I'm in need some guidance, hopefully some of you pros can point me in the right direction.

At my old house, I converted carpeted steps to hardwood. It was a PITA. When we had our new house built, we paid the extra upgrades for a) hardwood stairs w/ white risers and b) open treads w/ railing. This way, when the kids are old enough to not ruin floors, we can yank out the carpet, put down hardwood, and the staircase will already be done.

The package specifically stated that the landing is hardwood, but the builder carpet was installed instead. We included that in our list of things which needed to be fixed with a new house. They came out today to fix it. I'm not happy; my wife is livid.

The work done makes the hardwood landing look like more of an afterthought than look like it was built this way, which in effect it is because the work was not done correctly the first time. Even though it's not original, it sure could look better like it was one cohesive staircase unit IMO.

Question 1 -- The first riser -- Home warranty guy (HWG) says that he will switch that to a white riser.

Question 2- Shouldn't the bottom tread be proud of the (perpendicular) stringer (like all the other treads are) by about 1", instead of being 1/4" BEHIND it looking tucked away? HWG says he will not fix that, but rather just try and slip in something in place of the carpet.

Can anyone provide a picture of how this SHOULD actually look? I can't find a specific picture, but I know this is not right. I tried to show all angles, but it's tough to show how it actually looks in person.

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/ld9ok ... 7-h1025-no



You can see on the left side the other treads hang over. The landing nosing is shallow.
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/dtxYi ... 59-h900-no




Are these back-to-back moldings even normal? Or was it done because nothing was done right from the beginning so it's the only fix they could think of?
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-7XeH ... CN3731.JPG



Just looks stupid.
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-hjJ- ... CN3732.JPG

Not as big a deal, just something I'll have to fix later. This is just lazy I guess -- cuts into profit?
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-ATjL ... CN3729.JPG



Lazy I guess -- mitered returns cuts into profit.
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/d-d1n ... 5-h1025-no