The biggest investment of your life, your new home, comes with the least amount of consumer protection and when you have a construction defect no one in this state will come to your assistance .

When a new home buyer has a defect the last recourse they seek is the advice of an attorney. Unfortunately they learn there is no city, county or state organization that will assist them in their dispute resolution. Calls on the Texas Attorney Generals office results in a recommendation to consult an attorney. Calls on our elected officials results in the same response. Where does a homeowner go when they would rather have the defects resolved without requiring an attorney?

The new home warranties provided by Texas Builders are extremely limited offering more protection for the builder than the homeowner. Many owners are shocked that foundation damage is not necessarily covered during any part of the 10 year warranty. And most coverage concludes after the 1st year. Because of this limited protection new homeowners must do what is possible to avoid a defect in a new home.

When a builder decides to be irresponsible or incapable of repairing a defect in a new home, there is no state level organization which will sanction or police the builder. Texas home builders are not licensed, regulated, registered, or monitored. Anyone can be a builder by simply building a home. The industry has been allowed to police themselves and it has failed. The home building industry must be held accountable when they are irresponsible or incompetent or else we will experience another Enron event with home buyers losing their financial investments. This is a sad situation for a state that invented the word "responsibility".

New home builders demand mandatory binding arbitration to resolve all construction defects instead of our Constitutional right to a civil trial. The vast majority of Texas builders require a pre dispute arbitration clause as a prerequisite to purchasing a new home. Contrary to popular belief, arbitration is extremely costly and grossly unfair to the consumer. Consumers have been led to believe arbitration is faster and less expensive and just as fair as our time honored civil court system. Only when the home buyer is faced with an overwhelming expensive defect and an irresponsible builder, do they realize how  unregulated, unmonitored, and completely out of control the arbitration process is.

Arbitration guarantees only two things, the builder will be protected and the owner will be screwed.