They sent a notice around Phillips Villas re my builder and the vent problem. Others with the same builder were checking to make sure they didn’t have a screen in their vents.

My concern is no construction company I know of builds a house faster. They go up almost as fast as army barracks went up during WWII.

Maybe Immissed it? The CONSTRUCTION PROBLEMS were ?

I was in the Army in 1960 and slept in WW11 Barracks. They seemed OK to me. What were the problems you saw with these Barracks?

Perhaps you can help others with your knowledge of construction times? How can you tell if a home is being built too quickly? Is there a formula?

Well, for one thing, the concrete needs time to cure.

When it comes to construction, cooking and intimate physical activity, faster is not better.

I was stationed at Ft. Jackson, SC in 1965. The barracks were terrible, uninsulated firetraps. Soft coal was burned to warm the shower water. Of course burning it seriously polluted the environment. We did morning pushups in a low lying cloud of coal smoke. If a man blew his nose into a handkerchief lots of black soot was deposited into the cloth. Ugh!

Freezing in the winter and sweltering in the summer. the barracks were not insulated, heated or cooled. It was a dump!

I can imagine how upset you were with these problems.
You would think a new house wouldn’t have so many
issues.

I hope all is okay now.

How long do the Villages Builders cure concrete for ?

Quote from Infantry Museum. “During the 1940s, Fort Benning rapidly expanded to meet the demands of the WWII military buildup. These “series 700” buildings were intended to last only as long as the war, but they proved to be so solidly constructed, they were kept in use well into the 1990s.”

Coal was the fuel used by most homes including the apartment building I lived in so I did not notice and difference and never blew black stuff from my nose although I did plenty of pushups. Someone was on Fire Duty every night shoveling coal so even if there was a fire I doubt anyone would be trapped.

One of the builders told me that some of the workers on the houses are paid on a piecemeal basis, not by the hour. That may explain why they go up so fast. Although, I am impressed with the overall quality of the construction as compared with other new construction I have seen.

If you talk to the people who are building your house, which we did, every day, they will tell you the same story. They have been with the builder (and there are many builder teams) for a long time. In our case with both the house in Hadley and the one we live in now, both builders had been with the Morses for many years. When we had the walk through on Hadley, I gave the builder our list, some caulking that was missing. Pole lamp not working, slider not moving easily and other things and in MINUTES there were teams there repairing things. We had an issue in the garage of a sagging platform under the water tank and it was fixed after seven years.

I doubt your assessment about "piecemeal payments". It is huge organization with very comfortable funding and it runs like a well oiled machine. On the day you commit to build, you are given a closing date, and if you don't come up with financing you will be fined. The reason is that each team is scheduled. The concrete, the framers, the electrical, the sprayers of the wood for termites, the inspectors, the drywall...etc. The materials are delivered the night before and the team is on duty next day early. We had sixteen men on the roof on one of the hottest days in July, from seven to seven... when they were roofing our home. They are built fast, but not sloppily. We are not new to building homes and we are more than satisfied.

Yeah, all is ok now. Thanks. What set me off yesterday was the same water leak (as told to my neighbor by the plumber) that had to be repaired twice during a short period of time. Still love The Villages, just didn’t expect all of these problems during the first fifteen months. Hopefully that’s it for a while. And no complaints about the warranty office. Although there was a bit of a problem coordinating the air conditioning guy (he provided the correct vent) and the roofer (he installed it). Eventually I got the builder to call me (I went through my Villages realtor) and he made it happen quickly.

One of the biggest reasons I did not buy a new home was not being able to be here during that all important first year when all the building issues show up. There is no way you can buy, go back North for a year, only coming down for short vacations and weekends and identify all the necessary repairs required. For the problems to show up, things need to be used on a daily basis.

If I was planning to be here full time during that all important first year then I might consider new, but if not if, I would only buy a few year old resale. And one that had a full time person living there.

Concrete sets in 24 to 48 hours. It cures in 28 days. After 48 hours and most likely less because of the heat the builders are correct to start framing and are doing no harm whatsoever to the slab.

The speed of a house being constructed has zero to do with the quality of the finished product. Constant supervision of the workers is the key to keeping the work from being shoddy. Just like any other employee, some builders will take shortcuts because time is money. Old world craftsmanship is finished or at least very rare.

Imagine this at the sales office. Sir, we can build your Patio Villa the way we normally do and it will cost $180,000 plus the bond or we can build it slower for $200,000. What would be the choice of most people? Habitat For Humanity has the world record....In December of 2002, the Shelby County, Alabama chapter of Habitat for Humanity shattered the world record for the fastest home construction when volunteers helped construct a three bedroom home in Montevallo in an astonishing time of three hours, 26 minutes, and 34 seconds.