Builder Refusal to Provide Floor Plans

[Terrence Stark]

Hi there--

My aunt is an interior designer in Texas. During a recent conversation, the following question came up:

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"The question is:

You buy a 'new build' house. You are having an interior designer do work in the house. Your designer says we would like to have a copy of the floorplans with the wall heights, window locations, plumbing and electrical. The builder refuses to send them to you.

They state they are 'restricted' or send the type of layout you see online, just boxes, nothing the designer can use. This means the designer will have to charge the client to re-measure and redraw the entire house. It's quite a bit of pricey work.

Why would a builder do this? They must get this request all the time. It would seem having a set of plans would be very important for many reasons, like emergency plumbing or electrical, etc."

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Here's our current guess: "The builder's plans and the build may not line up perfectly, so the buyer could sue for breach of contract or a similar claim."

Can someone explain?

Here's her most recent thought on the matter if it helps: "Lack of inspection during building by project managers [is the problem]. Example: you can option to have a fireplace with two windows on either side. If you opt out of the fireplace, the windows should have been centered on the walls adjacent to this area. My client's living room is completely unbalanced and odd looking because this wasn't done, which I had to hide with some fancy drapery "magic" that was expensive. This was on a 'luxury' home."