How to Improve Home Building Productivity, Part 1: Simplify, Standardize
Simplifying and standardizing your processes and purchasing creates efficiencies that save money and time and attract the best trade partners
How to Optimize Your Plan Portfolio and Gain an Edge on the Competition, Part 1
To stay ahead of the competition, simply value engineering your homes is not enough. Adopt a performance-based mindset
Home Exteriors See Value Engineering by Home Builders
To contend with current cost pressures, home builders are taking steps to value engineer the exteriors of their homes
3 Ways Lean Design Can Help Home Builders Recover Margins
Using a Lean design and construction approach, home builders can reduce waste and costs without sacrificing amenities or marketability of their product
Reducing 3 Types of Construction Waste to Increase Home Builder Profit
Waste in home building is a much broader term than most home builders think. Here’s how builders can take stock of all forms of waste throughout the construction process to achieve greater profitability
Commodity Purchasing? There’s No Such Thing
Do you know all of the elements of the true total cost and total benefit for all of the products you put in your homes?
Lean Building
Lean Building Blog: Who has the edge on innovation?
Last fall the president of one of America’s “Top 10” builders who I have known for years corralled me at a conference. Because I travel this…
Construction Quality
Rework—What It Is and Ways to Avoid It
Rework is a common cause of schedule creep and cost overruns. Here's how to know what failures trigger rework so you can avoid them
Lean Building
PO vs. VPO—Another ‘Voice of the Process’
Your processes can teach you so much and save you a lot of cash. But you need metrics
Lean Building
Poster child for bad design
The accompanying picture was used recently with what was an otherwise good article on how to create profitable design. That article is much bigger…
Building Software
BIM: Pipe Dream or Promised Land?
Lean expert Scott Sedam goes back to his home-building roots to help pinpoint the potential of building information modeling (BIM) as a powerful enabler for Lean building and removing waste from product and process
Lean Building
Top 10 Lean Building Myths Busted
From the lack of meaningful savings to the overwhelming time commitment, Lean operations guru Scott Sedam refutes the most common misconceptions about implementing Lean process in home building
Lean Building
Trades Speak Out on Lean Process
What does it take to build a Lean culture with your suppliers and trades, and how does it impact their business and yours?
Lean Building
How to Save $5,000 Per Unit
If you knew you were losing about $5K per unit due to just one item of waste in your houses, would you do something about it?
Purchasing
The New Rules of Purchasing for Builders
Builders that purchase labor and material on bid price alone are guaranteed only that they will never operate by lowest total cost
Lean Building
20 Ways to Save $5,000 per Unit
From optimizing foundation design to reducing roof pitch to re-thinking your trash-removal process, Lean operations guru Scott Sedam identifies numerous ways to save a bundle on each and every home you build.
