D.R. Horton
Mourners and admirers gathered at Doxology Bible Church on Thursday afternoon to bid farewell to one of Fort Worth’s great business leaders.
Don Horton, founder and chairman of the board of homebuilding giant D.R. Horton, died on May 16.
He was 74.
As he was laid to rest, the billionaire home builder was remembered as a devoted family man who never lost sight of his humble beginnings in Arkansas, and who cultivated a corporate culture in which hard work and loyalty was rewarded and employees were treated as family.
Speakers testified to the value he placed on personal relationships.
“He was never D.R. Horton … he was just Donny Horton,” said his cousin Roy Gene Sanders, who described growing up with Mr. Horton in a large extended family in Marshall, Arkansas. “To know then of the brilliance that Donny later had and that he had those characteristics that were possessed by those kind of people that can start from nothing and attain this greatness, I never saw it back then.”
His punchline was met with laughter.
World-class work ethic, Sanders pondered?
“We spent most of our time conniving trying to get out of work. Work ethic? I never saw it.”
Don Horton, of course, had a legendary work ethic. How else to explain building a company from scratch, starting with one home in 1978 to becoming the largest homebuilder in America with operations in 119 markets across 33 states.
In total, the company has constructed more than one million homes. According to data, during the 12-month period ended March 31, D.R. Horton closed 87,801 homes in its homebuilding operations, in addition to 6,248 single-family rental homes and 2,536 multi-family rental units in its rental operations. D.R. Horton also provides mortgage financing, title services and insurance agency services for its homebuyers and is the majority-owner of Forestar Group Inc., a publicly traded national residential lot development company.
Horton took the company public in 1992. It became America's largest builder by volume in 2002.
Horton had served as chairman of D.R. Horton Inc. since it was formed in July 1991 and held the roles of president and CEO from July 1991 until November 1998.
David Auld has been named his successor as chairman.
Donald Ray Horton was born in Zack, Arkansas, on March 5, 1950, to Geneva and TJ Horton. The home he shared with four siblings was in Marshall, then population 1,079.
According to his obituary, he often shined shoes and did odd jobs to make money. He graduated from Marshall High School in 1968.
His brother Terry said that he and Horton had planned to both go to pharmacy school and open a pharmacy in their hometown. Horton, however, left school in 1971 at Oklahoma after marrying Marty Martin, whom he met there.
So, he went to work in the family real estate business in Marshall.
In 1977, the young couple, then with two children, left for Fort Worth, where Marty planned to attend TCU. Horton went to real estate school and worked for a local home builder. According to friends and family, it didn’t take long for him to realize that he could build a house far less expensively than competitors.
D.R. Horton Inc. was formed in 1978 in an unfavorable economy, including interest rates near 18%.
After finally finding a banker to give him a loan to build a house, he sold it in the framing stage. He returned to get another loan to build two more.
“I am deeply grateful to DR for his friendship, leadership and commitment to making D.R. Horton the leading homebuilder in America,” Auld said. “DR was truly a pioneer in the homebuilding industry. From the first house he built in 1978 in Fort Worth, Texas, as a local homebuilder, he led the business to unprecedented growth regionally and then nationally.
“Under DR’s leadership, we have had the privilege of helping more than one million American individuals and families achieve homeownership. We are all indebted to DR for his vision, tenacity and never-ending drive to continue to grow and improve our Company. While he is impossible to replace, we will strive to carry on his legacy of enabling the dream of homeownership for individuals and families across the United States in every stage of their lives.”