Two Veterans Experience
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We closed on what was believed to be a defect free home on 18 Aug 06. Considering all of the now known construction defects that exist in the home, we were paying for a valueless residential structure. Before the ink could dry on the mortgage paperwork and we left the title company, our home was destined to never benefit from increased property value as expected or be placed on the resale market without a massively extensive disclosure. We have learned the pitfalls of buying a house constructed by Pulte Homes, using a VA Home Loan, the hard way! We are not saying that Pulte Homes only builds defective homes, but we are merely documenting the most painful and costly homeownership experience in our lives. We share our knowledge and experience in hopes that no other homebuyer will suffer!
1: Misaligned pier pads that compromises the load-bearing capacity of the home.
2: Foundation walls are extensively cracked that is a result of hydrostatic pressure, caused by the builder's negligence to grade the lot post-construction. One area has begun leaking.
3: All four foundation walls have extensive cracks caused by hydrostatic pressure, two of the exterior wall have upper wall rotation, and one exterior wall (upper living area) is pulling outward (away from the house). This damage was caused by the builder's refusal to properly grade the lot for drainage.
4: Excessive deflection in LPI Engineered Floor System (Silent floor system). Due in part by the vertical movement of the basement floor compounded by poor product installation.
5: Water intrusion in all exterior walls (upper living area), failure to properly seal exterior windows.
6: Leaking roof.
We're running out of things that were properly installed/constructed.
Please "click" on the "Structural Defects" buttons above for details.
A sign of changing times and/or customer service? ----"Eat Burger, Waive Right to Sue"
Mandatory arbitration agreements forcing people to give up their rights to sue are now standard fare in everything from cell phone contracts to Hooters’ employment agreements. But the owner of an East Texas Whataburger has apparently taken arbitration mania to a new level. Every public entrance to the burger franchise displays a sign informing people that simply setting foot on the premises means that they are giving up their right to sue the company for any reason, even if, for instance, they get a little e coli along with their fries. Instead, customers will be forced to arbitrate their claims before the American Mediation Association, an organization that seems to consist of three lawyers in Dallas hired by the Whataburger (part of a 58-year-old fast food chain deemed a “Texas treasure” by the state legislature).
Attorney Dan Sorey spotted the sign in early January while in Kilgore investigating the scene of a motorcycle crash for a case. The Whataburger offered an ideal vantage point to study the intersection where the crash happened. Sorey says when he went in, he told a befuddled cashier that he didn’t think that the arbitration notice was enforceable, that anyway he wasn’t agreeing to it, and, “I need a taquito and a coffee.” He says he sat down, watched some traffic, and ate his taquito. “I didn’t choke, I didn’t burn myself, and I didn’t sue ‘em,” he reports. Sadly, while we suspect there is a good story behind the signs, the Whataburger franchise owner did not respond to requests for an interview. We'll just have to assume that the signs are the product of one too many late-night talk-show jokes about McDonalds' coffee lawsuits.
"The Reality of Mandatory Binding Arbitration": click here .
People Over Profits: The Arbitration Fairness Act of 2007
Jordan Fogal's Consumer web site.
Jordan Fogal's Congressional Testimony regarding Binding Arbitration
A must read for anyone who does not understand the consequences associated with Binding Arbitration Clauses in consumer contracts.
Pulte Homes announces their departure from KC metro area. KMBC9 News
LENEXA, Kan. -- [Dec 3, 2007] The No. 3 home builder in the metro area is leaving the local housing market.
Pulte Homes has property in Lenexa, Kansas City North, Liberty and Lee's Summit.
While Pulte Homes maintains its No. 3 ranking in building permits in the metro area, the company's financial statement shows that new orders are down 37 percent from the third quarter of last year.
"The market here has definitely deteriorated. As you say, it's a tough time to be in the home-building business," Pulte's John Conley told KMBC's Micheal Mahoney.
Since the mid-1990s, Pulte has built about 2,200 homes in the metro area.
Statistics show a nationwide housing slump, but Kansas City is the only one of Pulte's 51 markets the company is leaving.
Pulte attracts some mid-range home buyers through the company's warranty that promises to fix new home problems.
"And I talked to a sales rep, he said, 'Yeah, they are pulling out, but they're honoring their warranties.' And that's one thing you think of -- are they going to cover everything?" Pulte homeowner Becky Ketterling said.
"Anyone who has bought a Pulte home, their experience is not going to change. We intend to hold up our part of the limited warranty. And service that warranty with Pulte employees," Conley said.
Mahoney reported that what will change will be the face of some of the neighborhoods as Pulte sells off finished lots and raw ground to other developers who finish the projects when the housing and mortgage situation improves.
Metro Area Homebuilder Is Moving Out Of The Metro, Fox 4 Kansas City.
Pulte Homes pulling out of Kansas City, KSBH41 Kansas City.
