New home without flooring question

This is the scenario.

This new home did not have any flooring in it. The home is not part of a sub division–just a single home in an old neighborhood.

The builder offered X amount of dollars as an allowance to do the flooring. I got an estimate from their design center on what it would take to do the job and gave myself a buffer(just incase). I got estimates from outside parties and found the job would be done much cheaper–hence giving me more bang for my buck.

Now on the contract offer, the builder agreed to my terms and gave me the allowance I was looking for “to be used at buyer’s discretion”. No mention about “who” would actually do the flooring.

Now here’s the problem. The lender wont close escrow without flooring and I am not being allowed to do the flooring from outside contractors.

And here’s the questions

  1. If the buyer has discretion to use the X dollars as he/she chooses, why am I being forced to use the builder’s flooring?
  2. Can I get out from this contract because the lender wont close the home without flooring and that’s not my fault

My realtor is telling me I have to go ahead with this as there is an allowance which I have to use–period.

Any help would be great.
Thanks
K

Howdy KKTK:

Like Niki says just do it. It won’t matter 100 years from now. What are your plans with the house? Are you leasing it or living in it or what?

If you walk away without doing the floring you will lose your earnest money. The lender wants floors in the house before they loan the money . If you buy a car don’t you want tires and an engine. Put yourself in their shoes.

The builder wants to use their subs because they know their quality, warranty, etc and do not know your guys. You should still be able to get it done yourself but it just is not that big of a deal,

K:
I ran into this problem before. This is what you do. See if the builder will credit you the amount that they were going to pay for carpet and let you go to your own carpet guy. Pretend like if they do not do this, you will have to back out!
Builders are out to sell houses and will work with you.

Best Riches,
Jeff Adam

Once again great advice from both ted and Jeff!!! I agree 100% If you are just going to flip the property I would honestly leave the flooring out and get samples of carpet in your budget and let the new owner pick it out and have installed prior to the closing My thought on this is you may love what they hate and it could be a deal breaker!

And why is it that you don’t just put the carpet in using a credit card as payment. When you get the funds at closing pay off your credit card. If you have dealt with some companies they will even wait for payment until closing.