We decided to start looking for a home to purchase in April. This was to be our first home. We had never purchased or built a home before. Shortly, we came upon a company, Palm Harbor Village a division of Palm Harbor Homes in Grand Junction, CO that seemingly could provide us with the home we wanted. They told us they could build us a home on a lot of our choice and they could find us the financing all wrapped up in one. They claimed that they do this to make the process easier for the customer. They said they would be able to get everything done within around 5 months. It has now been over two years and the house is still not done. We know that this is a poor amount of time to build any single family home let alone a modular home.
We chose to use them to build our home and paid a $500.00 earnest money fee. We got a real estate agent to help us find a lot and had this done within the next month. Because Palm Harbor was unable to get everything set up in a quicker time frame they decided to pay for the lot themselves so we didnt lose it to someone else. We went into the closing and they had us sign a hold open policy which was explained to us as an agreement that Palm Harbor would sell it to us when we got the house done at the same price that they paid.
Because my husband is a contractor we asked if we could do some of the work as sweat equity rather than pay someone else to do it. Not only was he given permission to do some projects on our own, but they also asked and TOLD him to do some things as well.
Because everything they were doing was taking to long, their employee DC, said they could do a back end close and told us that this meant that their company would finance the building costs and then they would sell it to us for $265,000, which is what it was supposed to cost for the lot, house and contractor costs. We had been approved for loan after loan thinking that the house would be done and locking in a rate. Then the time would go by and they still hadnt done any work and the house wasnt done. The interest rate changed from a starting rate in 2005 of 5.85% to a more recent rate of 7.5% making it a more expensive deal for us.
DC lied to us time and time again. He kept telling us when things would be able to be done and they werent. He would tell us things had been done when they hadn. He would say that he sent us something and didnt. He said he would call and never did. He would tell us he paid someone for something when he really hadnt. He didnt get along with the contractors and caused problems with them. He avoided talking to us, he yelled and screamed at us. He called us names and made this the worst experience we ever had.
We decided it was time to try and get some help and sent a detailed letter to the main branch of Palm Harbor. The letter was addressed to the Customer service supervisor of the whole company. We didnt get a reply and things continued to get worse. Then one day we were told that DC had been fired and we thought that things should get better. It has actually gotten even worse. They found out that DC had overspent on our budget by a large amount of money and didnt tell anyone about it. We then contacted the guy who replaced him and were told by him that we were going to pay for all the additional, unapproved expenses or that we would not get the house. He then said we could purchase their Palm Harbor SPEC HOME. After all that we had already been through this is the last thing we should have been told.
We were extremely upset and tried over and over again to get a hold of someone at the main offices in Addison, TX, as well as filing a report with the BBB. Finally we reached the Customer service supervisor who told us she didnt get our letter until a couple days before (we sent it 4 months earlier) and she was sorry about all we had been through and she would have someone contact us. This person, the Vice President of Palm Harbor Homes, finally called us a week later. He listened to our experience and sounded very upset about what we had to go through and was also very apologetic. He said he would call back and try and figure something out.
When he called back a couple days later he said that he didnt understand what had happened but that DC had really done a number on our file and that it was all messed up. He had not documented very much. He said it was clear that many things had gone wrong with our build and that it never should have taken this long and gone through so many changes. He acknowledged that we are not the only customer that DC had handled this way. He then asked if we would agree to pay $285,000 for everything, and they would cover everything else (Originally we agreed that we were going to pay $265,000 with up to an additional $20,000 to cover the driveway and decks, which we found to be reasonable because that is what we planned). He also said that he would do whatever it took for them to get this house done as soon as possible because we had waited long enough.
What ended up happening is this: The house is STILL not done. The VP has since then (another 4 months later) gone back on his word and now states that they have decided that they are UNCOMFORTABLE with honoring the contract with the $285,000 price and they are UNCOMFORTABLE giving us any time frame as to when this house will be done. They sent us a letter saying that they were sending us back our $500 earnest money and that they were doing this because we were unable to secure financing within the time frame needed to finish the house. They stated that they would inform us when they put the house on the market, to give us a chance to buy the home at their new price. We were told to give them an invoice for what work we have done and what money we have paid towards the house, but to their knowledge and their documentation they had only agreed to us doing work on the driveway. (Remember they fired the guy we had worked with for almost 2 years and who gave us the permission and also told us to do many things.) They said they would LOOK OVER IT CAREFULLY And pay it if they agreed to it. Given everything else we had gone through we feel that some of these statements indicate that they intend to short change us wherever they can.
We also believe that they are lying to us about the appraised value to try and discourage us from pursuing any further. They told us the house appraised for $286,000. When we talked to a Real Estate agent we asked her opinion by the neighborhood values and by looking at the house herself and she agrees that they may be untruthful about this number. Her guess is around $330,000 or more.in our opinion we feel like they are acting unethically with the goal of trying to sell this house for more money than they had agreed to sell it to us for, especially given the fact that many of the things that made it possible for this house to be built were our responsibility literally as well as financially.
We were recently told that the contract that we were bound to is no longer valid and stated that it was only good for the first 30 days. While we were signing this contract we were not made aware of this and nowhere in the contract does it state that the lifespan of the contract is only 30 days. Our understanding was that the contract was valid for the full amount of time that it would take to build the home, which is why we did all the things we were told to do.
For anyone who reads this understand this, our credit score is in the mid seven hundreds. We have been told that we would qualify for a loan for much more than the price of this home. This was just a lame attempt to back out of the whole thing and putting the blame on something WE couldnt do. We have gone through over two years of h*l and still do not have a house. Where we live the cost of living has gone up tremendously within this time. We will have a very difficult time finding another home we can afford. My husband has missed many days at work just to build a home that ended up being taken from us, thus lowering our income. We have been unable to trade in our vehicle while it still had a good trade in value because we were told to leave our credit alone until we get the mortgage for the house. We have also had another child. Our intention for building this home was to provide ample space for our expanding family and now that our family has expanded and this house in no longer available to us at the price we had agreed on, we are forced to continue to rent a home which is just too small for our family.
If it is not obvious by now that we have been through quite an ordeal, I would like to state that we are very nervous about dealing with the building industry ever again. We simply want our home for the price we agreed to pay on the contract or full payment for all money and time that we have put into this house. They have ruined something for us that should be one of the many joys of life, being able to own our own home. We understand that building a home can be very stressful and difficult but we feel that they have gone way beyond this to make it downright miserable.
We are unsure of what our options are as we cannot afford a lawyer. There are apparently no regulating forces in the building industry and we want to end this dispute by being able to live happily in our new home, or being reimbursed fully for our time and money put into this home. And we would like to ensure that Palm Harbor Homes cannot and will not do this to anyone else.
Without home
somewhere, Colorado
U.S.A.
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