I attended a day long workshop on the development of the warranty standards and I can tell you they are EXTREMELY limited. Yes the state can brag about having state wide warranties for the first time, but they should be ashamed to have such limitations.
As an example of what is not covered:
Cracks in the walls
Cracks in the bricks
Tile coming off the floor after the 1st year
Hardwood floors buckling after the 1st year.
As the homeowners often find out, these warranties are not insurance, and are not what they’re advertised to be. Typical exclusions from coverage include code violations and any materials not installed per plans or instructions. That means many of the most common shortcuts/defects in construction won’t be covered. Plus, the policies almost always hold the homeowner to mandatory binding arbitration, often with an arbitration firm that’s in the construction/warranty industry’s hip pocket. One of these “infamous” arbitration firms is in TX and is run by a dibarred attorney. It was the subject of an investigation by citizen.org in 2004 and is still on the site.
We have updated our privacy policy to be more clear and meet the new requirements of the GDPR. By continuing to use our site, you accept our revised Privacy Policy.
I attended a day long workshop on the development of the warranty standards and I can tell you they are EXTREMELY limited. Yes the state can brag about having state wide warranties for the first time, but they should be ashamed to have such limitations.
As an example of what is not covered:
Cracks in the walls
Cracks in the bricks
Tile coming off the floor after the 1st year
Hardwood floors buckling after the 1st year.
This is just a sample of the problems. For a detailed evaluation of the standards see http://www.hadd.com/documents/warrantyreview.pdf
John Cobarruvias
Homeowners Against Deficient Dwellings Texas
As the homeowners often find out, these warranties are not insurance, and are not what they’re advertised to be. Typical exclusions from coverage include code violations and any materials not installed per plans or instructions. That means many of the most common shortcuts/defects in construction won’t be covered. Plus, the policies almost always hold the homeowner to mandatory binding arbitration, often with an arbitration firm that’s in the construction/warranty industry’s hip pocket. One of these “infamous” arbitration firms is in TX and is run by a dibarred attorney. It was the subject of an investigation by citizen.org in 2004 and is still on the site.