New Home Construction - not what we expected

Maryland - We are currently having a house built in Howard County MD. When we walked through the model, the sales rep assured us that the quality we were looking at in the model is standard for all houses.

5 months later, we are 1 week away from settlement and there are major problems. We put together a huge list of the problems we found and submitted them to the builder. We were assured that all items on our list were "punch items" and they would all be fixed prior to the walk through.

4 days before the walk through, I get a call from the sales rep - most of the issues have been fixed, and the outstanding issues will be fixed prior to walk through. My fiancée and I go up to the house and we were not pleased at all with what we saw.

Just to give you a few examples. The wood cabinets in the kitchen have cracks at a few of the bases and are peeling - I want them replaced. Instead, to fix the cracks and peels, they glued a piece of shoe molding on (and it is crooked) to cover up the cracks. Is that acceptable???

Another example - we paid for oak hardwood floors in the kitchen - just underneath of the dishwasher - there is one plank of wood that is totally a different shade - it looks like pine - and it is visible. They refuse to fix it - they say we are being unreasonable. I could go on and on - our list is 5 pages long.

We have hired an independent inspector to come and do a walk through prior to our official walk through. My questions:

If the quality of our house does not match the quality of what we were shown when we signed the papers - what are our options?

My friend suggested that we go to closing as planned - but leave money in escrow until they fix everything - can we do that?

Is the builder obligated to make all fixes received from us and the independent contractor - or can he pick and chose?

If we decided that what we are getting is not up to our quality (and the quality that the sales rep assured us we would get) can we back out? And if we back out - are they obligated to give us our down payment back (they have over $20,000)? We are spending a lot of money and want to be satisfied with what we are purchasing!!

Thanks,

[HomeGuru]

You can do all those things.


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