Habitat homes in big project built by Jimmy Carter and a raft of celebs are having trouble:
RESIDENTS of a model housing estate bankrolled by Hollywood celebrities and hand-built by Jimmy Carter, the former US president, are complaining that it is falling apart.Fairway Oaks was built on northern Florida wasteland by 10,000 volunteers, including Carter, in a record 17-day “blitz” organised by the charity Habitat for Humanity.
Eight years later it is better known for cockroaches, mildew and mysterious skin rashes.
A forthcoming legal battle over Fairway Oaks threatens the reputation of a charity envied for the calibre of its celebrity supporters, who range from Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt to Colin Firth, Christian Bale and Helena Bonham Carter.
Actually, I’m not going to pile on Habitat; the right H4H project can be a very good thing.
But trying to make something worth other than what it’s intrinsically worth is a bad idea to start with; trying to do it on a large scale is like selling at a loss but trying to make up for it in volume.
I thought H4H’s whole deal was supposed to be one at a time and with well supervised volunteers and homeowner involvement in the process. This seems like an excellent example of what can happen when an organization diverges from its core mission in order to grab the spotlight and $$$.
I did a few spring breaks with Habitat, and about a decade ago was appalled to see the condition that some of the 1-3 year old homes were in. Part of it is probably due to the quality of the owners, but a large portion is, sad to say, the responsibility of those building the homes as well. I remember vividly one short cut we were told to take to save a single 2×4 from being used. Yeah, that was one of the porches that weren’t doing so hot the next year.
I think it’s odd the only news citation so far for this Florida-based case is a UK newspaper with a Los Angeles dateline on the story.
If you actually read the whole thing, the problem seems to be that H4H sited the project on a former garbage dump. Hardly the indictment against celebs and Carter specifically that Mitch implies here.
Correction: The quote and a comment draw that inference. Mitch blames the “Soviet” scale of the project.
I’d wager any house built on a landfill in Gatorville would have similar issues.
Charlie, properly built real estate takes into account the kind of soil it’s being built upon. I am even now working in a building built on a garbage dump.
No settling. No cockroaches. No mildew or mysterious illnesses. Why not?
The people who built it knew what they were building on, and provided the proper foundation and water-sealing methods to make it work. Hence no problems.
So no, not any house built on a landfill would have these problems. Just ones built without taking into account what kind of soil they were built upon. And yes, any decent concrete contractor will warn you if the soil they find when they did is not suitable for pouring concrete.
And many hobby builders will not. Sorry, it sticks.
BB,
Of course, but you don’t work in Florida, I assume, where the water table, mildew and cockroaches have a bit more play and dumping, land disclosures and building codes codes just titch more uh… librul.
You’re also talking about a commercial building, I assume. You can find plenty of residences built by private contractors here in Minnesota that have those problems.
It would be very interesting to know how H4H got that parcel and what kind of tax write-off was taken. None of that could necessarily be put at the feet of the “amateurs” or celebrities who support their projects. “Hobby Builders” only help with the projects, they don’t pick the sites, perform the engineering and perk tests or install critical systems.
I’m just commenting on the snark/evidence ratio here. H4H may or may not be at fault, but it’s quite a stretch to pin this on Jimmy Carter.
charlieq said:
“I’d wager”
and:
“I assume”
and then:
“I’m just commenting on the snark/evidence ratio here”
Um, yeah. OK. You’re the expert then? *snicker*
Houses obviously built by these guys:
Blazing saddles
Bah– bad link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDDIGgdG0-k
Charlie, I am working on a former dump that is built in a marshy area. Yes, there are issues with the water table and so on. However, when you have a development that has a lot of these problems, you BLAME THE DEVELOPER. (You also blame the local property inspectors for not doing their job very well, either.)
In this case, the lead developer is “James Earl Carter,” who despite his prowess at driving 16 penny nails into 4x4s with a single blow, apparently has never learned the basics of waterproofing and such. Yes, he is to blame. He spearheaded the effort and didn’t mind his Ps & Qs.
And unfortunately, I’ve seen it happen elsewhere. H4H has a problem with dilettante building habits. They need to fix it, and I’d suggest that local building inspectors need to go a bit harder on them where they operate.