Jim U. Living in Forest Springs Townhomes. We moved in 13 years ago. I just had to contact them for an issue with the building settling. We live in an end unit which likely leaves it more prone to settling but this is ridiculous. The common wall between the kitchen and pantry has a huge crack to the extent the pantry door will not even close. Front door has been very difficult to close for close to a year now, obviously another settling issue. There is also a crack on an adjacent wall where a window is installed. In addition we have cracks down the driveway and a fairly wide crack all the way down the middle of the garage floor. I have seen many owners comment on the HVAC system which we had to have repaired numerous times, eventually having to replace it entirely a couple of years ago. Virtually every neighbor we know within a stones throw have all had to replace their system as well. I will report back on the settling issue. read more

Worst builder ever. Cracked walls, cracked crown molding, no base primer paint on walls just one coat, painted horribly. No hot water the first two weeks we moved in, defective dishwasher releasing water all over the new hardwoods, crack hearth on fireplace. Terrible lot, it was not prepped properly, dead sod, drainage issues in the backyard, eroding berm in the back. Worst craftsmanship we have ever seen. Also their workers remove blue tape instead of addressing areas thinking no one would notice. Nothing is leveled, almost like the home was built by a blind 10 year old with no experience. Our project manager was useless they had to bring in another one to finish the job. Home not ready for the closing that THEY scheduled, we postponed until it was ready, it still wasn't ready for the second closing. We were forced to close out of necessity since we were suppose to be out of our other home with the promise that items would be addressed after closing for 1-2 days after....we had men in an out for 3 weeks straight ...ruined our thanksgiving and Christmas. We have built numerous homes from scratch with different builders through the years and this has been the worst experience of our lives. We have never felt this much buyers remorse. Too many situations to list. DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT BUY OR BUILD WITH THIS BUILDER. read more

Update: We were told the only way the flooring could be fixed is by taking up the entire second floor and that the builder wouldn't do that. So basically they told us they know there is a problem but they won't spend the money to fix the problem. Now we have another problem. We're a year and half in and it appear no flashing was put at the J channel where the third car garage meets the main structure of the home. Sent a warranty request and heard nothing did two weeks. My wife emailed the warranty lady directly and she claims she never received the request. Instead of trying to get to the bottom of the issue she just told my wife the warranty ran out already and gave her an email address for the roofing guy that installed the roof. This is a NIGHTMARE!!! Will update once we know what they're going to do. read more

The worst builder ever! They run on pure Bu11sh!t and install inferior product, take no responsibility and are just plain annoying. Of course they blow sunshine up your butt in the beginning but once you're in the home - forgetaboutit!!! Inferior HVAC that breaks down constantly. They do nothing but defer to the installing company who, by the way, went out of business because they didn't know what they were doing. Now, fast forward 5 years - my townhome is sinking. Yes, the floor sloped, the fireplace is separating from the wall and the ceiling in the bedroom is separating. When you walk the floor, you can feel the dip. I was so looking forward to moving into a new home with no problems. HA! read more

A lot is left to be desired with the $320,000 home I bought 2 years ago. 1. AC unit has a tough time cooling the house. It gets the job done, but has to work extra hard. Other home models have 2 units, but this model has 1, why? Probably trying to cut costs. 2. Interior paint done very poorly. 3. GE Microwave is already failing after 2 years........they installed a cheap countertop unit into a space with a mounting kit. You call this a "custom kitchen" ? LMAO 4. Drilled a hole for the main door dead bolt and damaged the door bell voltage wire. Never had a working door bell. Offered to fix it by tearing down some of the wall, I decline. 5. Poor quality door handles. 6. Main door has a glass pane 7. Major drainage issues with rain water on the driveway. They basically installed a bunch of gutters and called it a day. Didn't design anything for drainage........just put everything together in a rush to get their money and disappear. Overall, an average grade builder. Don't expect a lot. Especially not with the drainage. read more

