Fulton Homes - Prices (Chandler, Gilbert: house, neighborhoods, to buy)

[AZgarden]

UPDATE to above: Waters of Ocotillo: Huge sign is up. Homes are starting in the Mid $ 300,000s. Lots of people are looking daily. Hope it boosts my house although I decided to rent, not sell.

[asufan]

I ruled out waters at ocotillo last year when I saw the final plat plans on the city of chandler website. They are starting in the 350's for the smallest plan, but the nice houses will be substantially more. FYI the lot sizes I saw were in the 5,700-8,000 sq. Ft range. For a large house, no thanks

[AZgarden]

Yes, I agree. The back lots do not even look big enough for a pool, at least not the models. And the homes do seem pretty close together, not like the older homes in the area.

[jimj]

Originally Posted by asufan

Fulton Homes is no better than Pulte or Shea, TW Lewis, etc. All the same. They used to call themselves a luxury builder but really had to down spec many of their homes when the recession happened, and even introduced cheaper product mid stream in some of their communities. What you are paying more for in Fulton Ranch is location and amenities. Fulton Ranch is light years superior to Freeman Farms and Ironwood Crossing, they are not comparable. I saw a resale Fulton Ranch tract home recently sell in the 700's, and it didn't even back to the water. The demand is there due to the community amenities, desirable Hamilton HS across the street, and proximity to thousands of 6-figure salary jobs.

Yep, pretty much unless you have it built yourself (as in custom builder) a tract home is a tract home and a big builder is a big builder. X amount of elevations to choose from in any one subdivision and you can be assured your house will look like probably a third or a quarter of the houses in the area. As for the building itself, I've owned various builder's homes and noticed one thing throughout all of them. They all cut corners when/where they can. It may look pretty BUT it's the "bones" of the house that matter in the long run and every builder does those "bones" as cheap as possible.

[azriverfan.]

Originally Posted by asufan

I ruled out waters at ocotillo last year when I saw the final plat plans on the city of chandler website. They are starting in the 350's for the smallest plan, but the nice houses will be substantially more. FYI the lot sizes I saw were in the 5,700-8,000 sq. Ft range. For a large house, no thanks

Yup, that was my issue too. I was interested in purchasing one of these as an investment property. There was an article in the Arizona Republic about a year ago stating Pulte was going to put up these homes and wasn't impressed based on my findings. They are building 31 homes on 10.5 acres which means these are glorified condos. We are talking not even a 1/5 of an acre! The only redeeming factor is the location which is nearly perfect. It's in the Price corridor just south of the Chandler Mall and right next to the the 202

[rasty]

We are also looking at a tract home (Shea). I am interested in your reference to builders cutting corners. If one is to focus on the "bones" of the house, what should we be looking for?

[PhinsFan1]

We've owned homes by many different builders. They're all pretty much the same. Every neighborhood we've owned in has had homes that were "lemons" right next door to homes with no problems. The builder is only as good as the subcontractors they hire to do the actual work and that's often a crapshoot.

I've looked at homes in Fulton Ranch many times since they first built the community and, IMO, they've always been over priced. Fulton talked up the community for a few years prior to opening it and there was a huge feeling of excitement and demand. They were selling lots via lottery, along with other builders too. But Fulton homes in Fulton Ranch and also their other communities were more expensive then many other builders. It was the height of the market and certainly builders can charge whatever they want for homes. If they'll sell at that price, that's what people believe they're worth. But I, personally wouldn't pay more for a Fulton home just b/c Fulton is the builder. Certainly location, community, etc. are a different story and I'd be willing to pay more in a desirable community.

It's a beautiful area. But I feel like the homes are built very close together and close to the street. It feels a bit closed-in to me as you walk around the streets with homes. I'm also not a fan of the gated "island" in the middle of the community where Fulton's home is....I get a "king looking down upon the masses" vibe. I'm kidding...a little That said, those homes in the gated section are gorgeous.

