A re-install of office should theoretically pretty much rule out any problem in the install.
Instead what you probably need to be looking at something related to the users profile.
This could be in few different areas
Something about a per-user default template
Something in the Current User hive of the registry for that user
Some other file or setting stored in the AppsData portion of the users profile.
Usually a quick test to rule out an issue with the profile is simply to login as a separate user on same system and see if you can duplicate the problem. If a separate account works fine, then you need to narrow down where the problem is. You do this by deleting(moving) various likely things in the profile. If the user can live with some loss of settings and configuration, then simply backup any data and nuke the profile and restore data. Issues with the profile and per-user settings can be pretty difficult to trouble-shoot.