Overall I'd rate them 4 stars but at the moment they are a 1 in my book. We have been living in our home for 17 months. The selection process was good with plenty of options and upgrades. The negotiations went fine, they did quote us one thing and then change it in the end. (we settled in the middle) We really wanted the house, so we moved on. Picking out the counters, colors, lights etc was fun and went very well. The build quality seemed solid, we were able to watch the construction almost daily since we were only moving 10 miles. Derek was our builder and he was excellent start to finish. He answered our questions and explained a lot during the process. This was our first time building a house, so we were very thankful to have him. The bad: They ran our hot water lines the wrong way IMO. The heater is on the 3rd floor. It then loops to the 2nd floor kids bedroom, down to first floor bathroom, over to the kitchen, up to the middle bath on the 2nd floor and finally to the master bedroom. It takes no less then 3 minutes to get hot water in the kitchen and over 5 minutes to get to the master. Common sense says to run the hot water to the high use areas first or to split the hot water lines to both sides of the house. I am not an expert but we waste hundreds of gallons of water each month just waiting for it to get warm. The 2nd issue is a small issue. How they handled it is a big concern. We are/were very forgiving with the builder and we are not picky people at all. We have watched Royal Oakes bend over backwards for some of our neighbors and they tell us all the little things they are having fixed. Most are things we overlooked or didn't care to bring up. When we did our walk through before closing we had an issue with the entry door from the garage and the door between the entry way and kitchen knocking into each other. There was not enough room for both doors to open, so they hit each other. While they were coming up with a solution they removed the door to the kitchen. Ultimately they put stoppers on the kitchen door, so it couldn't open all the way and thus couldn't get in the way of the door to the garage. We were happy with the resolution. Later we found out that the light switch to the entry way is behind the door to the kitchen. (I wish I had a drawing) It makes the switch useless, so our entry way is always dark. Its a good sized entry way with a built in bench, hangers and cubby holes for shoes and items. We waiting until the 11 month walk through to point it out, which is what we were instructed to do with any items we found between months 1 and 11. We did the walkthrough with Mark and he agreed it was a terrible placement. He also explained how easy it would be to move it and he would get back to us. They fixed the other small items throughout the house. Well after 5 months we never heard back from Mark. We asked again about the switch and they said they had no interest in helping because we didn't point it out prior to closing. How could we point it out prior to closing when there was no door in the way due to another issue? If its an easy fix why wouldn't they just handle it? They are replacing driveways, floors and walls for our neighbors! Why did they avoid the issue and never follow up? Between the hot water and being told to pound sand over their mistake I am a bit salty. It sucks after having so many good things to say about Royal Oaks and spending a ton of money on their house to be left hanging. UPDATE: We just had yet another piece of brilliant customer service from their warranty department. We had a window above my daughters tub crack around month 6-7. (12"x48" ish) They replaced it in October and explained its not uncommon to happen due to settling. Well it cracked again. Zero help from Royal Oaks. The once warrantied window is now classified as a "courtesy item" and they are not willing to stand behind their work. I want to believe they read my original review and have blacklisted me from any help. I really hope this is not their standard of business. read more

1/21/18: Drive way problems popped up with a patch Royal Oaks had to install on what was a new driveway, before we even moved in Dec. 2012. Of course they said it was a problem when they saw it recently and of course they wouldn't agree to fix it. Going to eventually cost us thousands to fix on our own. Thought that since we were dealing with less of a cookie cutter builder then Beazer or MI Homes type of builder and paying a LOT MORE money we'd get better service. That was just not the case. We have several complaints but the biggest is the ongoing issue with an HVAC unit that never worked properly when the outdoor temperature got really cold. We asked them to address it when they did some other warranty work at which time they said our unit would only be effected very infrequently. Well this past winter we had at least a dozen occasions where it was cold enough to cause our HVAC to go out. We decided after they wouldn't look at the problem the first time subsequent problems we would fix on our own and send them the bill. Well we found out our HVAC unit was improperly installed by Royal Oaks own sub-contractor via an independent 3rd party HVAC company. We had the 3rd party HVAC company fix the unit and sent the bill to Royal Oaks. Royal Oaks refused to pay the bill for the repair. They're reasoning for refusing to pay was that we didn't give them the chance to look at the unit and/or make the repair themselves. I explained they were given the chance to look at the unit when we asked them to look at it when the initial warranty work was done and they declined. This was the straw that broke the camel's back. I wouldn't even bother writing a review if not for the issue with the HVAC but now that we've crossed that bridge I'll also mention several other problems we had to deal with. We never got a promised sound system and they installed the wrong porch columns. We let both items slide because the move in date was already delayed by three months and tried to be good partners hoping the goodwill would be reciprocated. That didn't happen. They also tried to deny us a sink that was in the blue prints. We asked for the whole porch to be created out of composite decking, they only did the floor. That is my fault for not reviewing the paperwork closely enough after they slipped in a change to what they would do. If you pay that much money for a house you should get a better level of service. read more