[AZgarden]

I personally think there's too much brown in that community to be really attractive.

[jimj]

Originally Posted by PhinsFan1

We've owned homes by many different builders. They're all pretty much the same. Every neighborhood we've owned in has had homes that were "lemons" right next door to homes with no problems. The builder is only as good as the subcontractors they hire to do the actual work and that's often a crapshoot.

I've looked at homes in Fulton Ranch many times since they first built the community and, IMO, they've always been over priced. Fulton talked up the community for a few years prior to opening it and there was a huge feeling of excitement and demand. They were selling lots via lottery, along with other builders too. But Fulton homes in Fulton Ranch and also their other communities were more expensive then many other builders. It was the height of the market and certainly builders can charge whatever they want for homes. If they'll sell at that price, that's what people believe they're worth. But I, personally wouldn't pay more for a Fulton home just b/c Fulton is the builder. Certainly location, community, etc. are a different story and I'd be willing to pay more in a desirable community.

It's a beautiful area. But I feel like the homes are built very close together and close to the street. It feels a bit closed-in to me as you walk around the streets with homes. I'm also not a fan of the gated "island" in the middle of the community where Fulton's home is....I get a "king looking down upon the masses" vibe. I'm kidding...a little That said, those homes in the gated section are gorgeous.

You make several good points. Subs do all sorts of things, much depends on how they are paid and the quality of the craftsman the bosses hire. If it's piece work odds are they're going to bang it out as fast as humanly possible with little care to quality.
Thankfully I've had the experience of being around builders,project managers and subs and had a couple of friends who were framing subs who built houses for a tract builder. All of them told stories of how money is made in the tract home business and unless you see the house you're buying with the walls open you'll never see the shortcuts. Take studs for example, are they 2x4 or 2x6? Are they 12" on center,16",18" or varied? Are studs scabbed together? Dried wood or is there some green in there? Are the nails the appropriate distance apart (short nailing)? Is the subfloor glued and screwed or just nailed? Do you notice any "nail pops" in any of the models sheetrock? If you're seeing nail pops then they've used the cheaper method vs screws or a combo.
Some of this sounds funny but when you're building hundreds of houses and can save a box of screws or nails or anything for that matter per house it adds up pretty quick. Everything from blocking the trusses (putting blocks of wood between each truss tying it to the next one and the plate to stop movement) to properly setting the hurricane clips.
Fixtures,plumbing,lighting, I could go on and on about how corners can be cut including interestingly the corners themselves and how they are framed as you "could" save a board or two.
The best conversations I've had are with the finish carpenters. You've got no idea how angry they get as they're the last carpenter in the house and have to deal with (fix or hide) what all the other trades didn't do correctly like squaring up the corners,squaring the doors/windows or something as simple as setting the sheetrock properly etc.
The words "we'll let the finish guy deal with it" is really common from what I'm told.
It'd been asked what I meant by cutting corners, well here's some of what I meant. Again, it may look pretty with it's shiny granite and cherry cabinets but below that? In fact that reminds me of another true story. One of our friends lived in a very high end subdivision, beautiful houses and pricing to match. One day he was putting something away in the kitchen and the cabinet run fell off the wall on top of him. Seems they may not have hit enough studs when they put 'em up.

[Pink Jazz]

Just as a little update, according to this article:
Fulton Homes' sales spikeAZ Now Biz

Fulton Homes has sold 692 homes this year through December 16, an 46% increase from the 463 sold in 2011. Even with higher prices, Fulton Homes' sales remain strong. This includes 284 homes at Ironwood Crossing, 217 at Freeman Farms, 109 at Fulton Ranch, 25 at Ashcreek, 23 at Victoria Estates, and 34 at other communities (most likely includes Geneva Estates which sold out last spring as well as the new Fulton Estates in Prescott).

Therefore, to keep up with demand, the higher prices are justified.