Pre-Settlement Meeting (and don't listen to all those complaints)!

We had our pre-settlement meeting last week and everything went great. There were just a few minor things we pointed out that our PM marked to be "cleaned up". There was a scratch on the kitchen floor so he will be replacing that board before we move. The day before our meeting I took my parents to see the home and we had noticed a puddle right beside the basement door. It was just about gone the next day and our PM is almost certain it was from the door being left open when the sprinkler was running but he is going to keep an eye on it. He also said it would be  very rare for a walk out basement to leak and even more so for a RH walk out basement to leak....especially with our grading (you really couldn't ask for anything better than what we got...so blessed about that as the yard is the main reason we wanted a single family home).

We are very excited but it also hit us all the work we will have to keep track of (mainly with the lawn and just general maintenance). We've never had a lawn before so it will be new to both of us. We had no idea the work involved for new sod but we are going to love it. Some of the trees already looked "distressed" but that will be part of what the HOA's is in charge of so we don't have to worry with that. We did confirm  that we will have to maintain all the other landscaping (we weren't sure if the landscaping "upgrade" package included maintenance as well. It does not but we didn't think it did so that is fine).

I also want to say that we have been very impressed with our PM thus far and RH's in general. When searching for a new builder we saw  A LOT of complaints about Ryan Homes. Well, I think they were paying attention tho those complaints. They seemed to have put so many  new policies into place now and have stopped using many materials they use to use. We were also told that they now have to do a mold inspection almost 5 times before Settlement and that there is an entire regiment in place if mold is very to be found (which rarely is at this stage). We had never heard complaints about mold from Ryan home owners  but we do know 2 personal stories about mold in other new homes (Toll Brothers and Pulte) so it was a worry of ours since I'm highly allergic to any mold / mild dew.

Another thing to keep in mind about those complaints is that it really depends on the PM and who they decide to subcontract with. I found out today that one of my coworkers use to work for Ryan Homes. According to her Northern Virginia has (or at least had when she was working there) the highest customer service rate compared to the other areas RH's builds at. So when reading the complaints pay close attention to WHERE  (state and region) they are coming from. When considering buying any new construction home do some research on the PM first. We actually asked him right off the bat what his credentials were and which community he worked for before this. We were shocked at how much experience he had. We even knew some people in his old community so we asked how they liked him and we heard nothing but praise. If you notice a community is going through a lot of PM's that are not sticking around long that may be a red flag.