This is not how Royal oaks building group really is. Their customer service is bar none the worst in the home building experience. They have maintained the fact that we didn't maintain a yard that is unmaintainable as they put our "Bermuda starter grass" during the winter storm of 2015. That along with the massive amounts of rain and dry air have made it where even the best golf courses and landscapers had trouble. They never planted a seed in our back yard until the one year checkup in which they put in starter yard "summer rye" which is dying before we have even hit 90 degrees yet. I have personally watched them replace two different side yards of my direct neighbors who had the same problem, yet because we are a younger couple they think we wouldn't take this to the media and BBB. Our entire yard, with as much work as we have put into it, still looks terrible. Why? Because it is on dead clay below our "Bermuda" and "rye". Today's excuse for not replacing it was with what they sent with the landscaping in the contract and it states there is a deficiency of standing water still remains after 24 hours of rain. I have sent numerous videos and pictures of standing water in the side yard and back yard days after the storms have passed. I have told them that we will take this to litigations and they think this is a joke. They just built new homes and their starter yard looks like what we have requested since day one. They now have built the model home with Bermuda through the whole entire yard, which will be false advertising as this is not what you will get. My main concern is the fact that they think our yard is not maintained, only after we complained for over a year. We cannot maintain a yard that is built on dead grass and clay. We have tried and spent 1,000 of dollars on weed n feed, landscaping, numerous mows, and weed killing. The yard cannot be grown as it is dead. They obviously know how much it will cost if we were to be awarded a yard that was planted the way it should ( see the model home) this is exactly why they are putting the blame on the purchaser and not the seller. We are not the first house to complain about this, but they have multiple excuses that blame it on the homeowner, when in fact they never had anything feasible to work with to have a "maintained yard". I have read all the BBB complaints and they always deflect and put blame on the homebuyer. At what point is enough is enough? Be like any other builder and do your job correct and there will not be an issue this substantial. Sincerely, an upset homeowner who wishes they didn't choose "Royal oaks" do not take the long winded post for a joke, we are upset and will continue to let people know the issues we have had with this builder. Royal oaks and their terrible customer service will deflect back to the home buyer and say we have not maintained our yard, when we have maintained the best we could on a dead yard. You can see it with other lots that they built and created land space on places that weren't condusive to plant grass on. We had a complete mud pit for over a year and were told to wait until our one year warranty, in which the builder took the cheap approach and put summer rye grass which is already dying. Just as they have done with other yards here, we want the Bermuda replaced. It CANNOT be maintained because the entire yard is DEAD. It has been DEAD since we moved in and that was noted when they built during the coldest season that even the best golf course could not "maintain" their yard. We are not the first people to complain about the yards, but we are the only one they have refused to replace. We have watched them replace the entire Bermuda on numerous yards in person after constant complaints. I fully expect as I have read on here and about the business that they will deflect all on is as the buyer, but the irony is the HOA who we have NOTHING to do with sent us a letter stating we needed to re-plant our grass as it was dead and when Royal oaks and their terrible customer service will deflect back to the home buyer and say we have not maintained our yard, when we have maintained the best we could on a dead yard. You can see it with other lots that they built and created land space on places that weren't condusive to plant grass on. We had a complete mud pit for over a year and were told to wait until our one year warranty, in which the builder took the cheap approach and put summer rye grass which is already dying. Just as they have done with other yards here, we want the Bermuda replaced. It CANNOT be maintained because the entire yard is DEAD. It has been DEAD since we moved in and that was noted when they built during the coldest season that even the best golf course could not "maintain" their yard. We are not the first people to complain about the yards, but we are the only one they have refused to replace. We have watched them replace the entire Bermuda on numerous yards in person after constant complaints. read more

Royal Oaks Homes - Dead yard never planted by builder - Home Developers Near Me - Raleigh, North Carolina

Could have been a great process but after we closed on our house all the issues began. Lots of cosmetic issues, paint all over everything. Very disappinted because some things could have been caught by our project manager before we did our final walk. Had some other major issues going on but to long to write out. House appears to look great but could have had more attention to detail. Warranty dept has been great at sending the appropriate crews out. We've had people in and out for a year now since we closed, now thats sad. We need to get to a point where we can enjoy this major family purchase. read more

