STUART — It has been a bad week for a major national home builder trying to construct homes in Martin County.
On one hand, the Miami-based Lennar Homes Corp. gained a 3-1 approval from the Martin County Commission Tuesday to start building the last 86 townhouses of its 186-unit Whitemarsh Reserve development on Kanner Highway.
But the developer also decided to offer about 125 people full refunds on their Whitemarsh homes because of complaints that the builder did not notify them of a bridge and a park near their homes.
A Stuart real estate agent announced plans Tuesday to file complaints with state and federal agencies against Lennar alleging shoddy building. And the Martin County Commission made the company pay the county to landscape Kanner Highway in front of the development.
"This is not going to change our plans with respect to developments in Martin County," Lennar general counsel Mark Sustana said Tuesday, after all the developments unfolded before the county commission.
Mike Morgan, a Stuart real estate agent who bought one of the lots in Whitemarsh and said he has sold lots to 30 other people, has been asking the county to shut down Whitemarsh for weeks. Morgan claims the developer violated its agreement with the county when it failed to notify prospective buyers that a public park and the proposed site of the Indian Street Bridge are near their homes.
Martin County Attorney Stephen Fry said that, after he met with Lennar officials about those allegations on Monday, the company agreed to offer everyone who has agreed to buy Whitemarsh homes the option to back out of their contracts and get a full refund.
Morgan said he will take a $380,000 refund.
Sustana said the company did notify the residents about the park but did not about the bridge's proposed location. Most homeowners probably won't take the offer, Sustana said.
"We believe most people won't be bothered by the disclosures we were making," he said.
Morgan said he also hired a home inspector to examine three Lennar homes he was trying to resell for clients in another development on Kanner Highway called Martin's Crossing. The inspection reports claim defects in the roof, stucco siding and electrical wiring of the homes, which Morgan said could cause mold and deadly fires.
"Their subcontractors are using inferior products," Morgan said.
On Monday, Morgan launched a new Web site, www.defectivehomes.us, dedicated to getting complaints from Lennar homeowners from around the nation.
County Administrator Duncan Ballantyne said the county also would investigate Morgan's allegations.
Sustana said Morgan's inspections were done in the middle of the construction process, and Lennar's inspectors catch any problems before a home is done.
"He is making unfounded accusations," Sustana said. "I don't believe the quality of Lennar homes has changed at all."
County commissioners also required Lennar to give the county $20,000 toward landscaping the Kanner Highway median in front of Whitemarsh and give up 19 feet of back yards for nine homes to enlarge the buffer between the homes and highway. Commissioner Sarah Heard, who voted against the development, said the county should require Lennar to create an even larger buffer zone and also pay the full cost of building and maintaining a Kanner Highway median.
The developer did get some good news last week. County officials had shut down Whitemarsh after a county inspector said he thought Lennar was building on top of a wetland.
But Thursday, county officials determined that the wetland had not been harmed and lifted that hold, according to a letter from Growth Management Director Nicki Van Vonno.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/politics/content/local_news/epaper/2006/06/07/m1b_mclennar_0607.html
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