QUESTION

The contractor who replaced the tile in our bathroom after it was damaged by water and fire-fighting chemicals wrote in his insurance proposal that he would remove and replace 1/2 inch cement board and 3/4 inch BC plywood. The idea was to restore the floor to its pre-fire condition. The bathroom had been installed in 2002, and we had had no problems with the tile or grout until the fire. The height difference between the tile floor and the wood floor in the bedroom was less than 1/4 inch.

The new floor is about an inch higher than the original one. The contractor cut the bottom of the door to fit. The door is now 3/4 inch shorter and there is barely 1/4 inch between the bottom of the door and the floor. In addition the floor feels kind of lumpy underfoot. I am also concerned that the height difference might create problems with our acrylic curb-less shower, which now has about 1/2" of grout and or caulk on the bottom of it's frame.

The wall tile job is also terrible. I have not paid the contractor's final payment and don't plan to. My guess is the contractor did not replace the old cement board and plywood before installing the new floor, but could something else have caused the height difference?

ANSWER

ANSWER - If the subfloor and tile was replaced as specified, then the new tile floor should not have been any higher.   The tile installer should have known that the floor would be higher the way he was installing it and he should have asked for your permission before proceeding.

Chances are he may have installed the new tile over the existing tile or perhaps he installed backer board over the existing tile and then adhered the new tile to the backer board.  That would more likely result in 3/4" of height.  The lumpy feeling might be because the backer board was not installed over a properly prepared flat substrate.

The only way for sure to determine what was done and what caused those conditions is to perform a forensic intrusive inspection and remove a tile or two to see how it was constructed.