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Builder's tactics browbeat home buyers

By JAMES THORNER
Published February 20, 2005

Anyone who has looked to build a new home in this area knows the seller is king these days. But that doesn't mean the seller should rap humble home buyers over the head with his scepter.

For chutzpah you can't beat Transeastern Homes, the Coral Springs builder behind Live Oak Preserve, 1,300 acres south of the Pasco County line on Bruce B. Downs Boulevard in New Tampa.

My family and I have browsed model homes in at least a dozen neighborhoods. In almost every case we simply walked through the front office, picked up a price sheet from courteous salespeople and enjoyed the tour.

Not so with Transeastern's Live Oak Preserve. Getting access to the models last weekend was like begging permission to enter a blessed stucco sanctuary.

Not only did you have to fill out a form on a computer, you had to scan your Florida driver's license into the machine. For "insurance purposes," of course. Name, rank, serial number and yearly income, if you please.

When I objected to the invasion of privacy, the salespeople were content to let me take a hike. Why should they care? Live Oak sold about 700 homes last year.

If people are willing to wallow on Live Oak's waiting list, why should salespeople fuss with a guy defensive about his driver's license?

As I left, I made a quip about having to give my blood type before seeing a model, a gibe not appreciated by a snickering saleswoman at the front desk.

Transeastern is establishing a reputation for high-pressure sales tactics. Live Oak's grand entrance into the market began with a buffet dinner at Wesley Chapel's Saddlebrook Resort in 2003.

Potential buyers paid $1,000, which bought them 30 minutes face time with a sales agent. If a person failed to close on a lot in that half hour, he had to hang dog it back to the end of the line. The $1,000 was refundable.

You're risking $200,000 on a new house, and they're sending you to the back of the line as if you're a naughty schoolkid.

Transeastern applied similar techniques in Orlando, the New York Times reported last week. The newspaper said some buyers had little idea where their lot would be and how much their house would cost. Amazingly, they still plunked down deposits.

Turning up the dial on the pressure cooker, Transeastern set up loudspeakers in the Orlando sales center to announce price increases -- up to 16 a day -- leaving the impression you'd soon be priced out of the market.

"Even if they weren't planning on buying a home, they convince themselves to buy a home," a Transeastern executive told the New York Times.

Clearly it's not all the builders' fault. Buyers are feeding the sales frenzy. The market is tight with inventory of lots hovering at low levels in the Tampa Bay area.

Mortgage rates are a bargain. Speculators nab houses as investment property, further constricting the market. Some feel they have to buy now or forever hold their peace.

And new home builders aren't the only ones with big fat dollar signs in their eyes.

A family down the street from me in Land O'Lakes decided its 1,800-square-foot, swinging '70s-style, old roofed single-story was worth a ransom of $275,000.

The house almost could have belonged to the Brady Bunch, assuming the TV family hadn't made a major repair since Greg Brady ditched the room he shared with his brothers for the attic.

This in a neighborhood where homes are selling for a bit more than $100 a square foot, or about $190,000 in the case of this house. The family recently hired a Realtor, who should bring the price back down to earth.

And while I'm tweaking Transeastern, it's only fair to say it was the only builder from which I recoiled on my tour of model homes.

Most salespeople were helpful, nonpushy and aboveboard. Transeastern could borrow some tips from the Lennar Homes guy who explained home features in detail without turning the thumb screws.

Or the Beazer Homes sales rep who personally escorted me to an out-of-the-way model home under construction, letting me tour the barren shell so I could size up the layout.

You see, just because you're holding all the cards in a hot market doesn't mean you have to scoop up the whole pot before the game is finished.

[Last modified February 19, 2005, 08:08:05]