Matt Newman · General contractor, Santa BarbaraOne person, all the way through.

I came the long way: Salt Lake City, then Los Angeles, where I earned my contractor’s license in 2001.

I count from that year, when I became answerable for the work and not just my part of it.

AMN stayed small on purpose.

More crews, more jobs at once, a layer of managers between me and the sites: I have been offered that more than once and turned it down every time. Add the layer and you defend decisions you did not make. I would rather run fewer projects and be the one who walked the parcel.

I run every job myself, on site. When a client calls, they get me. That is how the company is built, and why it cannot get much larger.

Something is always behind a wall nobody drew, and here the ground and the agencies both have opinions.

Twenty-five years have taught me the damage is rarely the problem. The delay in telling you is. So you hear it from me the same day, with the cost and the options, before more work happens.

That has cost me money. It has never cost me a client.

The Loureyro Property in Montecito. We built it from the ground up, 2019 to 2023, through County review and the Montecito Board of Architectural Review.

Comfort and belonging were the owners’ words. When it was finished, they led the final punch walk themselves.

Walk through the Loureyro Property

• I am the one on your site. No account manager between us. How I manage a project.
• Bad news the same day. With the cost and the options, before more work happens.
• On your side, if someone else builds. I also work as an owner’s representative. What that covers.
• One price, fixed at preconstruction. After that it moves only by a written change you approve in advance.
• Two years on our workmanship. And a return visit at twelve months, whether or not you call.

Read the paperwork behind each one