Five years after contracting with Nova Homes of South Florida to build a home, a North Naples couple agreed to settle a lawsuit after withholding their last payment due to six structural problems that prompted Collier County to revoke the home’s certificate of occupancy.
Homeowners Monika and Paul Gatto settled for an undisclosed sum with Nova Homes of South Florida late last month, court records show, and Nova Homes’ appeal to the state’s Sixth District Court of Appeal was closed Aug. 1.
Monika Gatto and Eric Pacheco, of Nova Homes, declined comment, saying only that it was “amicably” settled.
The Gattos’ home in Livingston Woods involved work by Naples designer Dave Wainscott, who used fraudulent architectural seals owned by deceased architect Leonard LaForest and Gene Cravillion, 91, who has been in a North Naples memory care facility since August 2022 and began his cognitive decline in 2012. Wainscott’s letters to the county show he lied to county officials and said Cravillion attended an X-ray inspection at the Gattos’ home.
County records show outside footings, which distribute the weight of a building evenly, preventing uneven settling or sinking, are missing. One side of the 5,472-square-foot home extends 4 inches over the slab. A kitchen beam supporting the second floor is 4 feet too short and as a result, a column was built in the wrong location without a proper footing. That footing was installed 4 feet away, where the original column should be.
The lanai’s off-set tie beam — used to provide stability and prevent columns from buckling or leaning — is made of plywood, not reinforced concrete. And large custom windows Monika Gatto ordered for her home office, family room and loft are 14-16 inches smaller — not what the couple paid for.
The couple spent their life savings, $415,000 for the land and $852,817 for the custom-home contract, mostly covered by the sale of their prior home. Costs escalated due to numerous change orders and litigation. Nova Homes’ contracts require buyers to go through binding arbitration, a process that often favors builders — and ensures prospective buyers can’t vet builders or know about lawsuits. It was Nova Homes that sued the couple for their final payment.
In May 2024, the arbitrator ordered the couple to pay Nova Homes $82,014.24, including $42,140.85 — the last payment they’d withheld due to structural problems — and Nova Homes’ legal fees. That was in addition to the Gattos’ own attorney fees.
The next month, 21 months after the CO was issued, Collier County revoked the home’s CO, finding it was issued in “error,” had structural issues and didn’t comply with the Florida Building Code. As a result, the Gattos appealed the ruling, arguing it was based on the home receiving a CO.
In January, Collier Circuit Judge Ramiro Mañalich set aside the ruling, citing the revoked CO. Nova Homes then appealed to the state DCA, contending the Gattos had a “mere disagreement” with the arbitrator’s decision and were “trying to obtain a different result.”
Each month, the home is issued a temporary CO while they waited for Nova Homes to fix six structural conditions that engineers’ reports — and more recent ground-penetrating radar X-rays — show didn’t match approved plans.
Monika Gatto testified at several county Contractors Licensing Board hearings, prompting the board to revoke Nova Homes’ permit-pulling privileges this year. After that, Nova Homes incorporated another business, Nova Homes Group Inc. and a relative of two Nova Homes officials was applying to be a qualifier. County officials hadn’t responded by press time to emails seeking comment on how the settlement affects the CLB case.
