The home was completely restored during that summer, just after discovery and repair of the first problem. (document copy). Unfortunately, the heat pump once again produced soot and low level CO as soon as heating was used again the following winter season. Only then we knew a bigger problem had yet to be found.

A more precise digital CO detector had been added to the home by then, as was strongly suggested by our doctor. We chose a detector the provided monitoring protection of both high and low level CO. CO isn't detectible by our home's existing built in smoke alarms. Even basic home CO detectors, which we didn't have, would have only served to set off evacuation alarms during dangerously high levels. They do not typically provide any warning for long term low level exposure, which still can become dangerous. CO can be cumulative in the human body with frequently repeated long term low level exposure. It can still cause negative health symptoms and permanent cellular damage.

However, unbeknownst to us that following heating season, our new CO detector had been disconnected by restoration crews, and was not initially working when heating was first used. Only after we began questioning why our health problems returned just as before, in what we thought was a repaired house, and soot was again slowly covering our new home restoration, I discovered the new CO detector had been unplugged.

Its battery backup was removed, probably because it makes a loud (annoying) chirping sound with the backup battery left in, as a warning that its primary wall outlet power has failed, or in this case it was unplugged to get it out of the way buy painters. It detected low level CO in the home within about an hour of being plugged back in. We immediately turned the heat off, even though there was an ice storm going on outside at that time, and we had no other heat source. The repeat of soot damage was already done by the time we realized we still had a heating problem (pictured throughout this website).

It is important to note, smoke alarms and CO detectors are not the same thing. Fatal levels of CO can occur in a home without setting off most home's built in smoke alarms. When using the heat pump before the separately purchased CO detector was installed it did occasionally set off the home's built in smoke alarms. But this only occurred on the initial startup of heat during each fall/winter season. We were told this was normal. However the currently repaired HVAC system no longer does this, nor does it ever cause any detectable CO under any circumstances.

Most of us have experienced the burning odor that does occur when an electric or gas heat system is first used if it has been off for an extended period of time. To some extent this is probably normal. Usually this occurs because airborne dust has accumulated on the heating coils over weeks or months of non-use. It quickly burns away harmlessly for the most part, on the first restart of a new heating season. Some smoke and low level Co may be present, but it dissipates too quickly to do substantial damage to home and health. However, this burn off cycle was happening in our heating system every single time it restarted, which was often several times through the day and night. It didn't set off an alarm each time, but it did create measurable CO, which is odorless and colorless, and can only be recognized by a detector.

The typical reoccurring CO levels present in our home didn't trigger an emergency "evacuation" alarm, but CO was detected persistently in low levels coming directly from the heat pump ducts, before repairs were made. Everything was again gradually destroyed by the same soot damage just as before. Ten of thousands of dollars in home restoration from soot damage was all destroyed again.

Although there were four contributing mistakes made by both the heat pump/HVAC installers and attic insulation installers, the unsealed attic return duct was the only actual criminal building code violation (documentation). Had this been done correctly and up to code, it would have prevented what would become devastating losses and damages. As it was, the home was built to inevitably self destruct.  

Had the attic been sealed before adding blown cellulose insulation was put in, this too could have prevented catastrophic damages. IMO, Ryan Homes operational efforts to use a minimum of time and cheap materials for profit or cost savings, were the primary cause of the destruction of our home. As volume builders, Ryan Homes may build cheaper than most, but IMO, that may just mean built cheaply. For us, it would have been much better to spend a little more making sure our home was built right, than absorbing hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses for having a "cheaply" built home.

People often say they get a better experience with Ryan Homes by frequently checking up on the job site, and staying involved with the process. The only way a home buyer could have seen the problems with our home in advance was to have been always on-site, or hired someone full time to supervise the job site. We neither had the time or resources to do so, and It was mistakenly assumed Ryan Homes competently manages their own job sites, and that's part of what you pay them for when you buy their homes.

 

A NOT SO HAPPY ENDING

Once repaired, the system was very carefully checked and tested to be certain it was actually fixed, before a second restoration was attempted. However, the lack of timely support, loss of needed financial recovery for damages, and strained resources from the previous restoration caused the damages to shift into a much bigger issue of mold, or toxic mold.

The cellulose and soot build up in the HVAC system damaged the normal operation of the system, though it was used only for home cooling after CO was detected when used for heating. There was no reason to think it was also unsafe for cooling too. Our homeowners association doesn't allow window A/C units because it interferes with the cosmetic appearance of the homes, so there was little choice at the time. Temperatures in the upper floor of the home exceeded 100F in summer with no A/C on.

Oily soot, mixed with cellulose dust, had restricted and eventually clogged the A/C condenser drain pipe. When the condenser pan first overflowed, the surrounding black coated insulation inside the air handler acted like a sponge, holding and hiding a huge amounts of excess water run off. When the drain pan became completely blocked, it eventually produced so much overflow that it spread outside the system onto the carpeting, and finally became externally visible. Even then, the area of wet carpeting was adjacent to the washer and hot water heater as a possible leak sources, and it wasn't obvious where water was coming from until a constant stream was seen coming from the air handler. 

