Pulte Homes Reviews

NICE HOME BUT NOT VERY GOOD AFTER MOVE IN CUSTOMER SERVICE. THEY SAY THEY WILL HANDLE THINGS, BUT THEN YOU GET IGNORED

The people were great to deal with.

Quality of the materials is very very low class!!

I purchased a new-construction unit in South Village because of the great location and pretty, modern exterior. However, the overall buying experience and quality of the interior of the home are sub-par. Starting with the sales experience, it appears there are communication issues with Sales and the construction team. Many times, I made decisions on finishes with my Sales Rep only to find they were completely ignored by the construction team. For instance, I chose a tiled shower and one weekend I came to visit the house and a plastic molding one had been installed instead. Secondly, my Sales Rep tried to change things we agreed upon. We agreed upon hardwood treads on all the stairs, and at the last minute he said the top floor staircase was going to be carpet. I had to argue with him to get him to honor what we agreed upon. Luckily, my real estate had it written down in her meeting notes so I was able to leverage that. The construction team also does not provide timely updates and the updates they do give are wrong. You are left in the dark wondering what is being done. Lastly, the workmanship is below average. Starting with the garage. They did not let the concrete dry properly which caused it crack. They pulled it up and filled in the cracks with a very noticeable caulking agent. It magnified the cracks 10X and now looks horrible. I tried to get them to fix it properly as this was not how any of the other garages were but they refused. I am now left with huge ugly cracks in a brand-new garage. In the interior, they stained the staircase with a stain that does not match the hardwood. There are paint splatters all throughout the steps and places where they dropped paint and rubbed it off. They walked on the stairs after they put the finish and you can see footprints throughout. I had hardwood companies come look at it and they all said it was a poor quality job. Even the original painter came in to look after I filed a warranty claim and admitted it was done very poorly. Still they are only offering a touch-up job instead of re-doing and making it right like they should have the first time! The paint job was shoddy too. There are touch-up spots everywhere. Paint on the lighting fixtures. Even the electrical outlets were done in a sloppy way. They put the fan first then the light switch as the second one in the bathroom. You have to push down instead of up for the light to come on. Overall, it seems like they place very little emphasis on customer experience and quality control. They know the area they are selling in sells itself so their attitude is take it or leave it. At least that is how they treated me when I almost walked away because of the garage issue. I would not recommend buying from this company unless you are comfortable paying for a lot of contractor work to fix the mistakes they would not. I have to get my garage re-done, stairs re-stained, interior repainted all to get to a decent standard. This should not be the case on a brand new-home! ... More

We were not pleased with out sales agent at times. Sometimes it seemed she put her own interests or that of Pulte before our interests as homebuyers. We wished that we had used a realtor of our own or that she had encouraged us to read the contract before we signed or be more prudent about unnecessary upgrades, etc. The builders were polite and competent. They were eager to exceed out expectations and offered extras to make sure we were pleased. Some of the issues we had with buying our new home had nothing to do with Pulte, but with selling our former home and the closing process and also the mortgage approval process which was arduous. Overall, we are happy with our new home and wouldn't buy form any other homebuilder but Pulte. This is our 2nd Pulte home. ... More

I bought a brand new house from Pulte Homes in October 2020. I closed on the house & began moving in. However, there are a SIGNIFICANT # of problems w/ the house. One of the closet door knobs is missing. I have a water leak. One of the toilets was not properly installed. The carpet had a large # of nails sticking up. There was a lot of construction debris in the backyard. The garage door is really loud while opening or closing. There are at least 1 dozen other issues. These things should not be happening, especially w/ a brand new house.

After getting our home inspection report, all of our issues were fixed or repaired.

