People in cars spent the Tuesday after Labor Day gawking at the new house under construction at the intersection of Snow White and Hockaday drives. Walkers, with strollers or dogs on leashes, slowed down as they marched by. I took a look, too, because of what I had seen on Nextdoor and in a photo texted by an acquaintance who spoke of "gentrification in the Disney Streets."

We weren't there because of the home's size, nor because of its splendor, but because of how it has been decorated: with giant, black spray-painted X's, each several feet tall. And on the side facing Snow White, it says, in giant all-caps, "GREED."

The sleek, boxy new-build with a beige-brick facade replaces a white one-story home, built around about half a century ago. The old house, demolished months ago, wasn't so different than most of the surrounding homes perched on crisply manicured lawns radiating bright green the day after rain.

Houses like this new one are popping up all over this quaint, quiet neighborhood. Just like in Oak Cliff. And East Dallas. And Deep Ellum. And West Dallas. And in the neighborhoods adjacent to the beloved Disney Streets in northwest Dallas. And [Your Neighborhood Here]. Big erases small. New swallows old. High-priced crushes affordable.

You see it every day, everywhere. And with these new homes come the complaints, online or over fences or over drinks. But never like this.

I got there a little past 9:30 in the morning, to see the graffiti for myself — and pictures do not do it justice. When I pulled up, home builder Tom Wagner, co-owner of Frisco-based ICF Custom Homes, was just getting there, too. A nice gent in his early 50s, Wagner seemed genuinely floored by the graffiti decorating the house. He said it was surrounded by chain-link fencing because something like this had happened before.

Neighbors and the home-builder believe this house at Snow White and Hockaday drives was tagged because someone is unhappy with new homes being built in the Northaven Park neighborhood of northwest Dallas. (Nathan Hunsinger / Staff Photographer)

A few months back, he said, when the house was still a shell, someone X'd out the signs out front. Same thing happened to the other new build across Hockaday, from Plano-based Laguna Homes — one of those white-and-black-brick jobs that look like dentists' offices built out of Legos.

But in all Wagner's years of home-building, he said, he's never seen anything like this. He said it will cost a few thousand to replace the bricks and install cameras. And, yeah, it could be kids. Because sure, anything's possible.

"But I just don't see a kid writing 'GREED,'" Wagner said while we stood there, staring at the intruder's handiwork. He'd already called the cops, who were going to phone back to take a report. "More of an adult ..." He paused. "I don't want to ... It's potentially someone in the neighborhood."

Neighbors agree. On Nextdoor, there was some hand-wringing about this being an inside job — someone who lives in the Northaven Park neighborhood and probably needs to move. A middle-aged man who lives a few doors down walked by and told Wagner to get some security cameras to keep an eye on the house. Before he realized I was with the paper and that he didn't want to talk to me, the man told Wagner the perpetrator was probably some "disgruntled," um, so-and-so.

J.J. Aubrey, who lives a few houses down Hockaday, told me "this is not children's work," no way. The 32-year-old said she and her husband moved to the neighborhood a couple of years ago because of the new builds among the old — proof, she said, that this area, near Harry C. Withers Elementary, is "continuing to grow and enticing for young families."

But Aubrey sees the vandalism down the street and she just knows, you know? "This is an adult that is upset that a large home is going in."

And the thing is, Tom Wagner said he understands the "angst" that comes with new houses taking over old neighborhoods. But business is business. And this, he said, "is progress."

He's not just building the house; he owns the lot. This is a spec house. So is the one across the street, which is being built by Laguna Homes, whose owner Jason Malyk was also in the neighborhood Tuesday morning. Malyk said we're seeing so many new-builds like these in Dallas because home-builders are being priced out of Collin County by bigger companies who can fill whole tracts at deep discounts. Scraping and rebuilding in older neighborhoods is a better business model, for now.

Except it comes with a cost, of course — like those exorbitant property-tax bills arriving in the mailboxes of old homes next door to new builds. And the slow-motion erasing of neighborhoods that stood for decades.

Some neighborhood residents believe the vandalism is the work of someone in their community. (Nathan Hunsinger / Staff Photographer)

Wagner knows all this.

"Listen, I understand us builders are coming into these neighborhoods and changing them," he said. "I understand that. But it's progress. We've had some issues in the past with neighbors not being happy."

But till Tuesday, he's never seen anything like this.

"I am not surprised that people are not happy," he said, staring at the giant GREED on the wall, shaking his head.

"I am surprised by the act."