In reply to Steve Wilkinson.

I wasn't commenting on abandoned sites or people who get in too deep and can't adequately support what they build. I was describing people who start with the kind of shoddy theme that has been virtually unique to ThemeForest: plugin functionality and content types are baked into it, possibly along with insecure and inefficient code and a refusal to use WordPress' automatic update capabilities in an appropriate way.

The changelog/frequency of updates is immaterial because the end user/victim of this kind of theme is having a trap sprung on them. Even if they are tuned in enough to the WordPress way to create a child theme (which is rare and has not been emphasized at TF), they've still got a theme they can't easily leave if they fill it with a lot of content. So even if they do progress up the learning curve and want to do things better, that's going to be way more costly and difficult than it would be otherwise. This wouldn't have happened if they had gone almost anywhere else for a theme, even one that's far from the cream of the crop. Worst of all, if they did not set up a child theme for their settings and changes (which is typical), then they cannot run updates from their TF source safely. This is the typical scenario TF themes have generated. I think things are improving somewhat, but this is still the prevailing pattern.

For all these reasons and more TF is *not* a good place for anyone to get themes, least of all a "developer." If you're letting client "choose themes" from TF or anywhere they want, I think that's a mistake unless they cannot be reasoned with on this but are not unreasonable people, and you wish to work with them. Why would you do this? Because they have worthy goals, a viable business, and they are not paying bottom of the market prices. Probably they are hiring you primarily to help them achieve some business goals -- not just deliver "web design" services for "a website" in exchange for a fee and after that the relationship is over. If you find yourself in this position you can explain the drawbacks, hold your nose, mitigate the technical problems, and plan ahead for the future redesign.

I definitely don't recommend doing custom work and then leaving it to the client to support unless they have people capable of doing that. You should stay involved or it may come back to you (or someone else) in unpleasant circumstances. An ongoing relationship doesn't require "deep pockets" if the client is a profitable business. Here's a good example of how this can be done well: http://controlyours.com/

Have you taken a look at Layers from oBox? It sounds right up your alley -- a well-made "builder" theme with many customization features done right and well. You'd use it as a base "framework," and child themes for it can be sold by anyone -- the first crop of them is available now in a special section of ThemeForest.