Gulf Home Owners Face Shortage of Contractors, Materials

Of the estimated 9,000 Gulf Coast contractors who are members of NAHB, the number who were put out of commission by Hurricane Katrina is likely in the thousands and they are in no position to help with the rebuilding effort at this time. It took more than a decade to rebuild the homes in Florida that were destroyed by Hurricane Andrew in 1992, and Katrina destroyed 10 times as many homes. And even contractors who weren’t knocked out of business by the storm are having problems because many of their suppliers and workers lived in flooded parts of New Orleans, and the demand for the few workers left is skyrocketing. “Our builders say they are having trouble keeping their normal crews because people are literally buying them off job sites,” said Marty Milstead, executive vice president of the Home Builders Association of Mississippi. One Gulf Coast roofing company reported losing two of its crews in one day, he said. (http://www.ap.org/)
Associated Press Newswires (9/29/05); Michael Rubinkam

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BW 50: A New Blueprint at Pulte Homes

Richard J. Dugas, the chief executive of Pulte Homes, is pursuing a strategy of streamlining to increase his company’s U.S. market share of new home sales from 4% today to more than 10% within a decade. Plucking ideas from Toyota, Dugas is whittling the number of Pulte floor plans from 2,200 to 600 by the end of this year, keeping only those that have been popular across the country, and he is making upscale features standard in order to realize economies of scale. Using Wal-Mart as a model, instead of letting subcontractors buy materials and fixtures, Dugas is making the company’s supply chain more efficient by buying directly from manufacturers in bulk to get a better price. Steven C. Petruska, Pulte’s chief operating officer, estimates that offering home buyers fewer options and buying on a national scale will save the company 5%-10%. (www.businessweek.com)
BusinessWeek Online (10/3/05); Kathleen Kerwin)

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Developer to Pay $250K Fine for Wetland Destruction

Commercial developer Newdunn Associates — which in 2001 began developing 43 acres of land in Newport News, Va. without a federal wetlands permit — has agreed to restore 26 acres of the site that had been filled with dredge material and prepared for piping. The firm also agreed to pay $250,000, $150,000 of which is earmarked for the state’s environmental emergency cleanup fund and two environmental groups. In a lawsuit supported by NAHB, the National Association of Realtors® and the Real Estate Roundtable, Newdunn and two contractors asserted that the Army Corps of Engineers had overstepped its bounds because the federal government doesn’t have the authority to regulate wetlands that aren't near navigable waterways. The Newdunn site was nearly three miles from the nearest navigable waterway, the Warwick River. But the government asserted that the government’s regulatory authority also pertains to tributaries, and that water from the Newdunn wetlands runs into Stony Run, which eventually flows into the river. An initial decision favored Newdunn, but the Justice Department won an appeal and the Supreme Court allowed that decision to stand without hearing the case. (www.dailypress.com)
Newport Daily Press (9/30/05); Peter Dujardin

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Has Bubble Burst on Condo Investors? Yes, Maybe

Condo investors in Orlando, Fla. — generally first-timers who were banking on making big bucks in their condos — are having a difficult time renting out their units, according to industry insiders. Despite high demand and long waiting lists for rental units in the rapidly shrinking local apartment sector, some investors have been sitting on their mortgages for six or eight months without a single bite. Industry observers estimate that the occupancy rate for investor-owned condos is just 30%-40% because the owners are forced to charge rental rates far above market averages to cover their mortgages, association fees and rising tax bills. Some investors have started putting their units up on the auction block to get some sort of return. There are currently 15,000 apartments being converted into condos in the Orlando market, more than 5,300 new condo units have been proposed for downtown and there are nearly 12,000 condo-hotel units in the pipeline. (www.bizjournal.com)
Orlando Business Journal (9/26/05); Noelle C. Haner

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Wishful Thinking; From the Status Kitchen to the Trophy Garage, The NSO Stages a 2005 ‘It’ House

The 10,000-square-foot National Symphony Orchestra Decorators’ Show House this fall, located in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., hits many of the hot buttons of luxury living in today’s market, according to NAHB. These include: a spa bathroom spruced up with salmon marble tile floors, multi-head shower and his-and-her vanities; an outdoor kitchen with a polished chocolate-brown-and-white terrace around a built-in Wolf grill with outdoor rugs; a two-car garage and a separate one-car space, with a built-in storage system and nonskid locking-tile flooring in the double bay area; a laundry room with hand-painted walls and an old-fashioned farmhouse sink updated in Corian; and a maple-paneled library with bookcases backed with silk and an adjoining closet turned into a coffee bar. (www.washingtonpost.com)
Washington Post (9/29/05); Jura Koncius

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Renter Livability and Satisfaction Survey

Based on the results of data collected from users of ApartmentRatings.com on renter satisfaction and the affordability of average rents, along with data on local economic conditions from secondary sources, Raleigh, N.C. boasts the most livable rental market in the country, with a score of 91.17. In the remaining top 10 slots are: Ann Arbor, Mich.; Fort Wayne, Ind.; Grand Forks, Mich.; Kalamazoo, Mich.; Athens, Ga.; Lansing, Mich.; Sarasota/Bradenton, Fla.; Charleston, S.C.; and Salt Lake City. Out of 95 markets, Los Angeles/Long Beach placed last, preceded by Miami, Fla.; Oxnard, Ventura, Thousand Oaks, Calif.; Riverside, San Bernardino, Calif.; New Haven, Conn.; New York; San Diego; Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood, Fla.; and West Palm Beach/Boca Raton, Fla. (www.apartmentratings.com)
Apartment Ratings (9/22/05)

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