Elizabeth Newman Custom Homes Worst Builder in Dallas Con-Artist and Thief Dallas Texas
Elizabeth Newman is a "builder" in the Dallas (primarily East Dallas) area. I have never in all my years written a bad report of felt so strongly about protecting others as I do with this matter. Several years ago, my wife and I decided to build a custom house in Dallas - we interviewed several builders and due to an inordinate amount of promises and guaranteed cost savings, we chose this company. WOW, what a mistake that we will regret for the lives - and be paying for, for the rest of our lives as now that our home has been tagged as an Elizabeth Newman home - NO ONE will even look at it much less buy it. The process was nothing less than a nightmare and now I am reading stories on the internet from others and felt compelled to write, hoping to spare other from such agony.
In short, she embezzles money from the process and we constantly had sub-contractors on our doorstep (for months after we moved in) asking for money as they never received payment for their services. After much discussion with them, they confirmed that she asked them to cut corners for cost savings and offered kickbacks for cooperation. However, she never paid them a dime - the result, horrible construction, roofs that leak, foundations that crack, paint that peels, plumbing that backs up constantly, AC load that is half of what is recommended for this square footage, a fence that falls down, eaves that rot and french doors that leak (believe it or not, that is the short list).
I was told from a friend in the Park Cities that she was run out of that area as well as Preston Hollow and North Dallas as she could not even begin to complete - I even spoke to a builder a party that said she is the laughing stock of the entire building community and is known as a con artist and liar. Why could I not have learned this before we built!!!!
I could continue to tell more - but my only intent is to recommend people STAY AWAY from this company. I also read she has started a new company called Eco Oasis or Economic Oasis, something like that - she did this apparently as a ploy to clear her name. In fact, when you try and call her office number for warranty work - her ENTIRE work staff has walked out because they were all owed weeks of back pay (this was told to me by the girl who answered the phone was said she was a realtor, not a part of the company). You just cannot make this stuff up!!!!!
All is all - if you here of this crook in your community, RUN don't walk from her or her houses. It will just be a matter of time before she is run out of town - or better yet, serves time in prison where she belongs for all the injustice she has caused the poor victims of her rath - SHE IS EVIL.
Thank you for taking the time to review and good luck in any of your home building endeavors, and BEWARE of this joke of a company.
Paul
Dallas, Texas
U.S.A.
2 Updates & Rebuttals
Elizabeth Newman
Dallas,Texas,
USA
Hoax - This report was written by a non client
#3REBUTTAL Owner of company
Tue, December 07, 2010
The report written here was supposedly written by someone named "Paul" but is actually written by "Tony Barnard". He obviously didn't know his home address was going to show up under his signing this RipOff Report because at the time he wrote this, he lived in a 1950's ranch style home at that address not a new home built by ENCH (Elizabeth Newman Custom Homes). We didn't remodel that home, design anything for it, or even discuss building anything for anything on that lot if he cleared the house on it. Tony Barndard has recently torn that house down and is now building a new house with "Registry Homes".
This report was written strictly to hurt me personally as we used to be friends. Tony states in this report that he and his "WIFE" decided to build a home. That statement right there is an outright lie because he is not married. He is a gay man living with his partner "RICK". The report is filled with as much rubbish about the building process with ENCH, which he has obviously never been through. He has never had one of my sub contractors at his door looking for money because he has never had one of my sub contractors do any work for him. He has also never had any liens on his property because of ENCH either. That is easily checked as its a public record.
Tony Barnard is a banker for construction loans. We got side ways when he asked a friend of his to invest in Elizabeth Newman Custom Homes. 9 months later it was discovered that my long time CFO, Shery Harrison, had been embezzeling money from my company to the tune of 100's of thousands of dollars. This affected his friends investment and therefore, he blames me. I had nothing to do with this and the FBI and the Dallas Police and IRS got involved and Ms. Harrison has now been indicted and is awaiting trial at this very moment for the crime. My company has suffered terribly due to her crimes against it and myself.
It is very sad that people like this have to go to such great lengths to hurt someone like me, especially when I have already been damaged. I have spent 2 long years trying to turn things around after the embezzlement by my CFO in a very bad homebuilding market. Its not easy and having something like this doesn't help.
Thanks to the other client of mine who posted a rebuttal and knows the truth of what it is like to actually deal with my company and myself.
Alex
Dallas,Texas,
United States of America
Elizabeth Newman - Very Satisfied with my Customer Built Home
#3Consumer Comment
Thu, October 28, 2010
I'd like to offer an alternative view to the article written by Paul. I'm really not sure if he dealt directly with Elizabeth Newman as my wife and I gad through our process. In my opinion, aligning the Company with potential inappropriate behaviors of her constituents doesn't really create factual conclusions on how Elizabeth Newman operates her company. Again the information below is from our experience from Feb. 2005 - Apr. 2006.
Overview
My wife and I also interviewed various builders and chose Elizabeth Newman Custom Homes due to the location of the lot we wanted (and school district location). We started our process back in February 2005 and moved in October 2005. To be specific we never had issues described here relating to subcontractors not beign paid or showing up at our door after we moved in. We did not move into a "spec" home. We designed and built our current home with Elizabeth Newman. I would recommend any buyer to be more diligent in buying a new "spec" home never lived in before. As with any purchase of this magnitude due diligence along the process is required, in my humble opinion.
During the Process
My wife and I were very involved with the process and stayed in touch with our Sales person, Elizabeth Newman, and the Foreman. If we had an issue of concern, we brought it up and it was taken care of. We didn't feel any item was pushed down on us and we even pushed back the build date due to a last minute change on our part to increase the square footage in our Master Bedroom. We also didn't feel corners were cut and we even had the flexibility of hiring our own contractors for (some of the) work that we felt she was charging more than we thought we could get for it.
Working with the Title company and the lender's was a smooth process even with a Mechanic's lien to start the process before converting to a convential loan just prior to move-in.
Was our house perfect?
If anyone thinks there is a perfect builder or perfect house after a build is out of their mind. So let me share what went wrong with my home (during the build and) within the first year and what was done about it.
- Our first foreman was fired because he didn't execute on deadlines -- second foreman during the build was great.
- Our Sales person also resigned during our build, her replacement was fine.
- Son's upstairs toilet leaked after 3 months, loose seal on the toilet -- fixed toilet and damaged ceiling (warranty honored).
- One of my two HVAC units was not leveled and also leaked through my son's bedroom after 6mo. That was the AC contractor's fault, but again was fixed under warranty no questions asked.
Outside of the carpet bunching in some spots due to our over active kids we have had no issues with our home or any malicious/weird behavior with contractors/subs or otherwise related to Elizabeth Newman to this day. Present day we are still very happy with our home -- I'd like my media room to be bigger, but that's a different issue.
So why are people down on Elizabeth Newman?
I cannot speak to the allegations in this article and cannot believe it would even be true based on my experience dealing with Elizabeth Newman directly. Not sure when Paul's home was built and if he actually dealt with Elizabeth Newman, but it is unfortunate these allegations have come to light. If anyone wants to speak to me directly about this please feel free to email or call me and would be happy to share my experience directly.
Sincerely,
Alex Uy - (214) 909-8709 or alex.uy@live.com