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What should builders tell prospective home buyers looking for guidance about home security systems?
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These five pests are likely to be seen by your buyers if you are not vigilant and that they cause the most financial and aesthetic damage to your homes as well as your reputation if left undetected and untreated.
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Every builder knows, there's more to home-ownership than just the monthly mortgage payment. Repairs, maintenance, increases in property taxes, and other variable and sometimes unexpected costs can throw even financially stable families for a loop, making such costs all the more challenging for those homeowners who scrape each month to make their payments. Such costs are rarely included in housing affordability indexes.
PRESIDENT BUSH HAS BEEN quick to take credit for the low interest rates and continued strong demand for housing that spurred the building boom. Just about every week this spring and summer, the current 68.5 percent homeownership rate pops up in campaign rhetoric, near the top of the president's campaign platform.
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Comparing real-world costs of living with the price of new homes shows that most lower-income people don't have a chance.
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The same factors that have produced winning strategies for some groups have crippled others.
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With low-interest rates holding, and rosy forecasts from almost every economist with a conduit to the media, the American dream of homeownership for all seems to be chugging ahead at full steam. But behind the boom times lies a deep malaise. Many Americans, young, old, poor and middle class, cannot afford to buy a home.
Winners of the the 2004 Gold Nugget Awards, Residential Grand category.
IF YOU DROVE BY THIS PROJECT, LOCATED in a historic neighborhood, you would not likely guess that it's affordable, targeted to seniors, and features not only 96 apartments but a vibrant, 15,400-square-foot community center, as well. No wonder it came away with two grand awards.
OVER AND OVER AGAIN, THE JUDGES kept coming back to this little beauty's floor plan, front elevation, and plot plan, marveling at how the architects managed to pull off such a successful design. In just 1,938 square feet, on a 2,328-square-foot lot, this detached row house manages to reflect its historical community, offer a street-friendly outlook, and provide plenty of room for family life.
ONLY IN NEWPORT BEACH, CALIF., could an oceanfront, 3,837-square-foot $2.2 million production home with garage space for four cars be considered the perfect place for empty-nesters. But that's exactly the crowd that the builder targeted with Oceana's Plan 2.
EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE, A MIXED-use project gets it just right, and that's certainly the case with this innovative restoration project in downtown Sacramento, Calif. What was once a 1920s automotive showroom and service facility is now a seismically correct building that features two award-winning Asian restaurants (ground floor), offices (second floor), and 18 one-of-a-kind lofts (third and fourth floors).
TALK ABOUT RESTRICTIONS—THIS project had enough to stop the bravest of developers. First, the site: a brownfield adjacent to a state beach that is also the winter home to the protected monarch butterfly. Additional considerations included such disparate elements as ocean views, riparian habitat, a lagoon, railroad tracks, and community gardens. Finally, the project needed to maintain a 40 percent affordable ratio and high density.
THE BEST CUSTOM HOME WORKS ON every level. It fits an owner's lifestyle, belongs on its site, and proclaims itself unique.
AT FIRST, IT COMES AS A BIT OF A surprise to see Key West/St. Augustine, Fla.–style architecture in a North Orange County, Calif., community. But given the parameters that the builder and architects had to work within, the off-beat design direction turned out to be a good path to follow.
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The Gold Nugget Awards competition honors the best of Western architecture.
EVEN SOMETHING AS BEAUTIFUL AS THE high-desert topography of DC Ranch, the highly successful Scottsdale, Ariz., community, can present its own set of problems. That's what Robert Hidey Architects discovered when Market Street Homes charged it to come up with a plan for attached housing on a 13.8-acre parcel inside the community. The site bumped up against Market Street, DC Ranch's dining, shopping, and entertainment district. It also sloped toward a natural wash that was untouchable.
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Starts for homes fell 8.5 percent nationwide in June, dropping to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.802 million units, the Census Bureau reported today. Single-family starts were off 9.5 percent from May's totals, dropping to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.489 million units. The June fall-off represented the slowest pace for starts since May 2003. While a sign that the economy cooled slightly last month, the total still leaves home building at a healthy level for the year.
Few insurers want to touch a builder with an 8-foot 2x4 these days.
CSG has added sales automation software to its estimating and accounting modules to create a full construction management system
Universal Powerline Bus technology offers increased speed and reliability.
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- Beazer Homes hires ADCom and Gentronics to manage telecommunications and network management.
- BQE Software integrates its products with both Microsoft Outlook and Intuit's Quick Books.
- Alias SketchBook Pro now available on two new platforms.
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Its June 1 acquisition of FASTgives Constellation Software what it wants: a consolidated builder software market.
