A number of Raleigh homeowners got less than they bargained for when they purchased homes in the John\u2019s Point & Ashworth subdivisions, and on Tuesday sought redress from City Council.<\/p>\n
Ashworth\u2019s developer, Centex, now Centex-Pulte, is alleged to have improperly installed a number of stormwater control devices, the repairs and renovations of for which the homeowner\u2019s association is now on the hook. DLM Developers, which was behind John\u2019s Pointe, went out of business before it finished paving about 7,200 linear feet of neighborhood streets.<\/p>\n
Michael Dydula, a civil engineer and member of the Ashworth Homeowners Association, told Councilors that the HOA had been receiving a number of violation notices from the city for various storm water issues.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s saying we\u2019re out of compliance, but a lot of storm water devices were never installed correctly from day one,\u201d Dydula said.<\/p>\n
While the HOA would be happy to pay for normal wear-and-tear related repairs and upgrades, he said, they should not be stuck with the bill for devices that never worked right in the first place. Attempts to reach an agreement with Centex-Pulte, Dydula said, were unsuccessful. Calls by the Record to Centex-Pulte were not returned in time for publication. <\/p>\n
Although there is money in an escrow account \u2013 about $350,000 \u2013 that could be used to make some the necessary fixes, Dydula said the lowest estimates for repairs come in at about $425,000.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re supposed to get that money back only if we\u2019re in compliance, but I don\u2019t know what we\u2019re supposed to be in compliance to,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Some Councilors expressed concern over the precedent that could be set by the city becoming involved in this particular case.<\/p>\n
Mayor McFarlane said these kinds of issues are not uncommon, acknowledging, \u201cWe have developers that leave substandard storm water devices.”<\/p>\n
The Council referred the case to the Public Works committee for further review.<\/p>\n
The residents of John\u2019s Pointe \u2013 more than a dozen of whom turned out at Tuesday\u2019s evening meeting \u2013 had been left with a different kind of problem, one for which they will be forced to bear the entire cost.<\/p>\n
As the developer had never installed the final one-inch layer of asphalt on several of the subdivision\u2019s streets, the city will now be undertaking the project \u2013 and sending the bill to property owners.<\/p>\n
One homeowner, Sumayyah Arrington, told the Council that the city should have better safeguards in place for homeowners so this type of incident does not happen again.<\/p>\n
Describing the ordeal she and others in the Southeast Raleigh neighborhood have endured, Arrington said, \u201cWe thought we were living the American Dream, but it\u2019s turning into a nightmare.\u201d<\/p>\n
Other residents said they felt as though they were being \u201cpunished\u201d for being homeowners, and that the taxes they pay should be enough to cover the roadwork, or at least earn them a discount on the repairs.<\/p>\n
Once the city has selected a contractor and the work has been completed, the cost will be assessed and charged as a lien against the property owners on a per lot basis. <\/p>\n
Councilors said this is less expensive than having the homeowners solicit a contractor to do the repairs on their own.<\/p>\n
Prior to the adoption of the ordinance allowing the city to manage such projects, there was little recourse to be had for so-called \u201corphan streets\u201d \u2013 private roads that are left unfinished by developers.<\/p>\n
Council voted to move forward with the John\u2019s Pointe improvements, with 100 percent of the costs, likely to be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, passed along to homeowners.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Two homeowners associations blame developers for expensive problems in different developments. In one, residents say a developer left behind numerous problems with stormwater and they should not be responsible for repairs required by the city. In the other subdivision, a developer never finished the streets and homeowners will likely have to pay the city hundreds of thousands of dollars for repairs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24061,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21733"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24061"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21733\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}