Reviews of Pulte Mortgage

I bought my first house in October, I've been in it about six months. I bought it new, from the builder, Pulte Homes, because I live in a city that's cheap enough where I can afford it. The house itself is pretty much great, there's a bit of an issue with the vent fan in the guest bath and the AC ducts still having those metal flanges on to close them, also in the guest room (but I've gotten that latter mostly taken care of), but it's otherwise a fine house. The diswasher had a manufacturing defect, and the big plug (220?) for the washing machine and dryer didn't work when I first moved in, but that stuff was taken care of pretty promptly.

So the actual house is okay, but the companies I'm dealing with in some other regards aren't really.

Issue 1: Home Inspection
I have lived in my house for about six months, I still cannot get the local energy monopoly to transfer the power from the builder's name to me. Why? Because the records of the final inspection haven't been released to them yet. I called the Pulte customer service rep for my development every week about this, until he was transferred to another location, he rarely returned my calls and didn't forward my concerns on to the new guy who's yet to call me to introduce himself (as the letter Pulte sent me promised he would). On the plus side, I've been getting free electricity for the past six months, on the down side there's a six month gap in my history with the utility company: not good. I have called CPS every week for six months, so at least there's a record of that.

Issue 2: The Missing Shade
When I moved in, due to somebody in ordering being too stupid to count, one of my blinds was a temporary paper shade instead of the custom shade I was supposed to have. Temporary has turned into six months, I was contacted about measuring it once, weeks ago, and have never heard back. The previous customer service rep didn't return my calls about this, I have not heard from the new guy.

Issue 3: Landscaping
I realize this is South Texas, but the landscaping for most of the complex was not well maintained before the HOA got fully off the ground two months ago. The grass immediately next to my house (this is a townhouse development, the grounds are the HOA's responsibility) wasn't sufficiently watered upon installation and remained, until a recent spate of heavy rainfall, distinct blocks of sod. There is a massive ant problem over most of the grounds, although the HOA has put down some poison recently which has helped. I've taken to dumping Amdro on whatever ant hills show themselves in my immediate surround, but it's still annoying. Further, there are not sufficient public garbage cans, which results in many people leaving their dog shit all over the place. In addition, the builder left a huge pile of dirt and rocks in one area for no discernable reason: it's an eyesore. Worse, much of the drainage near me was designed badly, causing my neighbor's yard to flood fairly severely. They also decided not to complete about three feet of sidewalk between the playground and the sidewalk in front of my house, making it impossible to walk across the playground from the guest parking to the sidewalk in front of about 10 homes. Well, you can do it, but it tends to flood.

Issue 4: The BIG Issue
I closed my house in October, part of the closing documents (which I am looking at right now) indicates that we paid $112 of $570 in property taxes as part of the closing, the rest for 2006 being paid by the seller, in this case Pulte. I'll give y'all one guess what Pulte didn't do? DING! Pay the property taxes! So a week ago I received a delinquency notice from Chase (to whom the note has been sold), instructing me to pay the county $570 in the next 30 days or have an escrow account opened on my behalf. We didn't escrow the taxes because they will always, always take twice what you owe and I can't afford that, plus my folks are helping me out with the cost of those because Bexar county has fairly high property taxes (and we're legally co-owners). In any case, I've been dealing with Pulte's customer service people since Tuesday, and while they assure me that they will take care of it and let me know, the rep who was supposed to call me back on Wednesday didn't, and acted surprised that I called her today. She said I need to "give them a couple of days" to take care of it: but she won't tell me who, specifically, in the tax department is working on it. Fortunately, I have both her name and her direct extension and if she hasn't emailed me by 3pm Central on Monday, I'm calling her and I'm talking to her supervisor. This is ridiculous.

Conclusion
I'd buy another Pulte house, but not from the builder. And I would never, ever, use Pulte Mortgage again. Ever. They were completely moronic when we were doing the application, they still can't figure out that I'm the owner and my dad is a non-resident co-owner so when they call me to tell me that a survey is coming and I should say nice things they always ask for my dad, and they've generally been a pain in my ass. A huge, fat, pain in the ass. I'm very, very angry with Pulte Mortgage, and I sincerely hope that they go out of business the week after they pay those deliquent taxes.