Thought for the Holidays

Trials, temptations, disappointments -- all these are helps instead of hindrances, if one uses them rightly. They not only test the fiber of a character, but strengthen it. Every conquered temptation represents a new fund of moral energy. Every trial endured and weathered in the right spirit makes a soul nobler and stronger than it was before.
James Buckham

For Thanksgiving

Drop the question what tomorrow may bring, and count as profit every day that fate allows you.
Horace

Quote for Election Day

"If you want to be happy, set a goal that commands your thoughts, liberates your energy, and inspires your hopes."
Andrew Carnegie

In these times - quote to remember

If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability.
Henry Ford

To be a hero

You don't have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things - to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals.
Sir Edmund Hillary

If you can dream it....

"Don't be afraid of the space between your dreams and reality. If you can dream it, you can make it so."
Belva Davis

A quote for the start of October

"Victory belongs to the most persevering."
Napoleon

Read about Napoleon I of France

A quote for this day

"He, who every morning plans the transactions of the day, and follows that plan carries a thread that will guide him through a labyrinth of the most busy life."
Victor Hugo

September 18, 2008 - thought for today

"Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved."
Winston Churchill

For 9/11

"To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream,
not only plan, but also believe."
Anatole France

A Quote for Friday

"Yesterday's failures are today's seeds that
must be diligently planted to be able to
abundantly harvest tomorrow's successes."
Author Unknown

Labor Day Thought

A mind always employed is always happy. This is the true secret, the grand recipe, for felicity. Thomas Jefferson

Web Site Makeover Complete - Autumn Is Coming

We've redone one of our web sites and although it's been online a year, it definitely looks new!

Jorge Casimiro

Fall will be here soon....

"Winter is an etching, spring a watercolor, summer an oil painting and autumn a mosaic of them all."
- Stanley Horowitz

Words To Live By

Found this online in an article about how to be good:

"Be very careful what you say to people. It can be incredibly affecting to say something thoughtless off the top of your head. A rash judgement, a poorly observed conclusion can resonate forever in someone's life. This is particularly true for children and others with little or no defenses."

Quote For Today

There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a butterfly.
R. Buckminster Fuller

A Quote for the start of August

To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it.
Confucius

by Joyce Carol Oates

"It's where we go,
and what we do
when we get there,
that tells us who we are."

On this Memorial Day

"Liberty is never unalienable; it must be redeemed regularly with the blood of patriots or it always vanishes. Of all the so-called natural human rights that have ever been invented, liberty is the least to be cheap and is never free of cost."

-Robert A. Heinlein

In Reply to Houston Chronicle article by Lise Olsen on 4/27/08 “Owners Stuck with Flawed Homes”

To: Whom it May Concern Re: Houston Chronicle article by Lise Olsen on 4/27/08 “Owners Stuck with Flawed Homes”

This article in the Chronicle pulls together some facts, but as is common these days, these tidbits of “factual “information leave out pertinent information that draws the reader to incorrect conclusions. I prefer to call it lying by omission.

Overview : The fact that we are taking care of our customers long after Stature Construction ceased to do business was never mentioned . We are not harmed by any of these lawsuits . Our lawyers have made a lot of money . All of our financial responsibilities have been met and we will continue to do so in the future as always .

Facts: Jordan Fogal - The Fogals refused to go to arbitration while they still owned their home. They refused to let us fix the leak and damage to their home and demanded that we pay them $150,000 cash and repurchase their home.

Result: The Fogals stopped making house payments, had their home foreclosed upon and finally agreed to go to arbitration. At arbitration, the Fogals were awarded $37,308. This is the amount that we estimated would be the worst-case scenario to fix any damage caused to the home. We were willing to fix the home, but actions by the homeowner prevented us from fulfilling our warranty. The arbitrator agreed that the Fogals were only entitled to this amount, less any costs we incurred in defending ourselves against the Fogals’ attempts to sue us as opposed to following the remedies afforded to them under state law. The actual amount owed to the Fogals after offsets made by the arbitrator is approximately $26,500. Make no mistake, it is and remains the Fogals’ intention to bring about a change in the laws in the State of Texas. Conversely, it is our opinion, that the Fogals’ actions actually favor the current laws.

Fact: The Fogals haven’t been paid the $37,308.

Full Truth: The Fogals’ attorneys have appealed the decision of the arbitrator and the money is sitting with our attorney pending the appeal. The actual amount owed is approximately $26,500.

Fact: Two couples are expected to go to trial in May.

Full Truth: Both couples are not original purchasers of their homes from Stature Construction and their issues are minor. Our attorneys have advised us that there will be minimal, if any, financial impact. Because they are subsequent purchasers there is a strong chance that they will not even be granted legal standing.

Fact: Sarah Reid Ford, mentioned in the article, never purchased a home from Stature Construction.

Fact: Stature Construction does warranty work on homes that were purchased directly from Stature Construction. Stature Construction has not and never will back away from our legitimate obligations under the warranty provided to any original purchaser.

Fact: The Better Business Bureau rejected both companies from the BBB.

Full Truth: Stature Construction and Tremont Custom Construction Company both chose not to arbitrate our contracts with the BBB. Our written contracts with the home buyers call for arbitration with AAA arbitration. Since we chose not to abide by this requirement of the BBB, we along with several other builders, namely, David Weekley Homes, Perry Homes, etc. were forced to leave the BBB.

