Another One Bites The Dust....Some Sad News...Levitt & Sons Files Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

The builder in our area at Riomar in Sarasota and The Town Homes at San Simeon in Fort Meyer's - Levitt and Sons along with 37 of it's subsidiaries filed Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. On their home page they have posted the following message:

"On November 9, 2007, Levitt and Sons filed for Chapter 11. We deeply regret the impact this will have on homeowners, customers, vendors and employees.
Existing customers are welcome to call the customer hotline at 877-538-4889.
Existing vendors are welcome to call 888-538-4893.
Additional information is available at the following link:
Chapter 11 Information "

As a Realtor we have this love hate relationship with builders: in the "go-go" years of 2003-2004-2005 many new home builders significantly cut their cooperation with local Realtors. Then OF COURSE when times get tough they are e-mailing Realtors, courting them with big incentives etc etc because they know - what buyers there are out there tend to be working with a Realtor. But we take no pleasure in seeing ANY quality home builder in trouble and certainly this level of trouble is so much bad news for so many. The many people who have deposits on homes that are now uncertain of if or when they will close, all the folks associated with these homes that have money and time invested who do not know when or if they'll be paid and most of all the hundreds and hundreds of jobs lost and lives negatively impacted by this failure and just the overall slowdown in this market.

Nationally housing is tied pretty closely to the overall health of the economy but probably nowhere else as much as it has been here in Florida in the last 25 years. Without being on a soapbox we need to have fiscal policy that spurs on the housing market for a lot more reasons that the fiscal health of the Real Estate industry!

A tip we'd like to share with folks wanting a brand new home right now. Consider the benefit of buying a home at or near completion, a spec home if you will. And in so doing consider the safety of using a local Realtor and placing your earnest money IN ESCROW until the closing - if the deal somehow falls through you stand a much better chance of getting your earnest money returned. There is SO MUCH existing inventory - even with brand new homes with builders right now - that you can pretty much have just what you want and because it's already built you can close quickly, with much less exposure to the type of risk represented in this story and in many cases, because the builder or the investor needs to get this building sold - you could negotiate a stronger deal on the existing ones than one you'll close on in nine months.

Here's a link to the rest of the Levitt story:

http://www.floridarealtors.org/NewsAndEvents/n2-111207.cfm

- Mike W.