San Antonio Home Builders: An Open Letter

By rerockstar • January 26th, 2010

Let’s talk about this.

As we’ve all been watching the San Antonio “sinkhole” (aka “slope failure“), my thoughts have turned to San Antonio home builders and our relationships with them. I personally have written posts and shot photos of Centex Homes’ Hills of Rivermist and liked what I saw. Of course, there was a ticking time bomb waiting to shock us all. While covering the story, I’ve read all sorts of theories and ideas of why and how this could happen and I’ll do my best to avoid speculation and await all the engineering reports and news.

Instead, I would like to speak to the builders in San Antonio, especially the larger production builders. While I doubt my letter here will have much impact on corporate policy of national home builders, I hope a few will read it and give it just a second’s thought. Perhaps we can move to a better building policy in the future, but as I’ve learned, change can come slowly to companies of this size. I hope it comes soon.

Dear San Antonio Home Builders

Hi, it’s me Matt Stigliano, Realtor® with RE/MAX Access. Some of you know me and we’ve had the pleasure of working together, some I’ve met at various functions, and some I have yet to cross paths with. Although the whole “slope failure” occurred in a Centex Homes community, I think we should all watch this situation carefully. How would you respond to your homeowners if this happened in your subdivision? What can we all learn about community, building, and helping residents in times of need?

Centex Homes stepped up and offered to pay for hotels for those affected and the city of San Antonio seemed to react to the situation well, setting up a shelter and emergency neighborhood meetings. Of course, I’ve only seen this from the sidelines, so I’ll be curious to see how the residents feel about it once they’ve had time to sort out the mess that this has created for them. I hope Centex (Pulte Homes) continues to be supportive and help these homeowners, one of which had just moved in three months ago. Imagine that, three months in your new home and you look out the window to see your backyard sliding down the hill.

Look, I realize you’re a for-profit business and you have goals to meet. Home sales have been slow and you’re all not performing as well as you’d like to be financially. Many of the San Antonio home builders also built in some of the areas of the country hardest hit by the housing market, so I can imagine it hasn’t been a joyous ride for you from a business standpoint.

When things go wrong in the building industry, there are a few fingers that get pointed fast. As the home builder you’re going to be at top the list. Whether the landslide was caused by your building practices or not, it won’t matter. Public opinion will probably be against you and things are probably going to get ugly. It won’t be easy, but we’ll need to let cooler heads prevail. These homeowners are watching their lives – memories, material possessions, and their shelter slide down a hill. Imagine how you would feel. I can’t even begin to imagine the gut wrenching frustration, anger, and sadness that they’re feeling. But try anyway. Do your best to connect with those people. You’re handling of this matter will make or break you in San Antonio. Although you’ll carefully craft each and every statement to the public, I propose you talk to them openly and honestly – don’t just read press releases, but talk to these people as if they were your friends. They ought to be, they put food on your table.

Compensate these homeowners. We give money to charities everyday (as most corporations do), but these are people in our communities who came to you with confidence in your homes, don’t break that trust – even if the cause is not yours. What if the “slope failure” wasn’t caused by anything you may have done, you should compensate these people as quickly as possible. Do it without thinking. Those people will appreciate it and spread the word of how you weren’t a giant, evil corporation full of greed and an uncaring attitude towards those that buy their homes. It’s going to cost you. It’s going to cost you a lot. A bad reputation in San Antonio as a bad home builder will cost you much more down the line. Trust me, word moves quickly among San Antonio home buyers about builder’s reputations.

Take a look at what went wrong when the engineers figure it all out and fix it. Don’t let it happen again. This should be rather obvious I guess, but somehow I feel the need to say it.

Although, we don’t know the reasons yet, I would like to speak to you on the policy of clear cutting the land before building. Some theories floating around out there have called this the problem. I know this is easier and I assume more cost effective than working around native trees, but we are loosing trees at an alarming rate in San Antonio. Yes, I know you plant new ones, but what looks better and serves a greater function; a six foot tree that’s still so fragile it has to be held up by stakes or a native tree that’s been around for years or decades? We really need to change this clear cut system, it’s not good for the land and frankly, it makes for an ugly subdivision.

As large production home builders with a national presence, I realize that you may not live and work here. Remember though, you employ and provide work to our local San Antonio residents. The sales reps, the sub contractors, the Realtors®, lenders, title companies – the list is long. You also provide direct injections of cash into our communities, whether through the activities of those people or the money you spend on land, taxes, permits, building materials, etc. If you don’t react to a situation like this quickly and San Antonio decides they don’t like you as a builder, which causes you to pull out of our city and sell off your lots and land…well, imagine the financial impact you would have on us. We all know that as the housing crisis grew, you helped deepen it (not your fault); by having to make cuts, pull back on projects, start less new homes, and hire less people. San Antonio home builders are a huge part of our local community and we do not want to lose you.

So please, whether you’re invested in this recent disaster or not, stop and think what you can do for the community and what something like this could do to both your bottom line and the city of San Antonio. We need each other more than we care to admit and I’d hate to see any of you go. Together we can continue building a beautiful city that I’m proud to call my home.

photo courtesy of stangls