William John Pulte was the founder and chairman of

PulteGroup PulteGroup, Inc. is an American residential home construction company based in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The company is the 3rd largest home construction company in the United States based on the number of homes closed. In total, the compa ...

, one of the largest

home construction Home construction or residential construction is the process of constructing a house, apartment building, or similar residential building generally referred to as a 'home' when giving consideration to the people who might now or someday reside th ...

and

real estate development Real estate development, or property development, is a business process, encompassing activities that range from the renovation and re-lease of existing buildings to the purchase of raw Real Estate, land and the sale of developed land or parcels ...

companies in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Biography

Early life and education

Pulte attended

De La Salle Collegiate High School De La Salle Collegiate High School is an all-boys Catholic high school run by the De La Salle Christian Brothers. Founded in 1926, the school was located on the east side of Detroit before moving to its current location in Warren, Michigan, in ...

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

. He was a three sport varsity athlete in football, track and basketball.

Career

In 1950, just after graduating high school, Pulte and 5 friends built a 5-room bungalow near

Detroit City Airport Coleman A. Young International Airport (Coleman A. Young Municipal Airport, formerly Detroit City Airport until 2003) is six miles northeast of downtown Detroit, in Wayne County, Michigan. It is owned by the City of Detroit. The Federal Aviation ...

, which they sold for $10,000. In 1956, he founded William J. Pulte Inc. In 1959, he built his first subdivision. In 2016, after Richard Dugas Jr., the former chief executive officer of the company, moved the headquarters of the company from

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan Bloomfield Hills is a small city (5.04 sq. miles) in Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is a northern suburb of Metro Detroit and is approximately northwest of Downtown Detroit. Except a small southern border with the city of Bir ...

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

and initiated a change in direction for the company, Bill Pulte, who owned 9% of the company, and his grandson, also named Bill Pulte, pressured Dugas to resign. Dugas resigned, and the stock price went up.

Death

Pulte had 14 children (and was predeceased by one). He divorced his first wife, and married Karen Koppal in 1993. Pulte died at his home in Naples, Florida, on March 7, 2018, at the age of 85.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pulte, William 1932 births 2018 deaths American chairpersons of corporations American company founders American real estate businesspeople Businesspeople from Detroit 20th-century American businesspeople