The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) recognized the lack of quality control in homebuilding
“There is no adequate monitoring mechanism to catch quality deficiencies before they get out of control… inspections alone do not necessarily equate with quality.”...Has the Quality of Homebuilding gotten any better since a January, 2003 Roundtable?

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) recognized the lack of quality control in homebuilding
“There is no adequate monitoring mechanism to catch quality deficiencies before they get out of control… inspections alone do not necessarily equate with quality.”

Has the Quality of Homebuilding gotten any better since a January, 2003 Roundtable? 

Excerpts from NAHB Roundtable:
Quality-Related Issues

Roundtable participants identified the following issues related to quality assurance in the home building industry:

1. There is uneven quality of construction.

Builders sometimes choose trade contractors based on whether they have insurance or the price of their work, not the quality of their work or the way they run their businesses. Trade contractors use inconsistent construction processes, making quality difficult to achieve for the builder.

2. Product and design failures have given rise to class action litigation.

Some possible reasons are: (a) products are not adequately tested; (b) there are inadequate installation requirements; (c) there are too many manufacturers who do not give training in the use of their products; and (d) many field installers are inadequately trained. Training that is given is often not documented or evaluated for effectiveness.

3. There are few effective quality assurance programs available to builders and trade contractors.

This has been a long-standing problem within the residential construction industry, which precipitated the development of the initial quality assurance programs at the NAHB Research Center. Currently, the most advanced is the NHQ Certified Trade Contractor program, and an NHQ Certified Builder program is being developed and piloted.

4. There is no clear roadmap for instituting a national quality assurance program.

Building and trade contractors do not recognize the risks they face by not using quality programs. There is a false confidence that building to the codes covers liability.

5. There is currently not a complete and widely accepted set of construction performance standards for use in a national quality assurance program.

Many builders and contractors believe that compliance with local building codes meets quality requirements. However, local building codes do not cover all aspects of housing, just health and safety considerations. While such a simple quality test as code compliance might be desirable, customers have gone to court and won against builders and trade contractors despite compliance with the code. There is an industry need for consistent new home building practices that will yield high-quality new construction results. Part of the problem may be state and regional differences

in codes and laws.

6. There is no adequate monitoring mechanism to catch quality deficiencies before they get out of control.

There is a general hesitancy by firms to publicly expose their own quality problems out of fear of litigation.

7. The multiplicity of parties in the construction process gives rise to finger-pointing when something goes wrong.

Few involved in the home building process will admit how their part in the process contributes to poor quality and what they might do to improve the situation.

8. Parties seek to shift the risks of construction defects to others without getting to underlying causes.

Some courts are unwilling to enforce full transfer of builder risk to trade contractors and are assigning a percentage of loss to the builder for such reasons as deficient contractor supervision and lack of quality guidance provided to the trade contractor.

9. Customers are not involved during the construction process, the post-settlement period, or the warranty period.

Customer expectations sometimes exceed builder performance due to lack of information on or understanding of how their home is built or how to maintain their home.

10. While there are many inspections in the construction process, inspections alone do not necessarily equate with quality.

There is widespread use of relatively unskilled labor in new home construction. Unfortunately there are few skills training programs widely available for industry workers to provide the necessary skills. While builders may have provided this training in the past when workers were in their direct employ, most work is now done by trade contractors rather than employees of the builder. Builders are not likely to provide training for independent trade contractors, in part because that training will also benefit other builders who use those contractors but do not fund training.

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