Lamar Smith Signature Homes

Avoid Smith Family Homes (formerly Lamar Smith Homes) at all costs, especially if you’re looking into the Build On Your Lot (BOYL) program. My husband and I recently closed on our new build and to say we are disappointed with our experience would be an understatement. Before I get into the details of why, I want to clearly state something that the folks at Smith Family Homes don’t quite understand, though its been expressed several times: the labor and supply shortages, unexpected delays, and scheduling hiccups were never the core of our complaints. Our complaints are rooted in the atrocious customer service that we experienced during our build and continue to experience.

The process of signing the contract, making our design selections, and securing financing with their preferred lender was smooth sailing. From that point on, the entire experience was nothing but frustration. Smith Family Homes didn’t start site prep work on our house until almost 4 months after we signed our paperwork with no updates given, even when we asked for them. Once construction finally started, we asked our contractor Ryan Edenfield for weekly updates. One of the first interactions we had with Ryan was him telling my husband that he didn’t have time to give us updates. When we complained about this to Jeff Ford, we were told that the more often we bothered Ryan with questions, the longer it would take for our house to be completed and to filter any communication through him. So, from a very early point in our build process, our contractor was so unprofessional that we weren’t even allowed to speak with him. Often times we would have to follow up on the same question 2-3 times to get a response and were treated as if asking for progress updates was unreasonable. This continued throughout our entire build process. Ryan didn’t show up to the only two walkthroughs we had and he'd go sometimes weeks without visiting our house during construction.

When we finally reached the point of scheduling a blue tape walkthrough, we tagged several things (Cloudy, spotty mirrors, chipped bathtubs, faulty soft-close drawers in our kitchen, a faulty garage door opener panel, etc) that still haven’t been completed as of living in the house for almost 2 months. As an example regarding the garage door opener, we were told that a new panel would need to be installed. After we moved into the house, one afternoon we saw Ryan’s truck drive by. We went outside later and found a replacement panel on the ground. He had dropped off the panel and didn’t even have the courtesy to knock on our door. He also didn’t schedule someone to replace it, so we’re having to do it on our own. When we moved into the house, it was absolutely filthy even after having their “cleaner” come twice. We had to wipe down our cabinets, clean our floors multiple times to remove residue, clean debris from our drawers and bathtubs, remove paint splatter from our floors and wipe down our windows.

We’ve also contacted Smith Family Homes about providing us touch up paint for our walls. We asked Jeff Ford and the painting contractor if spare paint would be left for us in the attic, and both assured us it would. We needed the paint few weeks ago and realized that no wall paint was left, only white paint for our trim. I tried to buy a can of paint in the correct color, and it didn’t match. When we reached out to Smith Family Homes to help us they initially refused, but then told us we needed to buy the paint ourselves, even though the paint they use is a line only available to be purchased by contractors. When we pushed back, they fed us a line and told us they’re legally unable to leave paint, even though we were left paint for our trim. Based on that response, they either broke the law or are willfully fighting our requests to have matching wall paint given to us like they told us they would. So in my brand new house, any time I need to touch up, I’m going to have to repaint entire walls because Smith Family Homes won’t give us a quart sized container of paint.

Choose any other builder, trust me.