The only reason I have given this company one star is because I had to check something in order to write this review, otherwise I wouldn't even rate them as a one star. Our experience with this company has been less than ideal. We do like our house, however there are parts where you can tell cheap material is used. We had to be on top of everything with this building process. They installed wrong fans, wrong faucets, built the footprint of our house wrong, etc. Items that we upgraded in the house were not put in and we had to correct this multiple times. The carpet that we upgraded to a higher level than what is included sheds terribly. It leaves bald spots whenever you vacuum and at the thresholds with the hardwood floor it was poorly placed and I can pick it up and see the concrete slab underneath. NOT IMPRESSED. The preferred lender that they used was one of the worse in the business. We went with their lender because of the plus for closing costs. The lender was still asking for paperwork the day before and of our closing, needless to say we closed late. We left this group and refinanced ASAP. At our one year walk through they did surprise us. They fixed multiple things that day. Due to the bad weather at the time, a few things that needed to be fixed on the roof and siding needed to be rescheduled. The man that did our walk through said he would open up another ticket and have these things fixed. After three weeks of not hearing from anyone, I called the warranty department to check on this process. This took several phone calls prior to having my call returned. Whenever my call was returned, no one had any idea that I still needed items fixed. Items that I had signed off on with the representative from royal oaks. Two months after my walk through I am still being given the run around about when these items will be completed and am still not having my calls returned. Overall, some of the employees that we dealt with were great, such as the agent that sold us the property. Aside from that, I am less than impressed with the company. Check around before you decide to use this building group or if you go with them be ready to watch and make sure your floor plan is built correctly and the selections you choose are correct when installed. read more

We bought our house in 2014. Since then the AC sub contractor has gone out of business and the ac in my house is crappies out again. We have had issues since the beginning and royal oaks has done nothing to fix the issue still..... RUN AWAY AS FAST AS YOU CAN. read more

26 July 2018. Royal Oaks decided to sell our lot to another family without contacting us to explain there decision. We addressed our concern with the regional supervisor and she stated that they were following their SOP. She also stated that they did not have all of the facts when they made their decision. If you are smart, you will contact the other custom builders in the neighborhood. They will ensure that you do not go through the same emotional rollercoaster we went through. read more

Lived in a Royal Oaks home for a year now. Problem after problem. They are helpful for the first year of the warranty but after that they don't want to know you. Concrete cracked already. Many other problems. Stay away! They are a just get it done as fast as you can without caring about craftsmanship! read more

Moisture issues and mold appeared under our brand new home in less than 12 months; They refuse to fix the problem and apparently we're not alone. But, a fury is about to be unleashed on these guys! Lot's of moisture issues with Royal Oaks construction. And, they were very rude when asked to remedy the situation. Not going to mention names here, but I wonder how these guys sleep at night. read more

These homes might look great at first but within 6/8 months of settling they start cracking everywhere, glue is coming up from the pergo flooring, tons of soft spots from bubbling. Painters missed spots everywhere and have gotten paint splatter on the lighting hardware and flooring. They left windows open too long during construction some of the white paint is stained a rusty red color. The weather strips on doors started to fray, front door doesn't fit properly I can see outside on the left corner. The paint is cheap, when I was cleaning the baseboards with mild soap and damp cloth, paint started coming off. Bathroom cabinets are not even and are a cheap material. The garage door wall switch broke. The home was wired wrong in the living room and masterbedroom, some outlets weren't even connected, dryer was hooked up wrong. The electrical box was labeled wrong too left & rights were mixed. we had electrician out to fix and he could not fix it all. We now have wall switches that do nothing and they cannot figure it out. The heating /AC broke down 2x, whole thermostat had to be switched out. The neighbors had to have all their windows redone. The window blinds do not fit properly and cannot be opened all the way. They forgot to put in some window screens. The vent in my bathroom started rusting and the wall above the shower cracked in the first 8 months. I have to shower with window open because the fan isn't strong enough and I fear mold. The shower door was put on backwards. The nails/bolts are cracking thru the walls. The bathroom mirror downstairs and upstairs had scratches on them. I noticed it when I was cleaning the installation workers finger prints off the mirrors. The stair baseboard is cracking now after 1yr. The cement driveway/sidewalks/back patio are chipped and had started cracking (before the cold weather). This is happening in another neighborshood by Royal Oaks. I walk with a friend and its awful, they were notified and would not fix it. They blame the weather. The workers leave the roads filthy of silt, rocks and other debris. The yard fill has so much construction trash, bottle caps and medium sized rocks. The grass will not grow properly after seeding/watering. We cannot mow. The mower shot 2 rocks at our home so we trim across what little does grow with a weed eater or hedge trimmers. They only sod the front. I have been talking with a few neighbors and they have some of these similar problems. Do yourself a favor and make a friend who is stuck owning a Royal Oaks home that has been lived in so you will see the truth. Save your money and buy older homes the quality is a lot better. I will say I've seen better quality materials used in the Portofino neighborhood in Clayton NC. Unfortunately for most those prices are unobtainable. read more