A NEW MORTGAGE FINANCING PROGRAM IN TEXAS is taking aim at the growing problem of foreclosures, especially among homeowners with “B” credit ratings. The Affordable Homeownership Program for Texas (AHPT), in partnership with Ameriquest Mortgage Co., will provide $100 million in financing to families with credit problems. Brownsville, Texas, the host city for the project, will get $20 million from the pilot program.
IMAGINE A HANDHELD MOLD DETECTOR ABOUT the size of a stud finder. You hold it against a suspect area of wallboard, press a button, and get a reading on how much mold is growing in the cavity beyond.
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Pay raises for construction executives in 2003 averaged 3 percent. And according to the annual salary survey by Construction Executive, a consultancy with dozens of construction employers, 8 percent of employers planned no increases for some employees this year. Reasons included a need to bring costs in line.
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The new governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney, has been taking drastic steps to address the state's affordable housing crisis. He has put $100 million into a fund to help developers build 5,000 units of mixed-income housing in three years. At least 20 percent of those units must meet affordability guidelines—a goal the governor hopes will help him meet his campaign promise of 15,000 to 30,000 new homes in his first term.
AT AMERICAN WEST HOMES IN LAS VEGAS, it's called the “upside-down” house. That's because the 1,602-square-foot home in the builder's Coronado Ranch community has a floor plan that reverses conventional logic when it comes to room placement. Plan 4 puts the master bedroom and communal living areas—living room, dining room, kitchen, and optional den—on the second level. The first floor is home to a large game room and secondary bedroom.
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In a recent report from the Census Bureau, Georgia was home to five of the fastest-growing counties between 2000 and 2003. Chattahoochee County saw a 30-percent jump in population, while Forsyth, Henry, Newton, and Paulding counties gained more than 20 percent each.
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Massachusetts senator David Magnani has coined a new phrase to describe the kinds of restrictions that discourage families with children from putting down roots in a community. He calls it “vasectomy zoning.”
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Home building generated $59 billion in economic activity in the California last year.
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THE EXTRUDED POLYSTYRENE FOAM ASSOCIATION has launched a new Web site that aims to educate builders and architects about the benefits of using extruded foam-insulated sheathing. The site contains a detailed analysis of the product's energy-efficient and moisture-resistant benefits.
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Callifornia builders have created a series of three 30-second television ads nudging homeowners to talk to a builder about repairs instead of a lawyer.
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Recognizing that construction finances can be a bit tricky for even the most seasoned professional, the Construction Financial Management Association created a certification program. In May, the association held its first-ever Certified Construction Financial Professional exam, geared to accountants, bond underwriters, insurance brokers, attorneys, surety bond agents, and software providers. To become certified, financial professionals have to meet education or experience requirements, have at least 4,000 hours of verified work experience in construction-related jobs in the last five years, and agree to follow a code of ethics.
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Who buys a new house on the Internet? According to American Homes Guides' 2003 online home buyer profile, the profile of a Net home buyer is a 26- to 35-year-old woman.
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Builders who want to stand out from the competition (who doesn't?) can do that just by asking customers how they feel about the home-buying process. Yet only 25 percent of the nation's home builders measure customer satisfaction, says Paul Clem, national sales director for Overland Park, Kan.–based Enlight Research. Builders that regularly survey customers have lower sales and marketing costs, fewer call-backs, and more referrals, Clem says.
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Two public builders expanded their reach with late spring acquisitions. KB Home moved to strengthen its position in the Midwest with the purchase of Indianapolis-based Dura Builders, which in 2003 closed more than 500 homes for $75 million in revenue. To bolster its Florida-feeder markets, WCI Communities bought Spectrum Communities, which last year posted 359 closings in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.
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As solar photovoltaic panels gain popularity, especially on the West Coast and in Florida, cranky neighbors have found a new foe. According to The Wall Street Journal, about 50 homeowner associations in Florida try to restrict the placement of rooftop solar arrays in their neighborhoods each year. Arizona builders report the same kind of organized opposition. Fortunately, new solar products now on the market that look like normal roofing products should silence many (but no doubt, not all) of the critics.
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Builders sue Osceola County to overturn a measure that more than triples the impact fee for new school construction.
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Failing your framing inspection can be expensive, especially if you have to stop work to fix mistakes--and then go backward and tear out work you thought was complete. Here are some of the most common framing mistakes that can cost you a red tag. Don't be surprised at how sic some of these are--framers are still messing up on some of the most obvious details.
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When a company comes out with a completely new line of tools, expectations are usually pretty high. And if it's entering a totally new category, the new tools have to shoulder their way into a crowded field, and compete with old favorites to break into the big-time. That's the tough reality DeWalt faced when it launched a line of pneumatics last year featuring five nailers, and 18 gas and electric compressors.
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That's why smaller diameter saws like the Bosch 5-3/8-inch, 18-volt model 1659 still appeal to me.Bosch?s cordless saws have the same high-quality features and construction as its electric models.