Complete nightmare! From poor materials to inexperience, cheap contractors. Add that with zero quality control and you get a poorly built house. Pulte's only goal is to get your money then forget about you. They rushed us through the closing process, (still had blue tape after we closed) rush the construction process at the last minute. Get you to close then refuse to come back and fix anything. We have been in out home for 4 months and have beet met with unanswered emails and phone calls. Pulte and everyone who works for Pulte is unprofessional and in way over their heads. An overall terrible experience with Pulte. ... More

Although customizations are not an option outside of the available upgrade options (the negative for our situation), the build quality and workmanship is not far off from high end builder quality (the positive). This is our 2nd Pulte home. We had spent the last 2 years looking to move to a better location for our family situation. We looked at many existing homes and competitive builders, but ultimately ended up picking Pulte for their ideal home layout options, high efficiency standards, and quality (as seen in our last Pulte home and our current home. I have not uncovered "cutting corners" as seen by other spec builders). Post closing responsiveness to issues could see improvement. ... More

We recently closed on our home and love the house however I'm not sure how to rate it just yet as there are some concerns with our home that we are waiting on to be addressed by the warranty department. Our agent was nice but she forgot some things that we wanted in our home. Our building manager was great about keeping us posted on updates during the building process. Quality or workmanship on the home.... I would give 3 or 3.5 stars for the price we paid. There was quiet a few cosmetic things like scratches, dings and (chunk missing from the plastic on the big sliding glass door, missing caulk, missing paint, paint on the carpet) and overall quality of the subcontractors that were overlooked. There were also a few of things that came up on our inspection report like the roof shingle placement and uneven foundation and sloping in some areas that were noted as carelessness. When I sent an email to the warranty department they were quick to respond and requested a copy of our inspection report. So, again this survey is a bit premature because we are still waiting for Pulte to get back to us. ... More

These homes need Internet TV service connections in each bedroom.

While Pulte planned on nice homes and materials, the inferior workmanship of several trades standing out in the homes and the following up service is also poor and unsatisfactory!

The issues I’ve had with the plumbing has existed since I closed on the home 23 September 2020 and it’s 15 December 2020 and the plumbing is still backing up. My bathroom and shower are inoperable.

We were offered a $5,000 discount if we signed papers by a certain date. We did, and later were told that we didn't (even though we have text messages to prove it). Also, we were overcharged on our final payment to the title company ($700+) and were told we would get a refund from Pulte. Never did, and follow up has been ignored. Maybe others are okay with writing off $5,700+ but we are not, and are extremely upset with the promises made and the lack of follow up with management.

Be wary of what is or is not included in upgraded features. For example, we paid a ton of money for a walk-in shower with a spa package but we can now not fully use the jets without soaking the drywall outside of the shower because the upgrade didn't come with a shower door. The frustrating part is that the standard shower comes with a door so why wouldn't the upgraded one. No one will answer me.

I would (and actually do) recommend homes built by Pulte.

I found a new construction Pulte home when the frame was already up, and was told that due to that, no design/customization could be made because Pulte had already made all decisions and purchased all materials. The sales associate just seemed very un-accomodating in that regard and I'm not sure if there was a window of opportunity to make some design changes to my liking, or not (I am a first time home buyer). Regardless, if changes were not feasible, I should have been provided with a full rendering of the interior/exterior of the home so I could know what to expect and make a better informed choice about purchasing the home. In the end, I was not totally satisfied with the appearance of the exterior and would have made selected some other interior options as well. Additionally, I was informed by the Sales Specialist that there was a Amtrak train track near my street/homesite but that she had seldom heard any trains come by and it was just Amtrak that passed quickly. However, both Amtrak and very noisy freight trains come through routinely throughout the day AND night. Had I known about the train aspect, I would not have purchased this particular home. This is also of paramount importance because due to COVID-19, I work from home and it is important to live in a community where there are little to no noise distractions. I feel that the information provided to me and my realtor (who was present with me at the time) was both misinformed and misleading. Of note, the temporary sales office in the community was not as close to the train track as my home, so the Sales Specialist would not actually know about train activity during the day or night unless she spent significant time near my street/at my home site. I, along with my realtor, would have appreciated a more honest answer regarding the trains so that I could have avoided purchasing a home that is not in a location to my satisfaction or tolerability. ... More

Pulte builds a good floor plan very attractively at a reasonable price.

