Jeff Rutt, the founder and CEO, started Keystone Custom Homes out of Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1992. He worked for ten years as a dairy farmer, before deciding he would prefer a career with lower risk and fewer hours. He gained experience in the housing market after working in real estate for several years. When founding his own homebuilding company, he teamed with three local builders to expand his knowledge of the homebuilding industry.

Jeff Rutt gained a strong work ethic and values during his time as a dairy farmer. He transferred those skills into Keystone Custom Homes to create what it is today. They started with selling twelve homes in their first six months, and now they build in over forty communities in south central Pennsylvania and northern Maryland.

Keystone makes the home-buying process less stressful for its customers, particularly during the selection process. Around 2001, they began using a web program called KeyChoices to let buyers browse more through more than 50,000 options. There are photos and each option is pre-priced to make their choices extremely easy and straightforward.

“From our standpoint, it’s convenient because we don’t have to spend the time going through and pricing everything,” says Jeff Rutt. “From the [buyer’s] standpoint, it’s huge because they don’t have to pay for something they don’t want.

In 1997 Jeff Rutt founded HOPE International, a Christian faith-based, nonprofit organization across 16 countries. In 2008, Rutt received the Hearthstone Builder Humanitarian Award for his activities associated with HOPE International. With the help of several other builders, they have built over sixty homes so far for charity.

Jeff Rutt also led Keystone Custom Homes to win the America’s Best Builder Award three times. They were the first ones to ever win the prestigious award three times, winning in 1998, 2002, and 2005. They are also in the top 100 homebuilders in the nation, out of a staggering 200,000 members.

The award is judged based on finances and operations, customer service and quality, design and construction, community and industry service, and marketing. Seeing how Jeff Rutt and his team excel in all of these areas, you will be in great hands when you work with Keystone Custom Homes.