So long
Farewell
Aufwiedersehn
Adeiu
Adeiu Adeiu
To yieu and yieu and yieu
Speaking of warranty service, here is some food for thought:
EMERIVILLE, CA -- Some Emeryville residents will be forced to spend the holidays in a hotel, instead of their town homes, because of water damage that happened five months ago.
The builder is Pulte Homes. They put a new roof on, and the work is still not done.
"I can't have Christmas, I can't have New Years. That's not right for someone who's paying a mortgage and association fees and property taxes," said Amanda Coffey.
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Amanda Coffey has been living in a hotel in a jumble of boxes and belongings since July. Pulte Homes has been paying her bill while they put a new roof on the town home she bought four years ago.
That's when the problems began.
"Behind here is my shower, feces come out of the shower, where the light fixtures were had water just dripping down," said Coffey.
Today, the kitchen and bathroom are in disarray, parts of ceilings and exterior walls are gone and dehumidifiers hum incessantly. Pulte Homes promises they'll have her moved back in by January 7th. She says she doesn't believe it.
"They have promised us five times we're going to be in our house and it hasn't happened. It's a false hope. Now I'm scared to go home because every time I go home I see more damages," said Coffey.
Yesterday, Pulte Homes sent a letter to Amanda Coffey, saying they would reimburse her $25 a day for food if she signed this document, agreeing not to disclose any information about her problems here.
"They're asking me not to talk to the media, not to talk to my neighbors," said Coffey.
Pulte Homes says the letter is in no way a settlement. No spokesperson was available to talk on camera today, but Pulte Homes told ABC7 news by phone that they will replace damaged floors and furniture.
Their customer relations manager says: "We're a builder that stands behind our product and our homeowners. That's why we're out there repairing things. We'll make it right."
Other families are also stranded at the hotel, but no others would comment on camera. A mold remediation company was at work at the complex today. The homeowners association sued Pulte Homes over faulty construction and litigation is still in the works.
For now, the holidays mean a hotel and the new year could bring a resolution.
(Copyright ©2008 KGO-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)
Dateline story on Pulte Homes' warranty:
Services, Home Builders - Pulte Home Corp., Central New Jersey struggling to get Pulte to honor warranty"
Complaints.com received the following e-message on August 25, 2001:
RE: Complaint about Pulte Home Corp.
Fifteen months ago we bought a home from Pulte Home Corporation, in Central New Jersey. It came with a builder's warranty on many of the home's features. For 13 of those 15 months we have been struggling to get Pulte to honor that warranty.
We have made countless telephone calls and personal visits to their office. We have had to struggle and fight with Pulte every inch of the way to even get them to make the simplest of repairs. On some items they make repeated promises and never follow through. On others they just simply refuse to respond. The one year warranty on many of the items has now expired and yet we are still trying to get them to fix items clearly covered, that were reported to them 13 months ago. Even some of the items on our pre-closing punch list have still not been fixed.
Pulte has made many promises they have failed to honor. We feel that buying a Pulte home is one of the worst errors we have ever made because they have made life so miserable for us. Pulte built all the homes in our neighborhood. We are not the only ones who have had these problems with them. When people in the neighborhood get together it is the first and the main topic of discussion. Most of the neighbors we have talked with share similar experiences.
Pulte's approach appears to us and many of our neighbors to be to drag everything out and make it as long and arduous as possible, in the apparent belief that most people will give up somewhere along the way. In fact, that has worked with many of our neighbors. However, it has not worked with us. We have had to file for arbitration against them twice on a total of 24 different problems and continue to struggle to get them to honor their obligations.
Pulte Exits Wiregrass Ranch Project (Florida).
By KEVIN WIATROWSKI, The Tampa Tribune, Published: January 29, 2008
WESLEY CHAPEL - The developers of Wiregrass Ranch confirmed Monday that Pulte Home Corp. has pulled out as the massive project's master builder.
"We've had a divorce," said Don Porter, head of the family-owned company that four years ago set out to develop its 5,000-acre homestead in the heart of Wesley Chapel.
Plans for the ranch called for creating a city-sized project - complete with a hospital, shopping mall and government complex - that could become the downtown core of a sprawling area that lacks one. At the time, Pulte was tapped as the project's lead developer.
Pulte still owns more than 900 acres of the ranch, but is no longer responsible for the long-term development of roads and other infrastructure, said Scott Campbell, president of Pulte's Tampa division.
Pulte's pullout casts doubt on the future of the grid of public roads across Wiregrass that county officials saw as a way to improve traffic in the region. Those roads were to have been built by Pulte.
The lone road project still moving forward - the eastern extension of State Road 56 - is now the responsibility of Forest City Enterprises and Goodman Co., the two companies developing the Shops at Wiregrass mall at the junction of S.R. 56 and Bruce B. Downs Boulevard. Pulte was to have built the extension.
With the unraveling of its Wiregrass plans, Michigan-based Pulte has effectively vanished as an active builder in Pasco's housing market. Pulte recently sold off its Lakeside project in Hudson, where it holds a few home lots. It also sold off another project, Lake Hutto in Hillsborough County.
