By Amira Van Leeuwen
BUDA — Whispering Hollow residents are trying to ‘crack’ the code as to why they are having home infrastructure issues.
Paul Tenney is one of the many residents of Whispering Hollow in Buda who have begun noticing cracks spreading throughout his home. The neighborhood was originally built by Ryland Homes, that was bought out by Lennar – a homebuilder that residents have had issues with in the area.
Tenney and his family moved to Buda in 2007 after outgrowing their home in South Austin.
“I was contracting, not around [the are], for quite some time, and the city was doing this water study; they thought it was drainage causing problems here. I was a little upset because here I am next door to the biggest problem that they knew of at the time, and they didn’t even talk to me,” Tenney said, referring to his next-door neighbor, Jimmy Fort, who has been carefully documenting the issues he’s been having for the past several years.
“Then they formed this committee to decide things to do, and none of them were to help the actual homeowners. Nothing the city could come up with was going to help us,” Tenney added. “I don’t have $30,000 to fix a foundation, especially since I don’t think it’s my fault. When there’s a whole section this large affected by it, somebody didn’t do their homework.”
Tenney said he has cracks in the center of his wall going from one end to the other.
“At first, it was just one little one; now there are two cracks real wide,” Tenney said.
One crack in Tenney’s living room occurred just six months after moving in.
“I go by my old house in South Austin. I go ‘well, you know, how's my house look compared to that one? I mean, that one's got no problems. Here, this one's 15 years newer, and it's falling apart,’” Tenney said.
As for Fort, his water level meter states that he has 22 inches of water underneath his home and he is worried his home will collapse.
“This house is not built to have water underneath the slab,” Fort said.
On the peak of Fort’s roof near the chimney, there is a dip in his roof, which he speculates is structural damage in the attic.
Fort also said that he is in a lawsuit with Lennar, but not for the money.
“A wrong was done, and it needs to be corrected,” Fort said.
Mark Venditelli, another resident of Whispering Hollow, has noticed large fissure cracks in his soil.
“I’m talking big cracks that you could lose a small pet in,” Venditelli said.
Venditelli, who purchased his home in 2020, said he called the city and staff told him it was just the nature of the soil and there was nothing they could do. The city went to his home for a site visit around Aug. 30. Venditelli never heard back, so he began to badger them.
Venditelli asked the city worker who mows the retention center’s grass if the city could provide him with a truckload of amended soil to fill the holes himself. But, the city worker said they were unable to do that and repeated the original response: it was just the nature of the soil, and there was nothing they could do.
“That’s not what I was asking,” Venditelli said. “I didn’t say fix the problem; I was asking can you bring me soil. I can fix the problem, but they refused.” So, he went on a trip to Home Depot to buy sand and soil, mixed it up and began dumping it in the cracks himself.
Lennar Homes did not respond to requests for comment.
