FED UP!

I haven't  blogged in a while and unfortunately, this isn't a loving review of my current situation.....

It’s actually sad to feel this way but after trying time after time to overlook and hope things get better…but NO!  Things have not gotten better and the more time goes on, the more those “Ryan Home Myths” seem to be our reality.

We have been in our home for a little over 1 year. We closed on February 20, 2015 and today is May 9, 2016…

From our poor project manager who came off as a cheap used car salesman only trying to hit a quota to our sad excuse of a NEW HOUSE…I would say NEW HOME, but it doesn’t feel like a home.  It feels like that house on Money Pit...

From day one we have had issues.  Our banisters on our stairs were the wrong color.  He pulls another set from the storage container that are supposed to be close to our stain…better yet he claims they are new.  I mentioned how bad the banisters felt and was told that’s just a product of the material. The finishing’s are not done right they have cracks and chips, but yet again we are just supposed to accept it because that’s how it is.  You know what I think- he had an extra banister laying around from another mix-up so let’s try to pull one over on the new homeowners. As long as he gets his 10’s on his survey everything will get fixed…yeah right…

Next issue…flooring…we have the carpet in the entire upstairs minus the bathrooms and laundry area. Downstairs we have vinyl and carpet.  We have questioned the flooring since the framing stage.  When we noticed nails in the subfloor were not actually in the studs we were told “Oh that’s normal.  That’s why we screw and glue the floors as well”.  From week 1 we have had issues with the floor.  At the top of the stairs we had a crown in the hall between bedroom 2 &3.  Workers came and pulled the carpet up brought in a new piece of plywood and sander to try and fix the area.  The crown is gone but now it’s like a depression…I know it may seem like I’m complaining but as a public school teacher I took a huge risk to go with Ryan Homes and trusted them with my savings and my families future with this investment. 

Our floors to this day are not right…we have pops and creaking in almost every room.  The kitchen, and upstairs bathrooms are the worse.  You can almost bounce on the floors and hear them pop and squeak.  My house sounds like a 100 year old home, yet it’s not even two years old.  The service manager and his team have tried and tried to fix our floors.  They have been in the crawl space trying to shim the joist, they have cut holes in my ceilings trying to fix squeaks upstairs. These guys have put in countless hours trying to get it right…but you know what even they are puzzled as to why our floors are so bad.  I can tell you why…poor project managing…they sub contract out to the cheapest bidder in certain areas and they are trying to meet deadlines as opposed to building quality homes.   

We are so fed up we wish we could just give the home back and move.  I really wish the CEO or COO would come walk my home and tell me that this is an acceptable Ryan Home finished product.  We’ve even been told “we don’t promise you a squeak free home”.  Well you know what a few squeaks might have been ok.  However, it’s quite embarrassing to have people over and when they walk around your NEW HOUSE they stop and ask is everything ok?  Is it ok to walk over here?  It’s just sad and extremely frustrating to put your trust in people and they constantly fail you. We are past our one year walk-thru and our floors are still horrible.   Seams from previous repairs are undone.  Floors still popping, squeaking, cracking…..it’s bad.

What’s next?

Drywall.  So after your first year you get a courtesy drywall repair for nail pops, cracks, bulges etc.  Well let’s just say ours didn’t go well.  Our Naples is 3011sqft…we asked on the day of our walk through would they be sending a crew or just one person.  We were told they would send a crew.  Well they sent one guy and his female assistant.  Neither spoke fluent English, so trying to explain or address our issues wasn’t easy because of the language barrier.  To speed this up…they did NOTHING to repair nail pops.  They scrapped over it and then added putty.  After the putty dried they sanded certain areas and then attempted to paint.  Needless to say after arriving at 8 it was approaching 6:30 and they weren’t close to being done.  But here is the main problem…they used the wrong paint on our home and so therefore it looks like someone played Tetris on our walls and ceiling.  They also left a HUGE mess and missed several spots.   There’s more but honestly I’m just tired of it…Thankfully, the service manager came two days later and was appalled.  He had our house cleaned (which was amazing) and is sending a new TEAM to come work on our drywall.  Hopefully this TEAM doesn’t leave their trash behind for me to clean, they actually REPAIR the nail pops, and they use the correct paint. 

 

Here is the ceiling in my daughters room....See all the paint squares?

 

Some of the spots they missed the first time around.

 

Lastly because honestly I’m just sad and frustrated…yesterday I noticed a stream of water running between my house and the neighbors.  So after looking into I find that a pipe is leaking under my home in the crawl space.  Leaking is an understatement…..Of course I’m worried it’s not covered but plumbing is covered for two years.  I read the manual over and over before calling.  I even had my husband read it when he came home.  All of this to be told oh no it’s not covered by the plumber and Ryan Homes.  The plumber says you must pay $95/hr to get the work done.  I was furious so I called back to Ryan Homes customer service and the gentleman proceeds to try and find any and every way to not cover the repair.  I point out the pages in the homeowner manual where it says it covered.  He puts me on hold to try and find the exclusions.  Then he says he has to call me back so he can go and check somewhere else to prove me wrong.  Thanks again Ryan Homes. Way to make me feel appreciated. NOPE you’re still up to the same tricks…get your money, get through your first year and then kick us to the curb.  The customer service guy calls back 10 minutes later….yeah I can’t find anything to dispute your argument…Really, so I would lie or make this all up?

