MONARCH HOMES LLC - REVIEW

          

MONARCH HOMES LLC  (OWNER - LUIS MOLINA)
2521 N. MAIN STREET UNIT 1-302
LAS CRUCES, NM 88001

Builder Background:
Monarch Homes LLC is new home builder, an employee spin-off from another builder here in Las Cruces, NM. From my understanding, the small operation has been in business since 2018. They currently use The Palms Realty company located in Santa Teresa, NM to provide them with sales/marketing. Like other builders in the area, Monarch has no construction employees and uses local contractors for all building tasks. They have a minimal staff that includes several foreman/inspectors that supposedly monitor construction.

Quality 101:
Since I’ve been involved in various aspects of engineering for about 30 years, I feel qualified to comment on some of the basics related to the quality in this instance. There are three basic areas:

Design
Materials
Production

Let me first say that ending up with a quality product is not easy and doesn’t happen by accident. “Quality Management” is something that must be a continuous process in all the areas mentioned above to be effective. You can't test or final-check quality into a product at the end of the production process! Lack of quality control in any of the areas mentioned above can have a severe negative impact in the following categories:

Product Safety
Product Reliability
Customer Satisfaction
Company Reputation

Home-Owner Experience:
Looking for a new home is a daunting and time-consuming experience. Some local recommendations finally steered us to Monarch Homes. The sales representatives from Palm Realty were quite friendly and answered all of our questions. They told us that Monarch homes was a five-star builder and that their build quality was better than other builders in the area and that they used superior building materials such as 2x6 framing and upgraded insulation. After seeing other builder’s homes in the area that had been in progress, I voiced a concern about some of the things I had seen. The salesperson assured me that Monarch employed a conscientious foreman that monitored the contractor workforce on every build throughout the process. The construction took about eight months after deposit and contract signing.

The customary first “customer walk-though” was scheduled several weeks before the proposed closing date. We had been told that Monarch had hired an independent home inspector to evaluate the construction that same day. My wife and I attended the walk-through, and I was shocked. The home had numerous and obvious fit & finish blemishes and was missing a number of components. The natural gas meter had not even been hooked-up at that time, so there was no heat on that chilly morning. A Monarch representative made a list of the issues we saw and told us they would work on them. The independent home inspection report found the items we uncovered during the walk, and some additional items on the roof.

With the closing only days away, only a few items on the deficiency list had been addressed. I chose to delay the closing an additional week to have them whittle down the list. During a move like this, there are many tasks to complete on a certain timetable. It was a huge hassle to adjust that timetable to a delayed closing date. With only a few days to the re-scheduled closing, we were out of time… and although I was not happy there were still some items remaining on the list, we were forced to close and agree to have the remaining items fixed later. These home builders are well aware of the fact that in the final days before closing, the home buyer is under tremendous pressure to complete the transaction due to scheduled tasks such as rental termination, furniture movers, and utilities transfer.

November 2022:
We’ve already experienced our first taste of Monarch quality. Five days after moving in, I was working on my computer and heard what sounded like a huge bubbling gurgle from the kitchen sink. I didn’t like the sound of it, but I listened for a while and heard nothing else. Later, I used the bathroom but noticed the toilet didn’t seem to flush like before. I then went to another bathroom in the house and flushed the toilet. Same thing! The sewer was blocked! I had enough sense to stop using any water in the house and call the builder. Long story short… one of the PVC pipes out in the front yard was packed full of soil. A plumber came and used a water jet to clear the blockage. But how could a pipe, stuffed with dirt not be found during routine building quality checks? The answer is obvious...  there were no quality checks!


Pipe completely blocked caused a sewer backup.


December 2022:
Now after the emergency is over and that we’ve been in the house for a week, I’ve had a chance to look at the overall construction in much greater detail. Since I have no home-dwelling design or materials experience, I don't feel qualified to make any comments in those areas. However, in the production area… it’s evident that Monarch quality standards are extremely low, and quality controls was basically non-existent. The defect list has grown substantially in the past week, and there are issues being discovered on a daily basis.

After the initial sewer blockage event and living in the house for a month now, my general conclusion is a total lack of quality management during the construction phase of this home. Knowing this, I have serious concerns about non-viewable items such as pipes in walls as well as safety concerns about electrical wiring.

January 2023:
The "flaw list" on the house grows almost daily. I've detected a second crack now forming in the driveway. The first crack was noted several weeks ago and has since grown wider. I would expect the second crack will follow the same behavior. Having cracks in cement form when the cement is three months old is a very good indicator of a sub-standard job. Monarch has acknowledged all reported problems, and in several cases so far has dispatched workers to make the repairs. However, the people coming for the repairs are the same people who provided a sub-standard job in the first place... so in a number of instances... the repair was not performed properly... or even made worse.


Cracks everywhere in concrete work.



Bottom of garage door bent.



That's just plain sneaky. More latent errors.



Horrible caulking/sealing job almost everywhere.


