Category Archives: Uncategorized

Towards the end of each year I collect some housing forecasts for the following year, and it looks like most analysts are optimistic for 2015. Here is a summary of forecasts for 2014. In 2014, new home sales will be … Continue reading →

“When you look at a house as a complete system, you make better cost/energy performance trade-offs that you just can’t make when looking at a single component in isolation,” says Ekotrope founder and CEO Ziv Rozenblum, “We give builders a … Continue reading →

LATEST NUMBERS FOR RALEIGH SHOW NEW HOME CLOSINGS AND PRICES RISE In the Raleigh, NC market, closings of new homes gained year-over-year in July, and the market seemed to be signaling strengthening with a percentage lift more robust than June … Continue reading →

Most people know Angie’s List as a straight-up and popular resource for getting the scoop on service providers: which ones are good, and those you may want to avoid based on member reviews and other criteria. And members have a … Continue reading →

Single-family home sales fell dramatically from almost 7 million at the peak in 2005, to 4 million in 2010. Since the trough, sales have risen to 4.9 million in 2013. Assuming the late 1990s and early 2000s exhibited a more … Continue reading →

Across the country appraisal companies and lenders have been slow to acknowledge builders, buyers, and owners of high-performance homes. Many builders are fed up with a financing system that doesn’t put enough value on sustainable features and the savings they … Continue reading →

RealtyTrac has released its first report ranking all U.S. counties based on the prevalence of man-made environmental hazards. “Somewhat surprisingly, short-term home price appreciation over the past year and five years is stronger in the 50 housing markets with the … Continue reading →

Builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes rose for a fourth consecutive month in September to a level of 59 on the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI), released today.  This latest four-point gain brings the index … Continue reading →

Long before recent talks about increasing minimum wage, Henry Ford doubled the daily salary of his assembly line workers. This extraordinary move created happy employees, lowered turnover, and saved rehiring and retraining costs. Would we see the same result with … Continue reading →