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According to the 2006 New-Home Builder Customer Satisfaction Study, Centex was the highest-rated home builder among San Antonio buyers and Pulte Homes ranks highest in customer satisfaction in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. The study was published by Westlake Village, Calif.-based J.D. Power and Associates. .
City officials are concerned that a pond built to control runoff water could pose a structural threat to the nearly completed Lakeside 370 Business Park levee.
As a result, City Administrator Bill Charnisky is seeking authority to spend $252,000 to cope with the matter if no other solution is found soon.
The concern is whether sand was exposed during excavation for the pond, which is just outside the levee in the Mississippi River flood plain. If sand is exposed, water from a major flood could seep under the levee and weaken it, Charnisky said.
Trinity Products Inc. built the pond to hold rainwater runoff from its 45-acre plant site in St. Charles, just east of the Lakeside 370 levee.
Trinity's owner, Robert Griggs, said Friday that the pond had been built to proper specifications, adding that the project was under way months before levee construction began last year.
Construction of new homes has cooled to a one-year low, led by a pause in condos and apartments, in what one Canadian home builder described as a "lull" in the sector. That's not to say the domestic market is in for the same kind of slowdown seen in the United States. It's more that the fiery pace of construction in recent years is ebbing, economists said. Signs are already in the offing. Housing starts fell 2.4 per cent in September, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. said yesterday, countering economists' expectations for a gain. High-rise construction fell to a two-year low, although single starts rose for the second month in a row. .
PRINCESS ANNE -- The largest housing subdivision proposed for Somerset County -- worth a chunk in prospective property tax revenue -- was put on hold by a cautious Gemcraft Homes claiming prospective home buyer were slow to buy in a slumping national housing market. An apparently quiet pullout over the last few weeks caught county officials by surprise, and bewildered about Gemcraft's intentions for the 32.47-acre abandoned field next to Washington High School, Somerset attorney Kirk Simpkins is seeking answers, County Administrator Charles Massey said Friday. .
PORT ST. LUCIE The number of permits issued for new single-family homes in the city dropped last month to the lowest level since the building boom hit in 2002. The city issued 159 single-family permits in September, about 50 fewer than the amount issued in August and a 76 percent decrease from September 2005. Optimistic because of lower interest rates, a small increase in multifamily home construction and the selling of surplus homes, city officials are betting permits will level off in the next year to about 200 permits per month. .
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