11 Hot Green Building Trends to Warm Up To Building-Products.com “More people are going green each year, and there is nothing that will stop this trend. In fact, it is accelerating each year. As a result, we expect to see considerable interest in green products that promote water conservation and energy efficiency, including fixtures and [...]

Gathering Strength: The Healthiest Markets for 2011 Builder Online “The year’s list of the top 20 markets contains many of the same markets from last year, though we have a new leader of the pack. Housing markets in Texas and the Carolinas, where homes are relatively inexpensive, and where price appreciation didn’t get completely out [...]

Integrating design: Working successfully with interior designers Remodeling An excerpt: Want to know the most important thing about working with an interior designer? Bring them in at the beginning of the remodeling process. “We look at things from a different perspective than the architect or remodeler,” says interior designer Stephanie Henley, a principal with Beasley [...]

Foreclosures fell 26% in Dec., but 2010 filings set a record USA Today “The pace of foreclosures has slowed since revelations that thousands of foreclosure documents may have been improperly prepared, but for all 2010, almost 2.9 million U.S. properties received foreclosure filings, a record high, and up 2% from 2009.” 7 down payment assistance [...]

Happy New Year readers! Here’s to 2011 being a year of recovery, rebuilding and well, just plain old building. Before we begin blogging this year, we wanted to take a look back at the top five posts of 2010. Enjoy! Amazing builder videos DeWalt-16 Nail Gun by David Wiggins Q&A with green builder Matt Risinger [...]

Hire Locally Will Become the Law in San Francisco New York Times “Under the ordinance, city contractors and subcontractors working on city-financed construction projects worth $400,000 or more would be required to hire at least 20 percent of their workers from San Francisco. The requirement will increase by 5 percent each year until it reaches [...]

Marketing Tips for Green  Homes EcoHome “Energy efficiency, water savings, and health issues are the three green hot buttons that most consumers respond to, a panel of industry experts told attendees during the Greenbuild International Conference & Expo in Chicago. But officials of Pulte Group, American Standard, and USA Today also said that buyers not [...]

Saving Costs Residential Architect “Now more than ever, architects who hope to increase their market share must respect their clients’ limits. More importantly, they need a clear understanding of costs, a process flexible enough to adjust as the project evolves, and the creative know-how to do more with less.” Pending Home Sales Rose 10.4% in [...]

The New Water Cooler BUILDER “Builders are slowly revising their perceptions about social media being time consuming to sustain and difficult to track. Builders that dip into these waters also realize that social media don’t sell houses, at least not in the traditional ways other advertising and marketing do. Social media’s power lies in its [...]

Green Building Goes on a Budget Wall Street Journal “Casa Feliz is one of a growing number of affordable-housing projects nationwide that have been built “green”—that is, with nontoxic materials, highly energy-efficient appliances, and features such as green roofs and solar panels. Thanks to tax credits designed to attract private capital and aggressive cost-cutting on [...]