Need advice for getting out of a contract

[Graham K.]

I hired a general contractor to do a foundation replacement and several other smaller jobs on my house. The total contract is for $210k. The foundation portion is $163k. The remaining $47k is a bunch of other stuff like new HVAC, sewer lateral, electrical, chimney removal, siding, water heater, relocate gas meter, etc. We signed the contract at the end of May and it specified that all of the work was to be completed by the end of August. The contract we used is AIA Document A105 - 2017.

It’s now the middle of November. The contractor started with the foundation and it’s about 90% done. He has done numerous things incorrectly and the workmanship is awful. I have caught many mistakes, and to be fair, he has fixed them when possible. Everything is sloppy: the concrete pours, the way things are aligned, the way things are nailed. I could write a book about all that has gone wrong and all that has been poorly done. The contractor is usually on site for an hour in the morning and then his guys work the rest of the day. They are unskilled at best. I catch them doing things wrong all the time.

Because of the way things are going, I want to let the contractor go after the foundation is finished so I can work with other contractors to do the remaining work. Of course, I am current with all progress payments and I certainly intend to pay the contractor for all the work he has done.

But how can/should I go about getting out of the rest of the contract? I need a strategy for telling him without infuriating him. Even though it’s been a very unpleasant experience, I still want to avoid burning bridges. I also need to go about it in a legally acceptable way so that I am minimizing my risk of lawsuits and liens. Any advice would be much appreciated.