February 2023:
Although Monarch continues to show an interest in reducing the "flaw list"... by continuing to send repair personnel that created the issues in the first place, the repair process has been either unsuccessful or painfully slow. They keep insisting that competent tradesmen and repair/missing items are not available. Even after tradesman show up to repair an item, nobody from Monarch is ever present during the repair... and the homeowner is left to judge the quality of the repair, which is normally horrible! Monarch has shown a pattern of behavior to what I refer to as the three-Ds.

Deny - After Monarch is contacted regarding an issue... quite often there is a concerted effort to initially deny any problem exists or dismiss it as being normal.
Delay - Repair requests are met with a constant stream of delays.
Diminish - Even when an issue is acknowledged, efforts are made before and during the repair to diminish the severity or final expectations. The homeowner is constantly conditioned to accept sub-standard work as being the "norm".

Monarch finally sent the concrete contractor back to replace a portion of the front sidewalk directly outside the front door that was already badly cracked and had a chunk missing. In an effort to reduce material and labor time, they sawed-out and replaced a triangular piece. Unfortunately, there were several issues. One was the huge color difference in the patch... caused by using the wrong "mix" of concrete... and second... the triangular patch has two acute angles that started to crack before the wood forms were even removed!


After they replaced a badly cracked section of concrete. A triangle? Really? Now that's stupid...



The repair started cracking before wood forms were even removed.


April 2023:
The "flaw List" has been slowly reduced, but the story is not very good. Many of the items that have been repaired... have been repaired in a tearing hurry... and therefore not properly. The contractors who initially made mistakes and used sub-standard techniques are called in again to make the repairs. And this time, they normally do a worse job than the first time. Some items on the "flaw list" I've just plain scratched-off the list because it would be the second or third attempt at a fix... and at this point, I don't think they are capable of doing the job correctly. This devious tactic fits well into Monarch's plan to reduce or eliminate warranty costs.


Horrible attempt at door sealing.



Uneven staining on front door.



Terrible painting.



Striker-plates improperly positioned and cracked door frames.


May 2023:
Decided it was time to install a flat-screen TV on the wall above the artificial fireplace. The wall has already been set up with the necessary AC outlet and another outlet-box for running any necessary cabling. I removed one of the covers on an outlet-box on the side of the wall to look at the situation for routing my Ethernet & HDMI cables I had purchased. What I saw when I peered inside was horrible. Apparently, the area inside the wall directly behind the fireplace had been used during construction as a garbage can. Several discarded water bottles, caulk tubes, and even a beer can was visible through the small opening. My concern at this point was whether or not there was discarded food in that area that could potentially attract insects. I contacted Monarch with a photo that I shot showing the situation, and although they showed their usual concern, nothing was done. I decided that the fireplace must be removed, and that area thoroughly cleaned up. I did remove the fireplace and did find additional trash that couldn't be seen from the initial inspection vantage point. A partially eaten burrito was also found, so my suspicions regarding discarded food were correct. What a mess!


The first look inside the wall prior to my TV installation.



Fireplace had to be removed to clean-up mess inside wall.



A better look at all the garbage inside the wall. What's that? A beer can!
That's great, "drunken quality" from Monarch...



Another view of the garbage inside the wall.


June 2023:
A complaint was filed with the Better Business Bureau regarding the horrible job that Monarch did replacing a piece of cracked sidewalk after the owner of Monarch refused to make repairs. Mr. Molina did show up at my door angry about the complaint, and had the nerve to attempt to convince me that nothing could be done about the sub-standard concrete job to match the color or stop the cracking.

July 2023:
I was contacted by the Better Business Bureau regarding my complaint. They never received a response from Mr. Molina, so that information will be posted about Monarch Homes at the BBB web site.
Monarch Homes LLC Better Business Bureau File



CONCLUSION:
experiencing the number and wide range of issues that have surfaced show that Monarch Homes AND THE CONTRACTOR BUSINESSES LISTED below have severe quality problems and should be avoided!



Others Complicit in the Total Lack of Quality:
Now it wouldn't be fair to Blame Monarch Homes for every problem mentioned above, since Monarch doesn't have any construction staff itself... and relies on local contractors for all construction. Monarch is ultimately responsible for the quality of the finished product... and they are certainly completely delinquent in that area... but the following contractors that Monarch continues to use are also very much to blame:

  CIA PAINTING LLC - LAS CRUCES, NM
These so-called "professional painters" are the worst I've ever encountered. They routinely failed to use a drop-cloth or properly mask-off the painting area, causing collateral damage on multiple occasions due to normal paint spattering/splashing. The result... paint and stain all over the floor and trim!


Painting without a drop cloth. Paint all over the floor.



Again, no drop cloth or masking. Stain all over everything.



Stain all over trim because of the total lack of masking.


  DOUBLE-R CONCRETE LLC - LAS CRUCES, NM
These guys replaced a cracked section of concrete, with concrete that was nowhere near the same color. And if that wasn't bad enough, the replacement patch started cracking before they even removed the wood forms!


Started cracking before wood forms were even removed.




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