There are no plans to sell the Wiregrass property, Campbell said.
"As of Jan. 28, we're going to hold onto it," Campbell said. Pulte plans to seek rights from the county to one day build homes on the property, he added.
Pulte began rethinking its Wiregrass plans last summer, Campbell said. The decision was influenced, in part, by the years spent striking a deal with county and state regulators and also by more than $560 million in county-mandated improvements required of the project, he said.
County commissioners approved the Wiregrass Ranch deal by a 3-2 vote in July. The approval made Wiregrass the largest development ever approved in Pasco and the first time the county had agreed to help a developer build its roads. Pulte's decision to pull out of the project won't affect those approvals.
The vote came just as the housing market hit the skids.
"As the process went along, it did not make sense to us to continue to be the master builder," Campbell said.
Pulte's decision to step aside formally killed its plans to build an age-restricted golf community under its Del Webb subsidiary. That land was returned to the Porters in an August land swap for property on the western side of the ranch, Campbell said.
"The parcel we had envisioned for Del Webb still has age-restricted zoning, so someone could build an age-restricted community there," Campbell said.
At the moment, Pulte's Wiregrass holdings consist of two parcels - land designated for multifamily use near the Shops at Wiregrass mall under construction and a tract to the north originally designated for Pulte's DiVosta brand.
The DiVosta property contains the beginnings of Chancey Road's western end and the early stages of residential development. Work there stopped abruptly last summer, about the same time Pulte was having second thoughts about continuing with Wiregrass.
Campbell said the DiVosta property has no utilities or other infrastructure to maintain. The company has no plans to seed the bare ground with grass or take other measures to avoid erosion of the land, he said.
"There's nothing that needs to be done there to keep it viable," Campbell said.
In an interview with The Tampa Tribune last summer, Porter said his family was willing to wait out changes in the housing market, should a downturn come.
On Monday, Porter said he's seeking another company to develop the ranch.
"I would not be forthright if I said we aren't talking to people. We are," Porter said. "Some stuff I am not at liberty to give a lot of flesh to."
April 2007: Pulte Homes has abandoned plans to build 500 condos at the South of Market site of the San Francisco Tennis Club, a project club members had battled hard to defeat.
April 30, 2007: Pulte pulls out of proposed Benson home development.
Senior homes project lingers, Pulte Homes pulls out of deal (Nov 15, 2007).
Pulte pulls out of Placer VineyardsPlanners reject dense development plan.
July, 28, 2006: Developer pulls out of 681-home development in Johnson County (IN).
We are unable to objectively recognize and appreciate that although defective,
our Pulte homeownership experience should be equal to owning a defect free home.
Photograph by Garvey Scott.
This flag was used during the American Revolution to unite the colonists against a common enemy. The rattlesnake has sharp eyes and may therefore be esteemed as an emblem of vigilance. She never begins an attack, nor, when once engaged, ever surrenders: She is therefore an emblem of magnanimity and true courage.... She never wounds till she has generously given notice, even to her enemy, and cautioned him against the danger of treading on her.
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has." Margaret Mead
"Life takes on meaning when you become motivated, set goals and charge after them in an unstoppable manner." Quote Les Brown.
Editorial comment : |
LOT 53 For Sale! Why did the original buyer back out?
They say that a wardrobe is everything, this is my picketing t-shirt.
"Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist.
That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. They
know its power. Thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers, founded in injustice and wrong, are sure to
tremble, if men are allowed to reason… There can be on right of speech where any man…[is] compelled to suppress
his honest sentiments.
Equally clear is the right to hear. To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the
hearer as well as those of the speaker." Quote Frederick Douglass (American abolitionist, author, orator
(1817-1895)), In famous plea for free speech in Boston 1860.
Amendment 1 - Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
More insight into the legal explanation of this amendment can be read on this page: First Amendment - An overview
Of particular interest is the following:
The most basic component of freedom of expression is the right of freedom of speech. The right to freedom of speech allows individuals to express themselves without interference or constraint by the government. The Supreme Court requires the government to provide substantial justification for the interference with the right of free speech where it attempts to regulate the content of the speech. A less stringent test is applied for content-neutral legislation. The Supreme Court has also recognized that the government may prohibit some speech that may cause a breach of the peace or cause violence. The right to free speech includes other mediums of expression that communicates a message.
Despite popular misunderstanding the right to freedom of the press guaranteed by the first amendment is not very different from the right to freedom of speech. It allows an individual to express themselves through publication and dissemination. It is part of the constitutional protection of freedom of expression. It does not afford members of the media any special rights or privileges not afforded to citizens in general.
We are also protected by other laws. USC Title 18, Section 1513, federal whistle blower laws protects those that are informing the public about
possible federal crimes such as predatory lending.
created: 21 June 2007 updated: 09 May 2008
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