Thursday, June 14, 2012

Pulte, fraud and the FBI


http://www.woai.com/news/local/story/FBI-asked-to-evaluate-neighborhood-complaints/OnIDcSI98UWSyfniJRIVzQ.cspx

my comment:

"The crack in the slab and woman in the video say it all. Madam, I feel sorry for you; but, don’t feel bad—I have a civil engineering degree, and worked for more than 40 years in construction before I retired. I was a licensed professional engineer in 8 states and the District of Columbia. I, too, made the same mistake of entering into a contract with Pulte Homes to build me a house. More on that later.

Pulte says that they’re “fixing” houses in Fairhaven. How are they going to “fix” the crack in your slab? The fact is that they can’t. It’s like Humpty Dumpty—“all the king’s horses, and all the king’s men, couldn’t put Humpty together again”. Once unreinforced concrete cracks, like your slab did, there’s no “fixing” it. Build a house on a broken foundation, and you’ve got a broken house—forever.

Back to my story. My buddy and I both signed contracts with Pulte to build us houses. When I was in my buddy’s attic one day I saw valley trusses that I could have kicked off the main roof trusses. (This is in a coastal area where the building code requires that houses be capable of withstanding a 130 mph wind.) Needless to say, I was alarmed. Came to find out that Pulte had decided to substitute (2) nails for hurricane clips. The problem was, among other things, that most of the connections in my buddy’s house had either one nail or no nails. In the few that had two nails, many were driven in split wood. Others missed their target completely. Others were shorter than the specs called for.

When I entered into a contract with Pulte Homes to build my house, I expected them to build it to the normal standard of care. They didn’t. As a result, I am the victim of fraud, just like you are. In fact, MANY people have been defrauded by Pulte Homes. The problem is that they don't speak out publicly about the problem. As a result, how are unsuspecting folks (like us) supposed to know?

I hope that the FBI nails Pulte Homes (excuse the pun)."


Due to the word limit for comments, I was unable to mention defective stucco, leaking roofs, cracked slabs, poorly built SWM ponds, and other major defects at SCHH.

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