We bought a home from Royal Oaks in 2015 and found that they used upgraded materials like the foil covered roofing wood and upgraded cabinets. We later developed some very serious AC problems, due to the original installers errors they saw to it that all the problems were fixed. We would recommend considering them for a home. read more

Tina King (sales agent) was absolutely amazing in our home buying process!!! :) highly recommend working with her!! We are 4 months into our new home, and have not had any major problems with the house or builder. Any warranty issues we have had they addressed, and resolved in a timely manner. I personally would build again with Royal Oaks and highly recommend them to others :) read more

We bought a home with Royal Oaks in Cary NC and our overall experience was very positive. The option selection and upgrade process was very smooth. They were very responsive to our needs and came back quickly to any requests we might have. We have been in the house for 6 months now and have not experienced any issues so far. read more

Where do I begin to start? Royal Oaks Building group has now responded to our numerous and I mean NUMEROUS complaints about the yard. Ironically enough today, I was contacted by 2 other neighbors who have the EXACT same problems and the same issues with the responses from Royal Oaks. I honestly do not think at this point it is the company that is to blame, but the individual to whom they have answering their social media and BBB complaints. We have given many notices that the yard is NOT up to industry standards. We have pictures from the day we moved in. Royal Oaks has admitted as has any weather information you can read that during the time they did this "starter lawn" was during a time of terrible weather despair. It was one of the coldest winners, followed by one of the most seasonably wet springs and a dry summer. This left ALL landscape throughout the triangle with many problems. They stated that we should wait until our 1 year warranty look to which they would fix the problems. In the meantime we did basic lawn maintenance, spent 100's of dollars on landscaping and landscapers all to no avail as the yard was self-made on a hill that did NOT exist until Royal Oaks began building. You can look into Clayton town codes and Johnston county as well as they are building houses behind ours now. They will have the exact same problems. We have a neighbor two doors down who said she spoke with the lawn people on numerous attempts that these issues would occur from her yard, WAY before we ever moved into our residence. If you look at every response that this company has been notified of via the BBB they have responded back with all blame on the purchaser and taking NO accountability. Again, I do not believe now that it is the company but the person they are allowing to handle this. Please see below for the next excerpt. "The owner signed a contract to purchase the home in January 2015 and closed on the purchase in February 17, 2015. One of the documents in the contract is the Drainage and Landscape Warranty (attached). This document explains both drainage and landscaping to the buyer including maintenance responsibilities they will be required to complete after home ownership. You will see this was reviewed with the owner and signed on 1-9-2015." They are correct but in the guidelines it specifically states that if water is still standing 24 hours after rain that there is a deficiency in the yard. Our yard sometimes still has standing water 2-4 days later, not 24 hours later! We have now been notified we are not the only yard that has this issue. We have personally watched the two neighbors complain to the point of exhaustion until Royal Oaks finally re planted their Bermuda, during a normal season and it looks beautiful. Why? Because it was done when it is not snowing and there are no weather issues. Royal Oaks said our yard looked fine and was in great growing shape, UNTIL we decided to complain about this in which now they said it has not been maintained. The irony in all this is, we told them how the grass would not grow and the weeds would not kill because of how the yard was sodded. Royal Oaks is taking the cheap approach to this situation and trying to do anything in their power not to fix a problem that they know is costly. Our entire yard is garbage and has NOTHING to do with our maintaining of it as we maintained every yard we have ever had and nothing has been this terrible, ever. If Royal Oaks wants to continue to peruse the idea of putting blame on the home buyer then they should keep from trying to decline and delete any comments online about their reputation. You can read on the BBB page and it is terrible. Their responses to home owners is terrible, never once taking care of one issue out of the 7 I found in the last year, not ONE. Always putting the blame on the owner of the home. That is unfathomable Once again they are correct below with what I will attach, but you cannot have a drainage concern until AFTER you see how a yard reacts to rain and weather. There is no way to know that a yard will flood to the extent that is does. There is NO way. You might say you have no concerns, but the first time it rained, we raised the concern and rather than take care of it they deflected to the town of Clayton rather than take responsibility. "he Pre-Construction Orientation is completed with every buyer regardless of stage. It allows the buyer and the builder to review many items and for the buyer to acknowledge in writing that those specific item were reviewed with them. In this case, the pre-construction orientation was completed on 2/10/2015 and the owner signed acknowledging she had reviewed everything and specifically stated she had NO drainage concerns." Let me now show how once again the "person" who is handling these requests takes personal jabs at anyone who complains about what they have done. To note, we have numerous professionals who have attempted to help us with this "starter yard" yet read more