The constantly water logged fiberglass in the air handler was also covered with blown cellulose (shredded paper) insulation from the attic. This created an ideal home for mold spores to reproduce and grow into large mold colonies, that were completely hidden behind the heat pump's service panel. The unit and duct work had been cleaned professionally several (3) times just before this particular failure occurred. It is my contention that the oily soot in the condenser drain pipe would not respond to common HVAC drain cleaners that had recently been used during repairs and restoration. With great care, a strong drain cleaner that would break through grease clogged drains was in fact required to clear the pipe. Such de-cloggers are damaging to the aluminum used in most, if not all a/c condensers, and generally should not be used for this purpose. 

 

During the time of hidden mold exposure I developed a tumor, and my significant other developed Hashimotos syndrome, among other symptoms. This was during the most toxic period inside the home, with near 24 hour per day exposure. Suffice to say we became severely ill, and knew nothing about toxic molds at that time. Other permanent health damages followed, due to what we believe was primarily Aspergillus mold, though several molds variants were detected in a test, that showed mycotoxin producing mold spores.

The home was evacuated for three and one half years due to negative health symptoms it clearly caused when occupied, even for short periods of time. Since our resources were strapped buy failed repair attempts, I was doing repairs on my own as much as possible. I and anyone who spent time in the home experienced negative health symptoms. Disposal of contaminated items, cleaning, and ozone gas shock treatments eventually killed mold symptoms before restoration began. There are still no official government guidelines to handling mold or toxic mold, as of this writing.

 

We had an attorney, who filed a suit to recover damages, but he intentionally omitted Ryan Homes in the suit, and he refused to have the suit he did file served. He essentially blocked us from filing or serving any suit until statutes on filing a suit expired. He further lied to the Virginia State Bar to avoid a scheduled prosecution hearing. Disbarment is typically automatic when an attorney allows his client's legal statutes to expire while under a binding contract to handle their case. He later tried to join with Ryan Homes in a threat to sue us for slander. Even his allegation was legally incorrectly stated, and he violated federal copyright laws to make the allegations. made by both parties were clearly false, and no real action beyond threats was taken by either party.  

A Ryan Homes representative reviewed documentation and photos of the defects and damages prior to the home becoming mold infested. The Ryan Homes representative stated that regardless of fault, Ryan Homes would take no action or responsibility whatsoever to remedy the situation, and then sent a letter demanding they be allowed to do an inspection of our home so that they could "formally state" their pre-decided no fault position. Had any repair support been offered at the time Ryan Homes was contacted by registered mail, toxic mold and loss of habitability could have been averted.

No inspection occurred, due to those pre-set terms.  Ryan Homes official public position about our issue is, they didn't get to inspect the home, and thus use that as a blanket waiver for any wrong doing. NVR, Ryan Homes parent company, has shown up frequently in website log reports, with thousands of hits recorded from NVR servers.

The inability to get timely restoration through legitimate legal recourse, homeowners insurance, or Ryan Homes customer support, directly contributed to the toxic mold contamination that ultimately made the house uninhabitable, and caused permanent, life long health damages to all who resided in the home.

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Three opinions about the Ryan Homes situation:

Ryan Homes made three serious mistakes, though the mistakes have proven profitable and harmless to Ryan Homes.

First, several shoddy hidden construction methods became evident throughout the home over time, but the HVAC code violation became the most devastating financial and health damaging error. A number of careless errors combined with the code violation to cause critical damage to the home and occupants.

Second, there appeared to be overt and covert manipulation of the justice system to dodge liability on the part of Ryan Homes. Ryan Homes effort to remove themselves in general from facing any homebuilder liabilities, over-insulated them from a valid fundamental form of legal recovery from their negligence. To this day, mandatory binding arbitration is required to buy a Ryan Homes, solely for the purpose of keeping Ryan Homes out of court for criminal negligence and to shield their operations from real consequential legal liabilities. IMO, they also use several other more subverted methods to dodge liabilities and criminal negligence as standard operating procedure, wherever they operate. 

Third, Ryan Homes threatened their victim overtly and indirectly to resolve, or rather, eliminate evidence of their mistakes. Ryan Homes only tried to make us go away to resolve the problems they created. At no point did any one from Ryan Homes or NVR offer any genuine support or remedy whatsoever toward recovery from damages they were responsible for. I believe it is a primary goal for Ryan Homes to make most victims invisible or discredit them otherwise, so that satisfied customers stand nearly alone on the spotlight of their published customer experience. Ryan Homes attempted to make us cower into the "invisible victims" column; A tactic that almost certainly insured we would never do so. 

 

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