Ashwood Meadows by Stanley Martin Homes

The purchase and build process of the home was great. The construction manager was awesome to work with. Now that we have closed and involved with the warranty process, the warranty person is responsive only when they want to be. Our punch list after closing has not been worked on at all. It has been over a month since it was submitted. Took almost 3 weeks to get a roof leak fixed.

Overall experience went from excitement to disappointed and relief to just close. Our experience was divided, with loss of confidence and trust in sales (David), but positive with a great Construction Manager, Patrick. The two distinct experiences make it hard to rate overall, but when it came to communicating closing date, if we didn't ask, sales did not provide updates that it was shifted to later unless I asked. It seemed like David did not want to present bad news, or updates that were less than positive. It did not seem like Sales was committed to keeping the third (and final projected) closing date as much as we were. Immediately before closing all communication with David was lost, apparently he moved to another site or position with no handoff for us. There were updates that Stanley Martin needed to provide to the lender that were time sensitive that I had to review in order to keep everything on track. This was critical as we are not in state/ local area. David promised weekly updates (on the weekend) and near the middle to end of the build, they came later or we had to ask to obtain them. Initially the Sales Team (David and Penelope) seemed to try to steer us away from picking a lot (further down the street from current builds) and floor plan, although we were told Stanley Martin was going back to doing "build to order" homes. David did a good job clearly stating that there was going to be ongoing construction near our home and outlined hazards/ inconveniences (noise, nails in road, etc) that they could not control. We fully understood the risks/ inconveniences and proceeded with the lot and floor plan we wanted. By the time we closed, all houses on our street were done or in a similar phase of construction, and there was not major construction ongoing. Our initial meeting for contract review was a waste of time as the lot was not released, so we went over a notional contract and the options we selected for our home. We had several back and forth conversations with Sales (both David and Penelope) to determine if we could get a covered patio. Ultimately, we could not due to drainage pipes that went through the yard that conflicted with the footers required. This could not be explained to us and we had to keep pressing to understand why. On our actual contract review meeting we noticed the pantry was incorrect, and the low-voltage wiring diagram was for the mirror image of the floorplan. We never obtained the correct facing wiring diagram. On the flip side, Patrick has been outstanding and provided timely updates and remedies to faults annotated on the pre-drywall inspection and closing inspection. He is always professional, courteous, and drives action. He explained why the ceiling fans/ lights turn on/ off by themselves (RF controlled) and has an electrician scheduled to come fix it along with two 3-way lights that do not work correctly. Our master bath toilet fills with hot water and a plumber is scheduled to come fix that as well. The small detail of having backer boards for TVs was great. Stanley Martin should continue things like this, where a very small investment adds big value to the customer.

Great experience overall! Service and house exceed expectations. Support under warranty has been helpful as well.