the vanity cabinet.

The appointment was set for Monday at one. Nothing heard from until we called at 3 to check on their arrival time. They had unfortunately forgotten to write it in their book and couldn't make it. Mistakes are human and that's understandable so we rescheduled for the next day at the same time.

They showed up right on time. One older guy and one younger, polite and nice. The older guy did go outside for a bit and we had realized he let himself into our garage to cut the trim to fit, which kept him out of the cold - but he did leave the sawdust and excessive wood mess behind.

They were here for an hour and half - charged for two and one random ""zip-it blade"".

All in all, would recommend and will keep them in mind for future projects.

Bonnie H.

Dependable, reasonable rates, great work. Showed up when he said he would., worked efficiently, was very knowledgeable