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Note 2 - Business | 12 Months Ended
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Oct. 31, 2011
Nature of Operations [Text Block] | 2. Business Our operations consist of homebuilding, financial services, and corporate. Our homebuilding operations are made up of six reportable segments defined as Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Midwest, Southeast, Southwest, and West. Homebuilding operations comprise the substantial part of our business, with approximately 97% of consolidated revenues for the years ended October 31, 2011, 2010, and 2009. We are a Delaware corporation, currently building and selling homes in 192 consolidated new home communities in Arizona, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Washington, D.C., and West Virginia. We offer a wide variety of homes that are designed to appeal to first-time buyers, first and second-time move-up buyers, luxury buyers, active adult buyers, and empty nesters. Our financial services operations, which are a reportable segment, provide mortgage banking and title services to the homebuilding operations’ customers. We do not retain or service the mortgages that we originate but rather sell the mortgages and related servicing rights to investors. Corporate primarily includes the operations of our corporate office whose primary purpose is to provide executive services, accounting, information services, human resources, management reporting, training, cash management, internal audit, risk management, and administration of process redesign, quality, and safety. See Note 11 “Operating and Reporting Segments” for further disclosure of our reportable segments.

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- Definition The entire disclosure for the nature of an entity's business, the major products or services it sells or provides and its principal markets, including the locations of those markets. If the entity operates in more than one business, the disclosure also indicates the relative importance of its operations in each business and the basis for the determination (for example, assets, revenues, or earnings). + References Reference 1: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef -Name Statement of Position (SOP) -Publisher AICPA -Number 94-6 -Paragraph 10 -LegacyDoc This reference is SUPERSEDED by the Accounting Standards Codification effective for interim and annual periods ending after September 15, 2009. This reference is included to help users transition from the previous accounting hierarchy and will be removed from future versions of this taxonomy. Reference 2: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/presentationRef -Publisher FASB -Name Accounting Standards Codification -Topic 275 -SubTopic 10 -Section 50 -Paragraph 2 -URI http://asc.fasb.org/extlink&oid=6927468&loc=d3e6003-108592 + Details
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