Had THE WORST renovation experience with rental property!!!

[Burte Lkhagvasuren]

NEED ADVICE!!!

Hey guys, I'm in a bad situation and need some advice. Three months ago a tenant moved out who was rough on my rental house in east LA. At the time I was living in Ohio so a real estate agent and Airbnb host Ella Mai of @EllaHomes85 and Keller Williams Realty, Inc. offered to have her full-time handyman John renovate my house. She manages a lot of beautiful houses so I thought she would do a good job on mine. The agreement was she was going to charge me for his time and a daily fee for managing him. She told me how great he was, that he had an incredible eye for detail and worked on high-end houses before. I trusted her and agreed.

After 3 months and over 20k worth of materials and labor, I had to pull the plug and drive all the way down to LA to see the damage. The photos they were sending me were very bad, but the property was left in horrible condition. Not a single door I asked him to replace closed property. The bathrooms were nightmarish and not functional. Three layers of tiles stack on top of each other because he laid them crooked and just glued new ones on. The floor he installed is super crooked and has to be replaced. The AC mini split unit was dropped during installation and needs to be recharged. He broke windows trying to paint the house. Everything he touched has to be ripped out and reinstalled. But worst of all, he wired my house in an extremely dangerous way that is a complete fire hazard. (connecting yellow 10/2 wire to white 14/2 wire) It blows my mind that this whole time Ella was coming over and rushing him to work faster, not stopping the disaster and she was ok with John charging more and more money to my Home Depot card. When I messaged her she threatened to sue me if I and my husband would post online about this. Also told me it was my fault her handyman did such a bad job and she wasn't involved even though I was paying her for their labor. Now everything including 2 bathrooms has to be ripped out and redone. I don't have any more money and will have to live in this unit so I can redo everything myself to get the house in a rentable shape again.

I'll appreciate any advice?!

P.S. We didn't have a contract, but 90% of our communication is documented on Facebook and text messages. And we have bank transactions from our account to her for their labor. Of course, we also have hundreds of photos and videos of all damage they had done. 

P.S.S. Ella Mai is still working with that handyman and managing other people's properties in CA and FL.

[Timur Salikov]

Unfortunately this is all true. This real estate agent helped me buy a house in 2019. Ever since then we stayed in touch. When she found out a tenant has been rough on my property she offered to have her handyman make some repairs. Because she owns really nice AirBnbs I trusted her when she told me her guy was super detail oriented and a rockstar. So when this handyman started offering additional upgrades I agreed. He offered to change the layout of the house, put in 2 new bathrooms, replace all interior doors. I felt lucky I knew someone I could trust and had my back.
As time went on, they missed ever single deadline. The pictures I started to get back were very bad and the things they didn’t take photos of were even worse. After 3 months and 17k in materials I pulled the plug and told her handyman to stop work. I drove all the way from Ohio to California and found this disaster. I was devastated. Not only was I paying her handyman $265 a day, I was also paying this agent $100 to manage him. I don’t know how she thought she can get away with this horrible remodel. The house is completely unrentable.
The only solution I can come up with is demo everything and remodel it myself the best I can.