Let’s start with the foundation. The foundation is unique at each location. The soils are different and the surrounding slopes are different. Each location must be analyzed on its own and engineered to its specific conditions. Most builders pull out the same ole foundation plan that they are used to. Don’t get me wrong, there is merit in all foundations, but you must analyze each location for types of soils that will affect your home. We will raise or lower your new home based on the potential drain field that may shed damaging run-off water toward your home. We pour only low slump concrete for foundations and flatwork. Many contractors add 50 to 100 gallons of water to a single truck which weakens the mix, but we don’t allow that.
Next, let’s look at the structure. We use steel I-beams as the girder system under the floor. Girders are the beams that carry the weight of the home. Most builders use some multiple of 2x6’s or some might use 2x8’s. Most framing contractors and builders find that it is just too hard to work with steel. We like steel for all of those workhorse components like girders and other beams or headers that need to carry heavy loads. We have recently started using roof trusses again. As a former framing contractor, Fred always liked the conventional style of stick ceiling joist and cut rafters, but not all tradesmen are as careful about properly bracing the roof as it should be. Trusses bring peace of mind for you, the home owner, and us, the home builder.
Energy: Here is where we really excel. Many builders claim to be energy efficient builders. Many manufacturers claim that their products are energy efficient. There is a difference, however, in how one selects the most efficient items that actually pay for themselves along the way. In other words, if you can put the cost of the most efficient items into your loan and their costs only affect your monthly payment minimally, then they make sense. It is one of the ways that we consider an item to be a part of our system. There has to be a consideration for its individual life span also. Another consideration is if the system component adds to the overall performance of the home. If we truly can tighten a house to a point that we have to open a door or window for the bathroom fan to work, then we better understand how to network appliances like bathroom fans and kitchen exhaust fans. If you really think that you have to have a wood burning fireplace, with makeup air, or fresh air, while trying to exhaust stale air or burn air. For example, take a plastic bottle, put your mouth over the opening and try to suck the air out, as your bathroom fan, your kitchen exhaust fan or the wood burning fireplace would. You can imagine how you would collapse the bottle unless you opened another hole in the bottle of a size equal to the exhaust fan. So should we leave a big hole in our environment 24/7? That certainly solves the exhaust problem; however this would thermally run all of the time. Warm air rises, exhausting out and being replaced with unconditioned air from outside, now having to have our heating and cooling unit coming on and using energy to recondition that air. So you can see that just adding R factors or just buying an energy efficient item does not always make sense as a stand alone item. This means there is a building science to energy efficiency and we, as builders, have to be knowledgeable in order to make the system work. All of our homes fall into this category and it is not an upgrade. We would never downgrade the energy portion of our homes just for price consideration.
There are many items too numerous to list here making up our system and could be quite boring for the general public. What we want to impress upon you is our commitment to you, our home owner, to high energy efficiency and comfort in a home that we build for you. There are items that can be added to do even better and as long as those items are easily replaceable, then they can be a consideration.
Interior design: We offer several arrangements for all of our standard floor plans. We have re-configured the plans to be able to offer multiple secondary bedroom/bath options to fit your family and lifestyle.
You can finish the interior of your new home as basically or elegantly as you wish; the choices are wide and varied. Our standard amenities include many nice features and we offer a shopping list of options such as granite countertops, tile back splash, framed mirrors, upgraded appliances, tile flooring just to name a few.
The double pane, Low E glass windows are trimmed out with wood, no sheetrock returns here. You can add crown moulding to any room. The standard interior door is ThermaTru masonite with wood trim and stainless steel hardware. We use high quality, wood-look laminate flooring as standard in the kitchen, dining, utility, baths and front entrance. The balance of the home would be carpeted, unless you choose differently. It’s our goal to help you have the home you desire.
