I'd actually be ok with them using less expensive finishes so long as the houses themselves were built to last more than 20 years... there's a house I drive past regularly in a development where it's obvious that the sheet siding wasn't even put up square. I mean - what do the studs, the foundation, the insulation, etc in that house look like if they couldn't even get the seams on the siding to hang correctly? The finishers all get swapped out every 5-15 years as fads change, and they are the easiest things for homeowners to do themselves (IE: a little Home Depot style remodel). But, it gets a lot harder to fix things in the walls that weren't done correctly from the beginning.