Big Builder Online: news and analysis exploring the management, finance, and operations of America's big builders.

Big Builder Online explores the management, finance, and operating concerns of America's blue-chip builders�corporations that account for more than half of all residential construction.

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Home Builders Seek Traction in Pricing, Mortgage Rates

After a seasonal doldrums unlike any we've ever experienced, we're heading into a September through November leg that looms as anyone's guess as to how it's going to go in the new-home building and selling business. Put 10 smart, experienced people in a room and ask them whether the home stretch of 2010 will end on high or low note, and you'll get five telling you one thing and five the other....

Posted By: jmcmanus | Time: 4:40:00 PM | Permalink and Comments (0 Total)

September 02, 2010

Time Out! Rethinking Homeownership? Or Rethinking Newsweeklies?

The people that bring you People have too much spare Time on their hands, or so it seems. Maybe it's just the month of August, but it strikes us that the editors at the nation's remaining significant and viable newsweekly go off their rockers each summer as they pick their dog days issue cover topics....

Posted By: jmcmanus | Time: 4:05:00 PM | Permalink and Comments (0 Total)

August 31, 2010

News Flash: Ashton Woods Will Put $75 Million to Work on Home Builder Acquisition

Correction--An earlier version of this post contained two incorrect statements: One of Ashton Woods' banks was misstated. The correct name is Regions Bank. Also, Cory Boydston's title while serving at Beazer Homes was incorrect. The correct title was senior vice president and treasurer at Beazer. We regret the errors....

Posted By: jmcmanus | Time: 3:18:00 PM | Permalink and Comments (0 Total)

August 30, 2010

Home Buyer Tax Credit, Version 3. For or Against?

Another tax credit for home buyers? Not very likely, but if it were to come trundling down the pipeline when our dear Congressional representatives punch back in from their Summer vacays and try to get reelected, would home builders support it?...

Posted By: jmcmanus | Time: 3:20:00 PM | Permalink and Comments (5 Total)

August 26, 2010

Home Builders Eye the Gap Between New and Existing Sales

It's one of the things that makes home building executives lose sleep these days (or nights). It's what no home building company executive alive ever had to contend with in all of his or her downturns past. It's the yawning divide between existing home sales and new home sales....

Posted By: jmcmanus | Time: 4:02:00 PM | Permalink and Comments (0 Total)

Rss Excerpts

FROM THE EDITOR

Home Builders Seek Traction in Pricing, Mortgage Rates

Go to John McManus' Blog

Jamie Pirrello

Buying Clout: The Advantages of Big Vs. the Advantages of Trust

Do large builders, either public or private have cost advantage over smaller builders? Is the value they receive greater as a result of their size? Is it large builders that vendors seek to do business with? CEOs of large builders regularly speak of their advantages in purchasing over smaller builders. On the other hand, I've listened to individuals such as Larry Webb, of the New Home Company, argue no significant difference exists. Our own Vice President of Operations, David Murtagh, insists we are buying at or very close to all of our competitors.

Go To Jamie Pirrello's Blog

Wall St. & Maine

Dispatches from Schizo-America

We are who we are, unless, of course, we are not. Have you caught the September market rally? Ummm, you know, the one that sort of started last Thursday but then got sidetracked Tuesday and then came back Wednesday and early today, only to fade in mid-afternoon before it got going again during the final hour of trading?

Go to Wall St. & Maine

The Big Builder Online Survey

How Energy Efficient?

More than 1 million Energy Star homes have been built in the United States since the program first began labeling homes in 1995. Households living in Energy Star-qualified homes will save more than $270 million this year on their utility bills, according to the program's Web site. Big Builder Online wants to know what percentage of your new homes are built to Energy Star minimum standards.

Click here to take survey

Results from the previous survey: Another Leg Down?

Alex Wilson Wins 2010 Hanley Award

Green building pioneer Alex Wilson, founder of BuildingGreen in Brattleboro, Vt., was named this year's recipient of The Hanley Award for Vision and Leadership in Sustainable Housing. Wilson was selected from among 12 distinguished nominees by a panel of judges that included Michael J. Hanley, president of The Hanley Foundation; Frank Anton, CEO of Hanley Wood; Joyce Mason, vice president of marketing for Pardee Homes; Nate Kredich, vice president of residential market development for the U.S. Green Building Council; and last year's Hanley Award recipient, Edward Mazria of Architecture 2030.

Click Here to read the story.

PUBLIC BUILDER REPORT CARDS

Survival of the fittest was the rule for 2009 as most of the public home building companies did their best to shore up their balance sheets and push out debt maturities. They were not all equally successful. Here's how they did.

Click here for the overview and links to company profiles.

Click here for the aggregate financials chart.