Hello, Everyone!
This may be a lonely, one-man crusade against a big, giant home builder based in Atlanta, but I need to voice my opinion and warn other potential new home buyers.
I bought a "LUXURY" townhose that easily cost me more than $0.5 million in Montgomery County, MD (I will withold the name of the community for the sake of other residents there who are already suffering from all the bad reps) in 2005. Every possible issues and problems that one can possiblly imagine happened. I can write a book on this, but here are the highlights. Ready?
1) They have a fancy marketing binder with a built-in calculator and a pen... That I give them a good credit for... But that's about it.
2) Final walk-through? What walk-through? The foreman walked me around the house for about 15 min. Didn't take any notes or make a list of things to get done. All by memory. I thought he must have a very good memory.
3) Lo and behold, he forgot to take care of a few items...
4) Some fixtures that require the brass screws to make them look fancy ended-up getting a mixture of brass and some random-looking drywall screws in glaringly-visible places... Like the foyer. Foreman's response? They ran-out of the proper screws.
5) A patch of sod was missing, and they never bothered to plant it.
6) Staircase had visible gaps between each steps... And they put a carpet runner over it in the center. I would stick the toe in the gap and the carper runner would go "boink."
7) Floor/shoe trimming around the floor had pieces of randomly-cut of wood stuck-on to "fill the gap" in less-visible places like the bottom/top of the staircase.
8) Before the move-in, the basement flooded when it rained. It wasn't sealed properly. Had to replace the entire carpet.
9) A couple of days AFTER the final settlement, we received a call from the Loan Officer that they discovered major errors on the settlement form and that we would need to go through ANOTHER around of settlement to sign-off on the correct paperwork. She then informed us that we would be hearing back either from her or the settlement company to soon schedule the repeat settlement. We waited for a couple of days and never heard back from anyone. The next thing we know, we were receiving a letter in the mail informing us that, if we dont come back for another settlement as soon as possible, our house will be repossessed.
10) One day, I am driving in the neighbor and noticed a large truck with a huge hose pointing toward the upstairs windows of my neighbor's house. They forgot to put the insulation in the attic of my next door neighbor's house... And, it turns-out, mine also. They tried to sneak-by and put insulation in my house's attic during work hours, hoping that I won't notice. Sorry, I have flexible work schedule! I even overheard the sound of the supervisor asking the field foreman on the radio, "did Mr. _ (my name_) find out about it?"
11) 3-month walk-through? I overheard the field foreman telling one of the vendors (I think it was a carpet guy) that I was a "pain-in-the-ass." I think Beazer is the BIGGEST-pain in the ass.
12) They kindly point-out that I should go ahead and change the air filter in the a/c unit soon... Except I could never find where the filter is located... Because they never installed one to begin with! The superintendant's response?"All of our units come with a filter in the beginning, and they all should have been inspected." Inspect my buttocks.
13) The basement recently flooded again. Ruined the carpet and the painting. The estimated cost of the repair is $4,000. We initially thought that we forgot to winterize the pipes, and it bursted. We were wondering, "hmmm... It wasn't even that cold this winter... What happened?" When the plumber came, he kindly pointed-out that there is a large gaping hole in the wall where the pipes run to the outside - no sealing. All the cold air was coming-in from outside. No wonder the basement is so cold! What did Beazer say?"Sorry, your house is no longer under the warranty... And it's the owner's responsibility to properly maintain all the caulking/sealing outside the house." Maintain sealing/caulking that was never put-in/existed to begin with!!?? Plus, the house is only 2 years old! The Homeowner's Insurance won't pay for the repair because it's a "builder defect."
14) Getting the picture, yet?
15) The list goes on and on.
16) Tried to contact the Regional VP and just found out that he no longer works for Beazer... Go figure...
I have dealt with other new home builders in the past, and I can CONFIDENTLY tell you in my mother's name that they are the WORST of all. I never dealt with a company that's as horrible as Beazer during the ENTIRE building process (and afterwards).
Any suggestions anyone on how to resolve the pipe bursting/hole in the wall issue? Is there a Class Action somewhere that I can join? I sure can't be the only one suffering! I sent a certified letter and via FedEx on 3/6/08 to the local head of Beazer but no replies...
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