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We're at our 6th house (mixture of brand new and resale) and went through the same process you go through couple of times.
My vote goes for John Wieland, I think it is best value house (price vs quality) of all the big builders.
John Weiland was about to sign bankruptcy papers when a private equity firm came in and bought the debt. They kept JW on for 5-6 months as an adviser, but now he is no longer associated. They kept the JW name b/c it has a great reputation. So, any building you see from JW currently is not actual JW that we are used to . For example, take Rose Hill off Tilly Morris Rd. That was another builder's subdivision and the "new" John Weiland came in and is finishing up the existing plots. These are not JW floorplans that we are used to. It's just the JW name.
That being said, I live in a JW home and love it. If you can find an existing JW home, you're sure to get a solid home.
I'm sure many of you know to keep an eye on the construction process, but I'll share my experience with one of the builders named in this thread. I'm going to withhold the name unless I don't get any satisfaction really soon. I'm in property management, so I kind of have an idea of what to look for and what I'm talking about. I'm no expert, but I've been involved in nearly every aspect of home construction. Let's begin.
Before the drywall was installed, I pointed out that the electrical plan called for 3 outlets in the garage. I was told by the site manager that the third outlet was an option. On the diagram, an optional outlet was clearly labeled with an "O". I mentioned this to the agent we worked with and he had no answers. I protested and told them it was not an option and it was clearly labeled as a third GFI in the garage. Fast forward to last week and now they finally agree that there should have been a third GFI outlet in the garage. Mind you, we closed on the house in October. This could have been corrected with minimal effort at that time. The assistant manager's idea was to piggy-back on an existing outlet. I told him no. I want the outlet where it was originally supposed to go. The electrician is scheduled to come out Friday to install this outlet, and I really get the feeling it is not going to be done the right way. This is a concern for me because I use tools that draw a good bit of power and I don't want my living room lights going out of the air compressor trips the breaker.
Next, I pointed out that the dryer duct cover outside the house was missing a flap. To me, this is no big deal to correct. Either replace teh whole cover for $10 or pop a new flap in. The manager told me this was code, to have a flap off of the cover. What?!?! So, it's code to allow an opening large enough for birds to nest in my dryer vent? I call that a fire hazard. And a lie. At the 60-day walkthrough, it was corrected. I guess code changed in that 60-day time frame. Doubtful.
2 weeks after we moved in, my wife and I notice a small puddle of water near the entrance to the laundry room. having a 2-year old we just wiped it up thinking he spilled something. The following morning, we see this puddle again. And we smell something that smells like sewage. A few days later, we notice the floors are bubbling up. At this point we have nothing on any of the walls that could have punctured a pipe, so we know it was nothing we did. I call the construction manager and let him know about the water and the floor bubbling up. Fast forward, the linoleum in the kitchen, laundry and powder room has to come out and the subfloor is wet. I went out and bought a moisture meter and the floors showed as high as 49% moisture. And there is mold. After the mold is dicovered I was told someone would be there to spray bleach on it and I should open a window to get rid of the odor. We finally get the kitchen floor situated and the odor comes back. A few visits from the plumber and we finally have no odor. The odor was so strong you could taste it in the air and my mother got sick over Thanksgiving.
We finally get all of the wet, moldy subfloor replaced and the manager tells me he had to order a different linoleum because what we had was out of stock. Great. I put a call into the warranty department and explain the situation and the warranty manager agrees to replace the linoleum after the holidays. I agree to that. A few days ago, the assistant manager comes by and tells us that the floor we got is the same as what we had put in the house to start with. This is not the case. We now have two distinctly different floor coverings in the house. To top it off, the AM might as well have called my wife a liar.
The takeaway from all of this is get everything you can in writing. Keep every piece of paper you get, even the ones that say this page intentionally blank. Make notes as you go along and visit the house as often as possible during construction. Look at everything. Even the things you think are not important. Also learn the chain of command/ladder. Know who to call if things start going sideways, and don't be afraid to call them. You're about to spend a lot of money. Make sure you are getting what you paid for.
I could go on and on about all of the stuff we have found wrong with this house since we've moved in, but I don't think C-D will let me make a post that long.
John Weiland was about to sign bankruptcy papers when a private equity firm came in and bought the debt. They kept JW on for 5-6 months as an adviser, but now he is no longer associated. They kept the JW name b/c it has a great reputation. So, any building you see from JW currently is not actual JW that we are used to . For example, take Rose Hill off Tilly Morris Rd. That was another builder's subdivision and the "new" John Weiland came in and is finishing up the existing plots. These are not JW floorplans that we are used to. It's just the JW name.
That being said, I live in a JW home and love it. If you can find an existing JW home, you're sure to get a solid home.
First of all i have no dog in this fight, however, I live in Rose Hill in a custom home I built myself. I can assure you the JW floorplans are the exact same. John Wieland the man was a 70 something old business man and was never a public company. The "new" john wieland homes is part of his succession plan because he was old. The new company is partly owend by a private equity firm and the Wieland family trust. Floor plans the same, same employees, same subcontractors. As part of the sale they received all the intellectual property aka home plans. I even the see the same superintendent's milling around.