The sales manager was great. However, the materials and the contractors that Pulte hires were horrible. The contractors were sloppy at best. We have paint on our wood floors, scratch marks in the floors where they were dragging appliances in our kitchen, dents in the cabinets, loose door cabinets, holes in the walls where they installed the banister incorrectly and failed to patch it up, and so much more. The paint they use is a cheap flat paint that is impossible to keep clean and already looks worn. We are already talking about painting the entire house because of the horrible and cheap paint. More than a few of our windows don’t work. Overall, very disappointed in the materials and even more upset at the horrible contractors. ... More

Thoroughly inspect home prior to closing. Have any issues addressed during the building process and before closing. Even though there is a warranty, it is much easier to have any visible issues corrected before moving in to your new home rather than afterwards. Think the quality of the finish work needs to be improved and work of contractors monitored more closely (especially tile contractors, drywall contractors, and finish (trim, paint) and held to a higher standard.

Hired a home inspector is worth it, although my issues are inside the house. I had a home inspector and he save me by pointing out bad work such as the problem with the roof (sloppy work), he saw the standard water and the bad landscape just to name a few. When the homeowner walks through, look at everything, ensure that your upgrade is quality and what you paid for (mine was not), ensure that the floors are free from having paint drip on them (I am still removing paint drip), ensure caulk is where it should be and no hole, ensure the landscape is done right and when using the sprinkler there is no standing water and the water is draining. Ensure the floor baseboard is the length it should be and not short and fill in with caulk that looks like crap and to Pulte, it ok and will not correct the problem. The individuals that work on the house take a shortcut instead of doing the job right the first time. There is no Quality Check over these individuals and it all up to the buyer to look in places he/she might not think of looking or think it might be alright, trust me it is not. Yes, Pulte wants their customer to be happy before closing, what I learn through this process that the homeowner can only sign off on what he/she see when during the walkthrough and when you signed off places you would not think to look because the work thinking the same and when cleaning the homeowner will find all the short cut instead of correcting them Pulte fill in with caulk and probably thing the warranty will expire before the homeowner noticed the damage. Pulte has been responsive to the service requests that I have requested, the problem with their procedures is when a service is a request someone come out to inspect and might agree that the service should be done or not. Pulte had been good in following up to see have the service requests been completed. The quality of the materials is very bad, I paid to upgrade the tub it looking like Pulte got it from a junkyard, it appears to be use and someone had to come and restored it. I paid to upgrade the cabins and some of the doors had to be replaced due to crack, some of the top/bottoms of the cabin doors did not paint to match the other doors and they are not of good quality. Items that are standard in the house such as countertops, carpets are of poor quality as well however Pulte charge an arm and a leg to upgrade and after seeing the tub, cabinets, and tile floor that cost me plenty I am happy that I did not upgrade the carpet it would be money not well spend and probably get much better quality at Home Depot/Walmart. This is the third house I brought under Pulte and the worst! Beware of spending your money to upgrade, the homeowner probably comes out better going with the standard and hire a professional to do the upgrade. The standard and upgrade items are not top quality some look like it had been used, had been sitting outside and is not new. This is the third house I have brought from Pulte; it is the WORST of the three and since moving in and finding all the short cut the workers took to do something instead of doing it right the first time. Pulte's claim to build based on quality - that might have been true in the first two houses I brought in 1996, 2001, it is not true in 2020. Pulte Quality is more like use, very cheap looking and it looks like items are used, came from a junkyard, and Pulte forgot to restore it before installing it in the homeowner's home. Pulte upgrade is not cheap, however; the quality is cheap/used. My overall experience went from happy to disappointed to cannot wait to sell the house! ... More

This was the worst experience I have ever had in my life. From the beginning to the very end, the entire process was horrible. The lack of communication was the worst experience I have ever seen. I have been in the home now since the middle of September and I'm still waiting on final touch ups throughout the home. I would never recommend this company to any family or friends. Very unfortunate because the location are great. Ps. If you can get the contractors to follow through with the finishing touch ups that would be great.

Everything from A-Z was completed however, the quality of materials is not the same in the pass compared to older Pulte built homes.

Good house in a good location

Pulte Mortgage and Title were phenomenal. I purchased a model, so I would say that this comes without the standard warranty and i should have done a little more checking before the purchase. But the sales and project management team were very good themselves as well.