KB Homes Falls Short for Its Owners

My husband and I recently moved to this area, and rented a home that was built by KB. On-line images of the homes make them look very attractive. But the truth is that a pretty facade does not a good home make. The new neighborhoods being built at breakneck speed in this area are put up very quickly. We’ve watched houses in this unfinished development be built in two to three weeks. They lure potential homeowners with pretty models, decked out in designer furnishings. The model homes in my neighborhood are lit up like Christmas trees and I can see the fancy furnishings and faux paint jobs when I walk past. But a model is a model – it has all the upgrades, and you get to walk through it for 30 minutes and look around.

Moving in is a different story. KB brags about their unique architecture and their high quality on their website. But I live inside one of these homes. Single pane windows, poorly aligned door jams, and crooked walls don’t speak of high quality to me. Garages with no entrance into the home, first floors with no closet space may qualify as unique architecture, but unique doesn’t mean functional. They didn’t smooth out the transition from sidewalk to road, so that there is a sizeable lip to drive over to pull your car into the garage. This causes most cars to bottom out coming in or out of the driveway, causing damage. This is a pretty big oversight that shouldn’t have happened.

KB Homes brags about “walking trails” in the neighborhood, and I see random sidewalks instead. I don’t see any trails. There is a public park, but it’s backed up to a construction site, and doesn’t seem to be a safe place for children to play. The landscaping is poorly constructed. Most of the yards are full of rocks, with a lawn front yard, and partially grassed back yard. These rocks lay on top of a layer of plastic, presumably to keep weeds from growing up. Anyone who has tried this trick knows that weeds will find a way. But water won’t. Backyards flood, sprinkler systems malfunction, and these landscaping rocks end up moving around in the wind and the rain, blocking fence gates, spilling into driveways, and leaving behind a visible plastic barrier, that is not pleasing to the eye.

What’s missing from these homes is functionality and longevity. The landscaping has essentially eroded. The floor plans have a lot of wasted space, and can be frustratingly nonfunctional. Many of the original home owners of this neighborhood have moved out – seeking better built homes elsewhere. All over the United State, KB homeowners are displeased with the workmanship and support they get from a KB Home. There are numerous lawsuits, many neighborhoods where realtors won’t even list a home if it was built by KB, and many neighborhood groups that picket the company, and have even protested their local government to intervene.

Somehow, by a very small margin, KB Homes actually has a quite high rating from JD Power and Associates. This baffles me. Live in a KB home for six months, and you’ll see what I mean. If you have a choice of where you buy your next home – skip the KB neighborhoods. You’ll notice empty homes – because the original owners moved out and couldn’t sell their home. Always talk to your potential neighbors before taking out a life altering loan to buy a home. You don’t get to take it back if you aren’t satisfied. So walk away from KB.