"We immediately set up care centers in areasstruck by Hurricane Andrew," Miller said in atelephone interview yesterday. "We providedsupplies and information centers, we helped withinsurance claims and with finding people otherplaces to five."

"I think we're good corporate citizens of thestate," he added. "People have trust andconfidence in our company.

But the hurricane damaged Lennar's corporatecredibility as well as its real estate. A group ofHampshire owners sought an order to keep Lennarfrom attempting to rebuild the devastateddevelopments.

Louis Robles, the attorney for the owners,sought to keep Lennar from contacting orcommunicating with any homeowners without priorcourt approval.

"I have a real problem with that, without their[the homeowners] having advice of counsel," Roblestold The Miami Herald. "I don't know what Lennaris telling the homeowners frankly."

"I trusted [Lennar] because it was the largestbuilder in Florida," said Susan Woolf, a Hampshirehomeowner who decided to move rather thanattempting to repair her home after the hurricane."It just goes to show you can't trust anyoneanymore."

Miller and other Lennar officials argued inthis case as well that their houses werestructurally sound and built to code. HurricaneAndrew, they said, was simply too powerful formost buildings to withstand.

"In this town right now, what we need is moreroofers, carpenters, electricians and plumbers,not more lawyers," Miller said at the time.

He and others executives vowed to contest thehomeowners' claims.

"We plan to fight these lawsuits aggressively.They are totally, in our view, without merit,"Miller told a Miami Herald reporter at the time.

But by March 1993, Lennar had agreed to settleboth suits for a total payment of $2.4 million, orabout $3,800 per plaintiff after taxes andlawyers' fees were deducted.

In a statement issued with the settlementLennar officials reasserted their belief that theywere not at fault in the damage caused by the"extraordinary storm."

A Money Manager

Southern Florida residents might adviseHarvard's graduates not to make Miller an overseerfor his construction expertise.

But the man who offers himself to theUniversity as a housing expert is increasingly amoney manager as well.