Land Under Development	6 Months Ended
Jun. 30, 2011
Land Under Development [Abstract]
Land Under Development	3. Land Under Development On a limited basis, NVR directly acquires raw parcels of land already zoned for its intended use to develop into finished lots. Land under development includes the land acquisition costs, direct improvement costs, capitalized interest, where applicable, and real estate taxes. As of June 30, 2011, NVR directly owned three separate raw parcels of land with a carrying value of approximately $78,500 that it intends to develop into approximately 850 finished lots for use in its homebuilding operations. All three of the raw parcels are located in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area and none of them had any indicators of impairment as of June 30, 2011. Based on current market conditions, NVR may, on a very limited basis, directly acquire additional raw parcels to develop into finished lots. See the Overview section of Item 2, Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations included herein for additional discussion.

3. Land Under Development

On a limited basis, NVR directly acquires raw parcels of land already zoned for its intended use to develop into finished lots. Land under development includes the land acquisition costs, direct improvement costs, capitalized interest, where applicable, and real estate taxes. As of June 30, 2011, NVR directly owned three separate raw parcels of land with a carrying value of approximately $78,500 that it intends to develop into approximately 850 finished lots for use in its homebuilding operations. All three of the raw parcels are located in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area and none of them had any indicators of impairment as of June 30, 2011. Based on current market conditions, NVR may, on a very limited basis, directly acquire additional raw parcels to develop into finished lots. See the Overview section of Item 2, Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations included herein for additional discussion.