Conclusion : Our lawyers advised us not to speak to the reporters since they would slant the story anyway. We are sorry for any inconvenience that this may have caused. We value our business relationships and our reputations.

Respectfully ,
Jorge Casimiro
And on behalf of our other 2,583 satisfied homeowners

How fast are your actions?

Try this test:

Sheep Dash!


"Tiredness can affect your reaction times. See how alert you are with this game and test the impact of a cup of tea or coffee on your performance."

Two Business quotes for April 3rd

Great opportunity is usually disguised as unsolvable problems.
Gretchen G. Clement

A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man
contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.
Antoine De Saint-Exupery

From the late Arthur C. Clarke...

"The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible."
Arthur C. Clarke

44 BC - Julius Caeser - Beware the Ides of March

Caesar summoned the Senate to meet in the Theater of Pompey on the Ides of March. A certain seer warned Caesar to be on his guard against a great peril on the day of the month of March which the Romans call the Ides; and when the day had come and Caesar was on his way to the senate-house, he greeted the seer with a jest and said: "The Ides of March has come," and the seer said to him softly: "Yes, the Ides of March has come, but it has not passed."

As the Senate convened, Caesar was attacked and stabbed to death by a group of senators who called themselves the "Liberators"; they justified their action on the grounds that they committed tyrannicide and were preserving the Republic from Caesar's alleged monarchical ambitions.

Joy

“Enjoy life. This is not a dress rehearsal.”

Anon

Happiness

The truest greatness lies in being kind, the truest wisdom in a happy mind.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Two good thoughts for this day, March 1, 2008

Character is what a person is in the dark.

Great minds discuss ideas;
Average minds discuss events;
Small minds discuss people.

Thoughtful quote for today from Jorge Casirimro

"Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in getting up every time we do."
Confucious (551BC - 479 BC)

A bit of history about Jorge Casimiro

In 1996, former President George H.W. Bush presented Mr. Casimiro with perhaps his finest honor - the "United States Hispanic Businessman of the Year" Region III award bestowed by the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

Also been listed in Hispanic Business magazine's "Top 100 Fastest Growing Hispanic Owned Businesses” since 1994 and "The 500 Directory of the Nation's Largest Hispanic Owned corporations."

Not bad at all!

Another quote of the day by Zig Ziglar

“Success means doing the best we can with what we have. Success is the doing, not the getting; in the trying, not the triumph. Success is a personal standard, reaching for the highest that is in us, becoming all that we can be.”
Zig Ziglar

Quote for February 17

“The foundation stones for a balanced success are honesty, character, integrity, faith, love and loyalty.”

Zig Ziglar

Quote for February 16

"The secret of a good life is to have the right loyalties and hold them in the right scale of values."
Norman Thomas

Jorge Casimiro's selected quote for today

"Truth is generally the best vindication against slander."
Abraham Lincoln

I have always stood behind my products and have and will repaire problems, but I will not suffer extortion from someone who will not let me examine the problem and be able to create a solution for repair.

"Slander is the revenge of a coward, and dissimulation his defense."

Now is the time

Perhaps now is the time to reply to a few of the remarks being made about Mr. Casimiro on certain message boards, blogs, and open edit web site communities.

These comments are nothing more than another volley in a years-long dispute between various parties, including Mr. Casimiro, that have been dragged through courts and mediated arbitrations and continue to this day. Many of these entries are made in bad faith and are written or posted by people who merely wish to join a band wagon to bad mouth someone. They are usually clueless to the facts, but accept one person’s version of history of the events. They are never given all the facts nor do they bother to research them.

It is much easier to join a crowd and shout “Discredit!” than it is to unearth the true story.

Here we have laid out the “claims” made on these sites and blogs and then detailed as to why they should be ignored, the truth given, not the lies.

In August 2005, Mother Jones exposed Casimiro's business dealings in a 12 page article "Home Sour Home."

This claim says that the Mother Jones article exposed his business dealings in a 12 page article. However, if you actually read the article, it has more to do about one person’s complaints against the “construction-industrial complex” and Texas law requiring arbitration and uses a company my father used to direct as an example. In fact, he is not even quoted in the article. To say that the article “exposed Casimiro’s business dealings in a 12 page article” is quite misleading.

Casimiro was the topic June 12, 2007 in Washington D.C. at the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law “Mandatory Binding Arbitration Agreements: Are They Fair For Consumers?” where Jordan Fogal, "The Lemon Lady" testified against Mr. Casimiro.

An outright exaggeration. Jorge Casimiro was not the topic of this Subcommittee meeting, the concept of arbitration was the topic. Moreover, in the entire testimony totaling almost 6,700 words, Jorge Casimiro is mentioned only once. Further, to say she testified “against Mr. Casimiro” is misleading, she testified against the use of binding arbitration agreements.

In July of 2004, Harris County Judge Robert Eckels appointed Houston-based University Development Inc. CEO Jorge Luis Casimiro to serve on the Harris County Housing Authority which he served on through 2007.

This claim is true.

“The reason for his departure from this board is unknown.”

Cited several times yet this claim have validation. Further, it connotes that there was something afoul with his exit from the Harris County Housing Authority. In fact, he left the Board when his three-year term expired.

Certain persons, repeatedly, copy/paste the same viciousness on open edit sites and communities, message boards, and blogs. No changes, no thoughts, no additional information. Perhaps it is a new type spam bot, sent out, not to create links for Viagra and Cialis, but to bolster the delusions of certain individuals bent on extortion and emotional blackmail.