Greenwood in Tustin Legacy

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Yes, Hawthorn. We were considering buying Hawthorn which preplotted absolutely nothing and everything was an upgrade. Just to get to what Stan Pac includes as standard and preplotted would have been close to $50K at Hawthorn.

They included cheap one piece fiberglass tubs. You want any type of tile or slab any time in the future, you better upgrade thru the builder or you'll have to remove the entire unit. Puleaze! For that price you get something that cheap looking? Lots of other things that added up.

Even Sheldon doesn't include something that cheap. In fact, the sales office told me when I first looked at those homes, the home prices included most of the electrical including recessed lights, jpegs.

I had my doubts the sales people knew what they were talking about, but sure enough we were pleasantly surprised at how much of what we would have paid for was pre plotted.

Unfortunately whole house insulation wasn't one of their pre plots, but I still had extra cash to spend after that was included.
 
Ready2Downsize said:
Yes, Hawthorn. We were considering buying Hawthorn which preplotted absolutely nothing and everything was an upgrade. Just to get to what Stan Pac includes as standard and preplotted would have been close to $50K at Hawthorn.

They included cheap one piece fiberglass tubs. You want any type of tile or slab any time in the future, you better upgrade thru the builder or you'll have to remove the entire unit. Puleaze! For that price you get something that cheap looking? Lots of other things that added up.

Even Sheldon doesn't include something that cheap. In fact, the sales office told me when I first looked at those homes, the home prices included most of the electrical including recessed lights, jpegs.

I had my doubts the sales people knew what they were talking about, but sure enough we were pleasantly surprised at how much of what we would have paid for was pre plotted.

Unfortunately whole house insulation wasn't one of their pre plots, but I still had extra cash to spend after that was included.
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Funny thing was I thought Hawthorn/Pulte's upgrade prices were reasonable in comparison to what people here are posting on other developments.  I was very interested in Stafford (still am) but my wife didn't want to move there but during the first phase the sales reps couldn't provide any details about how much of the preplot upgrades were included.  If I had known there was a $50K upgrade included I would have even used Qwerty's name  to convince my wife to move to Stafford
 
There isn't 50K in upgrades at Stan Pac. There is the $7500 incentive for the design center, plus whatever they preplot (big slider doors, electrical, some lots have fireplaces which ours didn't have but I would have done..... unfortunately we were too late for that option as it affected the foundation).

The thing with Hawthorn, maybe their upgrade prices were better than other builders (I don't know.... I ONLY wanted Hawthorn so I didn't check anyone else) but what they included was much less than Stan Pac and so I had to keep adding things on to get to what Stan Pac either includes as standard or pre plotted or added on by us).

I was adding things like moveable windows, tiled tub walls........... just plain white so we could redo it later (which meant the entire tub had to be changed out), raingutters, jpegs, recessed lights. I don't remember what else. Might have included a slider door but I'm not positive it even included that as I'm not a fan of the California room concept and don't plan on keeping doors open.

So bottom line, the price we would have ended up with was significantly higher at Hawthorn than their base price and that was with standard counters and before I added in flooring which I would have done after COE.

You can ask for a password to find out their upgrade prices at Pulte and I'm sure Stan Pac would do the same.
They would have given us a list of pre plots but they didn't have it early on, so we had to take their word for it that they included a good amount of electrical. I thought for sure they were mistaken, but nope..... we were pleasantly surprised.

We asked Stan Pac for a list of what was chosen on one that fell out and they gave us the entire list. If they had only chosen different counters in the kitchen and whole house insulation we would have went with the rest of what they chose.
 
For starters, Hawthorne gave you white tile bath countertops. Whereas some other builders gave you estone. If you're trying to save $, you could just live with the estone. Hard to live with white tile
 
I didn't include countertops when I figured out what I wanted. The $50K was just what I would have paid to upgrade just to get to standard stuff included by Stan Pac.

Just basic things that would be harder to change out later. Bathtubs got included because the standard was so horribly cheap and would have required changing the entire tub. Sales guy even said they knew that people wouldn't be able to change them later cuz the tub wouldn't fit thru the door so it would have to be demolished in the bathroom and so it was basically an automatic upgrade they could get sold.

Stan Pac standard isn't white tile. Not sure what's it's called, might be estone. So still $50K even if I had included that at Hawthorn which I didn't.
 
bones said:
@R2D:  do you know why people are backing out of Stafford?
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The one we are buying we were told the previous buyer (who picked no options....... backed out very early) didn't like it because it had a two car garage. Personally I doubted that was the reason because it doesn't have any option BUT a 2 car garage but that's the reason Stan Pac gave us.

Because Stan Pac didn't get their white papers until months into their sales process, anyone who could prove they could qualify could put down their deposit plus half their options and get all their money back (ALL!) months into the process........ even up to flooring choices........ so basically no risk to the buyer except their credit was checked and some money being tied up (which earns very little in interest) for a while.

