In the fall of 2003 my Wife and I signed a contract for the purchase of a new home. The house was in a new development and was not yet built. The development is called Barrington Hills, located in Rocklin Ca. We we were told the house would be done around June. We signed the contract which included the purchase price.
After the first of the year in 2004 we were told the house was behind schedule due to the city being slow in issuing permits. Construction began around July. During the process we met at the design center to pick out upgrades.
This process took three different meetings. During the first meeting we selected the majority of our structural upgrades. We were given the price, which was off the upgrade price sheet provided by the builder. We wrote a check at the end of the first meeting, paying for the upgrades we picked out.
At the second meeting the lady told us she had bad news. She stated the builders cost had gone up because of the delay in construction. She stated the builder was going raise the price of the upgrades by 10%. I told her we had a contract and that we already paid for the upgrades at our last meeting. We refused to pay and went forward with our next meetings.
The builder called after we refused to pay. My wife informed him that we had a contract and would not pay the almost $5000 he raised the price. The builder, Dave Snyder, said his prices had gone up and that he was passing the price onto us and he did not care about the contract.
Dave Snyder told my wife that our purchase contract expired in the fall of 2004.in California real estate contracts are good for only one year. Dave Snyder said our house would not be complete within in the year time frame. Dave Snyder said he would hate to have to renegotiate the contract at the current market price. The prices in the area had skyrocketed over the year it took him to build the house.
During this period we spoke to others waiting for their houses to be built. We learned that Dave Snyder sent out letters to several buyers informing them he could not complete their house withing the year time frame allowed by the contract. Dave Snyder asked them sign a form and he would return their deposit and notify them when construction began.
Dave Snyder told them the reason construction was delayed was because the City of Rocklin would not issue the permits. However, after several people signed Dave Snyder's request to back out of the contract he quickly began construction on those lots. When he put them back on the market they were for hundred of thousands of dollars more, not the original purchase price.
As we approached the end of our contract I asked Dave Snyder's real estate agent to provide us with an addendum extending our contract six months, which Dave Snyder signed.
A few weeks before we closed escrow Dave Snyder sent us the final amount of funds due at closing. The cost included the almost $5000 Dave Snyder raised the price. During phone conversation with Dave Snyder he stated "He can and will raise the price" and that if we didn't like it we did not have to buy the house.
Now he knew we had sold our previous house and were living with my parents because he was behind schedule. Dave Snyder said if we did not pay him the money he would consider us in breach of contract and sell our house to someone else. Funny since he is in breach of contract. Dave Snyder would have loved for us to back out, since the prices on the homes had gone up over $250K.
Dave Snyder had us between a rock and a hard place so we decided to pay him the money and sue after we got the house. When we got to closing Dave Snyder told the escrow agent he had a form we needed to sign. The form was a release, relieved him of all legal responsibility regarding the increase and that we could not sue him. We refused to sign the form, but signed every other form to close escrow. This way he was the one in breach of contract again, not us for walking out of escrow.
Now we have problems getting the builder to fix things that are wrong with the house. He has been slow in fixing some items and some six months later things still have not been fixed.
We have found that many of the people in the development have had problems with the builder as well. Do not do business with or buy a house from this builder. He is dishonest and will not follow the contract.
The builder is Dave Snyder and the RMO on the contractors license is Larry Aflzo.
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