Beginner Gardening: what's wrong with my plant?, 2 by Stratmister

Stratmister wrote:
The house I bought 40 miles inland East of San Francisco, had 2 established bushes over 4 feet tall. Facing North-East and got less than 2hrs of sun. it thrived most of the year but hot summers would burn ends of leaves black, but it always recovered. I had to move both to pour footings for a deck in September, so I planted them under my large Japanese maple tree to shelter them. They weren\'t happy with the move and never bounced back.
Last thanksgiving I saw two varieties of it on the shelf and took home 2 plants. I divided them into 4 pots, one which lives in my office shares the soil with my snake-plant is doing great; secret being that it\'s not exposed to sun, gets indirect daylight and gets watered once/week.
The others not so great. I was keeping them in my garage until I could plant them in spring. But late December it got very cold and leaves were dropping so i brought them in, another one lost all its leaves and now I\'m keeping my fingers crossed as I\'m nursing the 4th pot.
Based on my experience, I believe this plant does not handle extreme hot or cold and doesn\'t like to soak its feet in the water, prefers a well drained soil, watered not more than once a week.