Director of Operations of the Tyler Area Builders Association Holly Lewis conducts a training class on how to use a phone application for the Parade of Homes event that will kick-off this upcoming weekend. 

It’s an important year to celebrate the Parade of Homes for Kerry Hamblett of Hamblett Construction Management, LLC, which has been a homebuilder in the East Texas area for about 15 years.

Past president of the Tyler Area Builders Association and current area vice president for the Texas Association of Builders, Hamblett is participating in his first parade this year.

His daughter Hailee Graham began helping him with design, which he said is mostly the reason why he is in the parade.

“My parade house is her design, so she got to see it come to fruition and she loves it, it’s beautiful. I think she has helped me to step up my game as a builder, so that’s been the most fulfilling to me, is working with my daughter Hailee,” Hamblett said.

He said he is proud that although she has a family of her own in Austin, she comes back to Tyler often to make sure everything is done right.

“The parade is highly stressful for the builders. I kind of recognize that, the requirement is that it has to be move-in ready on the day before the parade starts. That means that you have to be finished. It’s very doable if you start early enough,” Hamblett said.

Although he made the deadline, Hamblett was affected by the snowstorm this year, which delayed his start for another three weeks. Recent rainfall has also affected finishing the homes.

“For the parade builders, it’s been a struggle all around because this is just a different, new world we’re living in kind of,” Hamblett said.

On Tuesday morning, builders, along with sponsors and members of the Tyler Area Builders Association, got to celebrate their hard work by gathering for a ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the opening of this year’s 68th annual Parade of Homes that will begin Saturday, June 5 until June 13.

Mayor of Bullard Pam Fredrick was also in attendance to celebrate the new 11 homes being shown at the parade.

Parade of Homes is a way for builders to display their talents, giving consumers an opportunity to see new and remodeled homes and the latest technology. She said it also introduces new areas that are developing across East Texas.

Executive Vice President of TABA, Libby Simmons, said builders are typically at the homes, so it’s a good way to go out and see what’s out there.

“We love to share that a portion of our ticket sales from our parade go to charities that are selected by our committees, and this year, it is Kingdom Life Academy and Tyler North Academy and they will receive proceeds after the parade is over to help their organizations,” Simmons said.

Tickets are now available online, available for purchase between now through Saturday. People are also able to go to any of the homes on Saturday morning and purchase a ticket there.

Simmons said that with a purchase of a ticket, the person would receive a magazine with a map of all of the homes available for viewing.

“You really are going to expect to see everything. We have homes ranging from 2,400 feet to 4,000 square feet and different price ranges. Some of the homes are already sold, some are available for sale, but each home will have its own special flair and you can see different elevations, you can see different lighting features, different windows, now there’s all these smart homes, so you’re going to see just a variety of things at all the homes,” Simmons said.

Homes range from Tyler, to Bullard, to Chandler and all over East Texas.

“We like to celebrate the fact that we keep our addresses private until today, when we open up ticket sales, to create excitement and curiosity, so the ribbon cutting kicks off the ticket sales and they started today, and will run through the week,” Simmons said.

Simmons said that this year, builders have been working hard and have dealt with a lot getting the homes ready.

“I commend all of them for making a path and ordering, delaying, everywhere they turned was quite an obstacle, but I think it’s pretty incredible they could pull it all together this year,” Simmons said.

“We welcome the community. We hope that everyone will come out and go and see the homes and enjoy what every builder has to offer. I hope it’s a great parade,” Simmons said.