It is a subdivision they are building. The contract states dates from certain events... like we have "10 days from signing to make changes, or we have to pay a $500 change fee", but everything is skewed their way for things like "We will make every EFFORT to do the following within x amount of days, but due to weather, permit issue dates, etc. things are beyond our control."
So we have to abide by very firm dates. They don't. We also are in the non-refundable portion, but they still haven't gotten permits from the city. The city we are moving to is so in love with building that you can walk in and hand in your drawings, and have a permit the same day. The architectural drawings weren't sent for 2 weeks after finalizing, and they claim it is within their rights because they had to make changes. There were no visible changes from the preliminary drawings to the final submitted drawings. They just prefer to not walk into the city. They'd rather fax things and wait forever for a response. I've gotten building permits in under 10 minutes before. It's too hard for D.R. Horton though, because they are a big national builder. They have everything in their favor. I never would have agreed to build with them, because I think they suck rocks, but it wasn't my decision. I was given paperwork and told to sign it. When you're down and out, you just do what you can to keep the peace, especially when the person who is asking you to sign forms is also the one who is making sure you stay alive by getting you to the hospital and getting your medications at the pharmacy, so whatever. D.R. Horton wins. I guarantee that anything that isn't absolutely perfect will get nitpicked to death until it's fixed. I'll go in once a week at least with a level, a tape measure, and our engineered drawings, and I'll be making sure everything is done exactly to plan, code, spec, etc. They are going to hate me, but I'm not letting them cookie cutter up a piece of junk that we'll be paying for over the next 20 years.