Dear RYAN HOMES…I really hope you fix your practices and I really hope you fix your customers service. Most of all I really hope you fix our issues!  I really hope you start making your customers feel appreciated and thankful they chose you. Because right now I DON’T.  SAD, MAD, AND FED UP!

30 days in.....

We had our 30 day inspection and overall I'm very pleased.  We had a very long list of things that needed to be addressed....some of which were on our list of things before closing. 

The carpet in our bedroom needed some work.  We could see the carpet pad at the edge of the carpet.  This was fixed today and looks much better.

The rails to our steps were replaced today.  We had a mini walk-thru before our official new home orientation.  During this time we noticed our rails were not the correct color.  They attempted to re-stain them and they just did not look good.  I'm very happy that our PM suggested that they be replaced.  They look wonderful now!

There was a hump in the landing at the top of the stairs.  They had the framers come back to repair this.  This was a very loud repair, lol. 

Our microwave has been a collector of drywall dust.  I'm positive that I've cleaned the microwave more than any other item in this house.  Every time we open it, there is dust.  I clean it and more dust.  So today they took out the microwave and found dust on top of it.  They cleaned it off and vacuumed behind the microwave and hopefully we won't have any more dust.

We had the crown moulding on one of our cabinets repaired.  During this, we discovered a hole.  Not too happy about that, but it was covered with the moulding.  I just think that some sort of patching should have happened before the moulding was put on, but that's just my opinion.   It was patched today so we are happy.

There were some other minor things like trim and paint and a tiny piece of tile, but nothing else major. 

In a couple of weeks there will be some more repairs.....

We have a crack in one of our cabinets.  Nothing huge, but its a crack.  Our PM has to order the cabinet and it will be installed along with the other repairs.

Our back yard looks pretty bad.  I know that Ryan isn't going to seed our entire lot, but we currently have nothing but mud and rocks.  Our PM is going to have the landscaper come back and rake the lot and put down new seed.  Hopefully we will have some grass in the upcoming weeks.

The exterior will be taken care of....it definitely needs some TLC.   There will be some painting and caulking and power washing.  It will definitely look nice when they are done.  The winter weather is to blame for this!

Overall our 30 day went well.  Our PM addressed every.single.item we pointed out.  He answered every question and we are very pleased with all the repairs.  I love our house!

Now for the fun stuff.  I'm definitely happy with the progress of our house.  We are down to very few boxes and are getting settled in quite nicely.   Hopefully we will get some curtains up soon!  We are trying to use a lot of the things we already had.  Of course I've purchased some new items and will purchase more at some point, but I'm trying to be thrifty.  We have a lot more space to decorate and we are on a budget.  I'm trying really hard to do one room at a time, but it's not working out so well for me, lol.  Here are some progress pictures....from my cell phone.

Dining room

 

Living room

Daughters room

 

Master Bedroom

 

Son's Bedroom

 

Kids bathroom

 

 

 

My picture wall....I'm very proud of this!

 

 

 

Fun with Flooring!

We finally had our flooring appointment.  This was something that I was really excited about.   I had been talking to the flooring representative in advance so I could get an idea of the cost.  I didn't want to get there and blow our budget.

 A lot of people put hardwood in their houses because it is durable and it looks beautiful.  I love the look of hardwood floors but definitely do not love the price tag that comes along with them.  Also, after our experience with the hardwood in our current house, we knew we didn't want them in our new house.  So this left us with some limited options…..Vinyl, carpet, and tile. 

I know a lot of people turn their nose up to vinyl....I know this because I was one of those people, but vinyl has come a very long way and there are a lot of nice options out there.  So we upgraded our vinyl flooring to one that looks like hardwood.  With two young children and a dog we needed something with easy cleanup!  We also had to get permission for a non-standard….putting the wood like vinyl in our living room and dining room.  Who thought that putting carpet in a dining room was a good idea?!?!?  Food and carpet do not mix!    We did upgrade the carpet and pad in the family room which will be a high traffic area.  We decided to stick with the standard carpet and pad for upstairs. One day we will change it, but it will do for now.   We put ivory ceramic tile in our master bath….nothing fancy. 

Here are some pictures of our selections. 

The vinyl flooring with our St. Celia granite and Maple Cognac Cabinet

Bathroom vinyl and cabinets.  The master and guest bathroom will have the same stuff. 

Everything all together

Handrail will match the vinyl.