May 6th, 2008 by Michael Oliver

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Every buyer client I have ever taken on always asks the same question, “Which homebuilder builds the best quality?” I will try to explain the differences and quality issues as I see them. First off, unless you’re talking about a full-blown custom home, there’s not a significant difference in quality for most homes under $500k. The municipalities govern the homes being built through building codes and plan approvals. They ferret out a lot of bad building practices from the onset. However, the municipalities are not working for you, the customer, in any way. They are just making sure homebuilders are abiding by the ordinances and building codes. If they are, then they do nothing to point out better practices or the way something should be done but isn’t by the builder.

Ok, so now that we have covered that angle, which builder do I think builds the best homes? In order to compare, we first have to break the builders down into two categories: the national high production builders and the local builders. The national group includes builders such as KB Home, Pulte, Richmond American, and Meritage Homes. Local Tucson builders include AF Sterling, Pepper Viner Homes, Canoa, Miramonte Homes, and other smaller builders that build 50+ homes a year. For the local builders to compete, they have to build higher-priced semi-customer homes.

Among the national builders, in my opinion, you receive the best overall quality by purchasing a Pulte home, followed by Lennar and DR Horton. Why? Well, I see a lot of homes, and for the most part, it seems to me that Pulte tries the hardest to build a high quality home. While it is true that every builder — even Pulte — occasionally builds a horrible home, Pulte’s will generally be a little higher quality. As mentioned before, all the production builders build to essentially the same specifications. For some reason, KB Home seems to have unjustly acquired a bad reputation around Tucson. KB typically builds the most home for the buck (largest square footage for the money), and therefore a lot of builder’s sales reps have a hard time competing against a KB Home development. To try to counter this, they often say to potential buyers, “KB builds horrible homes! You would never want to buy that.” I have heard this repeated so many times when I take clients out to new home developments. It’s just crazy! Now to be honest, KB has built some horrible homes, just like every homebuilder in Tucson has. A company that has built thousands of homes over the past 5-10 years is bound to build some homes that just aren’t that good. I would rank KB Home’s overall quality as mid-range. They’re neither at the bottom nor at the top.

Ok, so what about the local builders that build more semi-custom homes? Most of these builders use 2×6 construction, which gives you somewhat thicker walls with thicker insulation. Large production builders typically use 2×4 to save costs. In addition, most of the local builders add flair to the homes with casita options and more dramatic elevations (the look of the outside of the home). From what I see myself and hear from clients, I would rank the local builders as follows. All things considered, AF Sterling is my pick in terms of quality. I have always liked AF Sterling, and think they will give you the best quality home at the end of the day. After AF Sterling, I would rank the local builders in this order: 1) Pepper Viner and Canoa, 2) TJ Bednar and Miramonte, and 3) Sierra Pacific. Please keep in mind, though, that buying from any of the lower-ranked builders does not mean you have to worry about your roof falling in.

Tell me what you think. If you have had a home built by a homebuilder, send us a comment about it. Or better yet, use the more detailed builder review form on the website and give us a review of your builder so other potential buyers can know what to expect. We don’t publish full names, so your identity will be kept confidential. Reviews we have already received are published on the individual builders’ pages within the New Construction section of the website.