I live in a Niblock Home in the Harris Village subdivision in Mooresville, going on 8 years now. I LOVE my home! We've had no real (knock-on-wood) issues with it. We have a Wyndham model & it's plenty big for us with nice features. There's a few larger model homes available in our subdivision now that are worth a look on your visit this month. We do have a community pool & we are in the MGSD.
Down the road from us, Niblock is building in the Ashlyn Creek subdivision. Smaller community & they are building their pool area this year. Niblock is a semi-custom builder, so you can make changes to the plans if you want.
I live in a Niblock Home in the Harris Village subdivision in Mooresville, going on 8 years now. I LOVE my home! We've had no real (knock-on-wood) issues with it. We have a Wyndham model & it's plenty big for us with nice features. There's a few larger model homes available in our subdivision now that are worth a look on your visit this month. We do have a community pool & we are in the MGSD.
Down the road from us, Niblock is building in the Ashlyn Creek subdivision. Smaller community & they are building their pool area this year. Niblock is a semi-custom builder, so you can make changes to the plans if you want.
Thanks for your reply and no, (sigh) we have not decided on a place yet! We hope to be closer to the lake, and now Lennar is building a subdivision within The Farms development that we are interested in. Still interested in Bells Crossing, too. We did like that when we were there in Jan.
But, we still haven't ruled out Davidson, Huntersville (parts of) and Cornelius! I feel like we'd be so happy in all of these places that it will probably end up coming down to the house/neighborhood we fall in love with. We are coming down again in a couple of weeks and hope to narrow down some more. I was hoping to have our house up here sold but so far only 2 low-ball offers, but we are getting lots of traffic so I am hoping it's only a matter of time.
Thanks for your reply and no, (sigh) we have not decided on a place yet! We hope to be closer to the lake, and now Lennar is building a subdivision within The Farms development that we are interested in. Still interested in Bells Crossing, too. We did like that when we were there in Jan.
But, we still haven't ruled out Davidson, Huntersville (parts of) and Cornelius! I feel like we'd be so happy in all of these places that it will probably end up coming down to the house/neighborhood we fall in love with. We are coming down again in a couple of weeks and hope to narrow down some more. I was hoping to have our house up here sold but so far only 2 low-ball offers, but we are getting lots of traffic so I am hoping it's only a matter of time.
Thanks for asking!
Good luck selling your home!!! I still have a possibility of getting relocated, we are heading down for a Wedding the weekend of May 9th so I am going to look around. The Farms is one that I am very interested in seeing, same with The Pointe. Hope it is as nice as it appears.
From visiting True models, and walking around their homes; it doesn't matter if the purchase price is around $500K or under $200K, everything is to minimum building code. They, like most tract builders have all interior walls at 24" on center. A sturdier house will have them closer 12"-16". True, and a lot of tract builders staple the housewrap and don't tape the seams. It takes longer to tape the seams, it's also how the manufacturer recommends the wrap be installed. I weigh around 120lbs, I can jump up and down in a completely furnished True home and it will shake. I don't want to spend that much money on a home that will vibrate just by someone my size jumping up and down.
I'm curious if this was just one TH home you saw or was it more than one? Not saying that TH is the best out there, I know they're not, but speaking from experience - we're in the building process with them, the above has not been the case with our house.
We've been visiting the site since they broke ground pretty much every other day. My husband knows construction and has been taking pictures and has been in constant communication with our project manager.
Anyway, the wall studs are all 16" OC (they have that information in their standard specs doc). The floor joists are set at 20" OC. My husband measured when one of our friends who works in construction asked. Max allowed is 24", recommended is 16". Sounds like TH goes for the medium.
It may be that the homes the poster above saw were part of the "Integrity Collection". I have a copy of the floor plan and spec and it says that all walls are 16" OC except the Integrity Collection which are 24" OC. TH has 4 different levels of home. They may be the same floor plans, but the finishes and bones of the house are different - and it's reflected in the price.
The home was tape wrapped (we have the pictures) not stapled at the seams for the house wrap.
I weigh 170 lbs and have jumped up and down in our empty (framed out with only drywall) house and nothing shook. My husband did the same (he weighs 200 lbs). We were wondering about the structure as well and were curious about the sturdiness of the framing.
Based on all the comments, it sounds like there are a few builders that consistent with quality-- usually the smaller local people, and there are those that quality will really vary based on who the project manager and the contractors are. It's also important to read EVERYTHING and ask a lot of questions.
We've had TH make changes without charging us a change order fee because of their oversights, but the only reason we noticed is by being on site on a regular basis. For example, ours is an unfinished basement home, but no one thought to ask if we wanted insulation in the basement. Our PM asked us and they put it in for a few hundred dollars extra - no change fee.
We were limited in our choices due to needing a basement and looking for a very specific location. If you're options are more open I would try to stick to someone as local as possible.
These are all contractors, so your concrete, framing, mason, grading, electrical, gas, HVAC people are all going to be different..
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