All insurance companies include coverage in your home owners policy for what they call Catestrophic Ground Collapse...ie when a major depression is visible and causes damage to your home to the extent a goverment authority declares it unfit to live in. Granted this type of problem is fairly rare but does exist.
The Sink Hole issue (cracking of foundation, drywall or improper closing of doors) is predominate all through out Florida, and its a nature of the subsoils ...This is not only a VIllages problem and its not simply a problem where you can say the builder did not compact the solil properly. You would be hard pressed to persue that legal angle given all the sinkholes all throughout florida. The fact that you have settlement due to "sinkhole activity" is not something you want to hear BUT it is not the end of the world...but granted I would rather NOt have this problem.
All sinkhole claims are different and there has been alot of insurance fraud associated with sinkhole claims that resulted in the homeowner getting full value of their policy and in return immediately sells the property back to the Sinkhole inspector for the value of the land. With little or no fixup, the Home is then rented out (hey the new landlord may have only paid 20K for this property) and is collecting $1500-2000 per month rent. This is why the insurance companies had to tighten up or eliminate sinkhole coverage entirely (NOT catestrophic ground cover collapse). BUt again this is for practically all of FLorida!!
Yes some people have developed a sinkhole issue but they are far and few compared to the approx 40K homes built in TV.....and to say this problem will result in people not wanting to buy in TV..(or all of Florida) is crying wolf. I certainly know many many more people who are enjoying their TV homes than those who have laid claim to a sinkhole problem.
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