We were told that even after they got the white papers they could still get their funds back until final loan approval was due.

I'm going to guess there were some who in the end weren't happy with the taxes, HOA dues, schools, small lots or just decided the cost was too high but I have no idea. I just need a place to live with a downstairs master, downstairs office, downstairs laundry and enough extra rooms which can be upstairs for my out of town/state kids to stay in and Stafford fit the bill.

Not my ideal home. Would rather be in Irvine, in IUSD (even tho we have no kids I just feel it's better for housing appreciation and holding the value more important if we/my kids have to sell in a buyer's market), different exterior, larger lot, bigger garage, but with those options it would be several hundred K higher, so we're making the move back to Tustin which is where we came from a couple of houses ago.
 
Ready2Downsize said:
bones said:
@R2D:  do you know why people are backing out of Stafford?
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The one we are buying we were told the previous buyer (who picked no options....... backed out very early) didn't like it because it had a two car garage. Personally I doubted that was the reason because it doesn't have any option BUT a 2 car garage but that's the reason Stan Pac gave us.

Because Stan Pac didn't get their white papers until months into their sales process, anyone who could prove they could qualify could put down their deposit plus half their options and get all their money back (ALL!) months into the process........ even up to flooring choices........ so basically no risk to the buyer except their credit was checked and some money being tied up (which earns very little in interest) for a while.

We were told that even after they got the white papers they could still get their funds back until final loan approval was due.

I'm going to guess there were some who in the end weren't happy with the taxes, HOA dues, schools, small lots or just decided the cost was too high but I have no idea. I just need a place to live with a downstairs master, downstairs office, downstairs laundry and enough extra rooms which can be upstairs for my out of town/state kids to stay in and Stafford fit the bill.

Not my ideal home. Would rather be in Irvine, in IUSD (even tho we have no kids I just feel it's better for housing appreciation and holding the value more important if we/my kids have to sell in a buyer's market), different exterior, larger lot, bigger garage, but with those options it would be several hundred K higher, so we're making the move back to Tustin which is where we came from a couple of houses ago.
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Congrats. Sounds like it's a good spot for you guys.  All in, how much cheaper is stafford versus Hawthorne if you pulled the trigger 2 years ago at the builder pricing? Which Hawthorne plan were you considering?
 
It was the plan 2 Hawthorn.

Ended up being about 100K cheaper but that is for nearly 3900 sq ft vs a bit over 3100 sq foot house.

Hawthorn would have had a little bit bigger yard, been in Irvine, IUSD, on a little culdesac so the location and lot size would have been better. We would have changed out the storage area in the garage for a prep kitchen (which I didn't include in the price comparison) but we're gaining a bedroom in Stafford which is valuable to us since sometimes all our kids come at the same time and hopefully we'll get some grand kids in tow.

Still liked Hawthorn and I'm sure we would have been ok with living there. In fact, I sometimes think we should have gone with that one but at the time I had issues with my mom and where she was going to live and who would be taking care of her so I didn't have much choice......... had to pass till that was resolved.

So Stafford is where we're going. I don't anticipate I'll be able to sell for breakeven given the cost to sell for quite a long time but I think that could be said with anything new right now.

Hope we get good neighbors without dogs that bark into the night.
 
$100k cheaper with 800 SF more to play with. I say you came out ahead given that you don't need Iusd.  I hope to one day downsize to 3900sf like you :)
 
Ready2Downsize said:
It was the plan 2 Hawthorn.

Ended up being about 100K cheaper but that is for nearly 3900 sq ft vs a bit over 3100 sq foot house.
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Hawthorn first phase Plan 3s were about 1.189 base so I assume Plan 2 was about 1.1 base.  I don't think phase to phase price increase at Hawthorn was significant.  But Stafford started at 1.2 base.  So was Hawthorn 100K cheaper than Stafford?
 
The bottom line was we wanted something new that was configured to allow my kids a place to stay and had what we need all downstairs in case we can't navigate stairs as we get older.

I know that configuration is a tough sell and it looks like it's a fail for the builders but I honestly think it's because someone in our position doesn't want to spend money on higher property taxes as they get older so that little niche group aren't buyers but down the road those who do get older with everything upstairs are going to look back and say coulda woulda shoulda when rates were lower.

Selling would most likely limit who would buy my house (same reason........ those forced into the downstairs area are probably not going to afford a big older home) but I think we're going to be happy with our basically single story with an upstairs hotel for the relatives.

I'll definitely miss my four car garage but I'm determined to fit both cars in the two car garage and we'll get used to the postage sized lot with less maintenance.


 
We didn't want a house in the early phases and the price difference included my adding things in that were standard at Stafford (like real tubs with tile walls), second oven, raingutters, electrical, etc. and the builder incentive in the design center.
 
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