Builders

Talk about tough customers. Today's new homebuyers are a demanding bunch, and they're forcing builders to rethink floor plans, exterior designs, appliances and amenities.Buyers are tighter with their dollars, choosing products more carefully and planning to stay longer in their new homes, builders say. Following the last couple of years' trend of "bigger is better," families are now looking for more value for their dollars."I think people can afford more, but they are not extending themselves," said Wanda Cross, local marketing director for Ryland Homes, which sold 961 homes here last year, 10.3 percent of the Baltimore region's new-home sales.

ATLANTA - Homebuilders are recognizing a seldom-tapped market as the number of potential homeowners over the age of 55 continues to grow. The housing they build for this expanding niche won't be marketed under the moldy-sounding "senior housing" brand. Expect to hear more about the "universal" house, designed for aging baby boomers not ready to give up their active lifestyles. Within 30 years, the number of Americans over age 65 will top 70 million, said Horace Deets, AARP executive director, in a speech to the National Association of Home Builders Convention and International Builders Show.

G1440 has been building for builders. The Columbia-based Web engineering company, which makes custom applications for companies, launched its first commercial product last month. The application, Builder 1440, helps homebuilders manage their internal processes and their processes with customers. After agreements to link the application with a marketing company and a maker of software products for homebuilders were announced recently, Builder 1440 is poised for quick growth. "I would think that it would be an alternative product for builders of a lot of different sizes," said John Kortecamp, executive vice president of the Home Builders Association of Maryland.

G1440 has been building for builders. The Columbia-based Web engineering company, which makes custom applications for companies, launched its first commercial product last month. The application, Builder 1440, helps homebuilders manage their internal processes and their processes with customers. After agreements to link the application with a marketing company and a maker of software products for homebuilders were announced recently, Builder 1440 is poised for quick growth. "I would think that it would be an alternative product for builders of a lot of different sizes," said John Kortecamp, executive vice president of the Home Builders Association of Maryland.

HERE'S A NOVEL idea for builders such as the one suing Harford County, whose adequate facilities law prevents construction of homes near a crowded school: Build elsewhere.Sprawl will continue so long as developers push new housing into areas where the infrastructure isn't, rather than proposing projects for older areas where the need for reinvestment is most critical.You see this phenomenon repeated around the Baltimore region: Mini-mansions rise in Columbia's final village, River Hill, while older neighborhoods elsewhere in Columbia and along Howard County's U.S. 1 corridor battle perceptions of crime and grime.

For months, builders, legislators and bureaucrats had labored to build a foundation that would result in the first statewide bill to regulate homebuilders. Optimism was high that a consensus would be reached and consumers would have some recourse against rogue builders.But last week in Annapolis, House Bill 967, which would establish the Office of Home Builder Registration to license homebuilders, was attacked by builders who are seeking to bulldoze the bill into oblivion. They plan an encore Thursday on a similar bill, sponsored by Sen. Delores G. Kelley, a Baltimore County Democrat, when it comes before committee.

Builders should not be in the business of selling their creations, Robert J. Lucido says.That may seem like backward thinking. Where would builders be, after all, without buyers?Yet Lucido has built his career on just that premise, and builders have gladly taken the advice.Builder clients of the Columbia-based sales and marketing firm Builder's 1st Choice leave the selling of their homes to Lucido, whose business it is to know why some builders fail where others succeed.Most, he says, are simply too busy building to step back and consider the appeal of the two-story foyer or placement of the optional den.For five years, Lucido and his team of new-homes specialists have acted as extensions of dozens of area building companies, becoming their eyes and ears in a fiercely competitive marketplace, recruiting and training salespeople to staff model homes, and scoping out suitable building sites.

Consolidation has found a spot in the local homebuilding industry in response to land preservation initiatives and a heavy demand for housing. Some industry experts believe that consumers will benefit from the move, while others worry that consumers eventually could find their choices limited. Meanwhile, Maryland's smaller builders are looking for new ways to compete on a rapidly sloping playing field. During the past year, Miami-based Lennar Corp. acquired two of Maryland's leading builders -- Harford County's Barry Andrews Homes and Howard County's Patriot Homes -- as well as a title company, to secure its footing as a full-service operation.

Skyrocketing prices for building materials are putting the pinch on homebuilders and contractors, and consumers can expect to keep paying more for new houses and home improvement projects. Strong demand and a lagging supply of wood products are the principal reasons for a continued rise in prices, according to Random Lengths, a publication in Eugene, Ore., that tracks the lumber market. Steel prices also have increased, pushing up costs for nails and other items. Random Lengths' weekly market report says the framing lumber composite price, which tracks the prices of 15 key softwood lumber items, is up more than 30 percent over the past year, from $285 per 1,000 board feet last year to $371.

Auction signs sprout from manicured front yards of a row of new brick and stone townhouses in Columbia, signaling yet more foreclosures amid the collapse of the luxury housing market. n But in what some experts see as the latest wave of foreclosures to hit the Baltimore area, the homes' builder, rather than homebuyers, went into default. Two separate lenders have foreclosed on 35 of Dale Thompson Builders' unsold homes, building lots and unfinished houses in Columbia's Scot's Glen townhouse development.