6th Annual Most Valuable Product Awards
Drumroll ... Please join us in celebrating our 6th Annual MVP Awards winners, which represent the best in innovative building products
Fortera Takes Concrete Steps to Reduce the Climate Impact of Cement
Clean-tech company Fortera, which uses technology to capture carbon emissions form cement manufacturing, will open its first commercial-scale operation on April 12, 2024, in California
Lumber Leads Building Materials Prices Higher in March
Overall, the cost of building materials rose during March, with softwood lumber, gypsum products, and concrete all seeing price increases. Only steel mill materials saw price drops
6th Annual MVP Awards: Connected Home
The Most Valuable Product Awards showcase the best in new building product design, innovation, and functionality. Here are the winners in the Connected Home category
6th Annual MVP Awards: Doors + Windows
The Most Valuable Product Awards showcase the best in new building product design, innovation, and functionality. Here are the winners in the Doors + Windows category
6th Annual MVP Awards: Exterior
The Most Valuable Product Awards showcase the best in new building product design, innovation, and functionality. Here are the winners in the Exterior category
The Affordable Zoning Paradox
Builders have long railed against inclusionary zoning, a popular municipal tactic that requires a number of homes in a new community be set aside for sale at below-market prices. Builders say it violates supply-and-demand common sense and yields less, not more, affordable housing. New research from the Los Angeles-based Reason Public Policy Institute bears them out.
San Francisco's $100,000 House
Clever Homes, a San Francisco construction-systems company that develops pre-fabricated homes partnered with Affordable Green Development and CNet Networks to unveil the "Now House," a 2,400-square-foot-house that cost a little over $100,000 to build and includes the latest electronic gadgetry. On display in the parking lot at SBC Park in San Francisco, the project demonstrates that affordable ...
Two of the Top 10
TimberSIL Nontoxic Pressure-Treated Wood: A sodium-silicate-based pressure-treatment system for wood that relies on a mineralization process rather than toxins to prevent infestations and decay. The patented chemistry and heat-treatment process result in the infusion of microscopic glass "crystals" throughout the wood, providing a permanent, insoluble treatment with no dusting or leaching.
Eucalyptus Hybrid Flooring
A hybrid eucalyptus tree, Lyptus is quickly becoming one of the world's most important hardwood lumbers, says manufacturer Weyerhaeuser, primarily because it represents a sustainable and renewable resource. In density, strength and technical properties, it compares favorably with hardwood maple, and it rivals cherry and mahogany in appearance.
Adjustable-Rate Mortgages
The good news out of the University of Southern California's Lusk Center for Real Estate is that experts there see no pricing bubble in the California housing market. The bad news is that they are concerned about current high use of adjustable rate mortgages — especially down the road, as more of these loans convert from fixed to adjustable rates.
Where is a Nexer to Go?
As we continue our focus-group research with the nexers, we've been hearing about their preferences for features and layout inside the home. The nexers have already provided us with a mountain of ideas that might motivate them to buy a new home. With so many possibilities on the table, we will work to zero in on the nexers' hot buttons with highly specific stimulus materials keyed to how they w...
Hiring and Retaining Employees
An employee leaving a company is like a stone thrown in a still pond: ripples of disruption spread through the organization, creating unbalance. In any business, this unbalance can be expensive. Turnover can cost a builder in recruiting and administrative fees, lack of attention to quality from employees on their way out, and slower productivity until new employees are up to speed.
Price Does Not Affect Profit
When we dig into the data from our most recent Builder Financial Study (the 11th consecutive survey of Lee Evans Group clients), we find house prices in 2003 ranging from $98,800 to $3.2 million, but no direct correlation of price and profitability. Thirty-eight percent of the builders had average sales prices under $200,000, 29.
Design Sketchbook: Entryways
For years we've placed tremendous emphasis on the design and construction of front entries. From richly detailed doors to elaborate foyers with vaulted ceilings and multiple layers of crown molding, formal entryways all contribute to the initial impression of a home. At least they do if you're a guest who actually enters through the front of the home.
Expanding Market Horizons
Phoenix, a consistently strong housing market, keeps pushing its boundaries with communities on the fast-growing citiy's outer ring. One of the newest is the master plan of Verrado, a half-hour drive west of the city. There, with its Horizons neighborhood, Engle Homes' Arizona Division shattered preconceived notions of the prices the market would support at the edge of suburbia.
