The Quality of New Homes in Central Florida

Executive Summary:
In the first statistically valid study of new home quality, researchers inspected over 400 randomly selected single-family homes completed in Central Florida during 2001. Using an extensive checklist of quality attributes, researchers searched for defects on the interior, exterior and surrounding property of each house. Results were reported in a weeklong series of front-page articles in the Orlando Sentinel and simultaneously reported as lead stories by the local NBC television affiliate. Defects were categorized by severity as ‘priority problems’, ‘concerns’, and ‘worth noting’. Priority defects were believed to pose potential health, structural, operational, and safety risks. Concerns were easily noticeable and indicative of poor quality control. Defects worth noting were largely unsightly cosmetic problems. Among the root causes cited were pressures on large national builders to build too fast - 24,000 homes will be built in the Central Florida market in 2004. This pressure is passed along to local subs, staffed largely by an unskilled, immigrant labor force, who are unable to maintain the pace without sacrificing quality.

Technical Reports & Papers:
Link to WESH site (http://www.wesh.com/news/2595371/detail.html)

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