Blog/News

Curb Appeal
If your home’s facade is bumming you out, check out your shutters. Are they smaller than your windows? Nailed to the siding? Shutters were made to cover windows and hang on hinges. Find a form that follows this function (or make them at least appear to be functional) and that goes with the style of your home.  See the Article

We recently finished installing this UltraTouch denim insulation.  This is actually made from cotton denim (mostly recycled blue jeans) and is a pleasure to work with.  It has no VOCs and is totally safe for the environment.  It contains 80% post-consumer recycled natural fibers making it an ideal choice for anyone looking to use a high quality sustainable building material.

As our housing market declined in 2008, so did the people who love house flipping (that is, to buy a fixer-upper, fix it up, and then sell it for a profit). But now, our market is improving, and so are the instances of house-flipping. Yahoo confirms that house flipping is on the rise, up about 12% since 2011. Low inventory, stricter lending practices, and the recent market dip have essentially changed the rules for home-flipping, and the rules all say, “Be More Careful.”

Yahoo’s list of new rules for the house-flipping economy are:

1) that we should choose our locations very carefully, as not all are equal (Orlando, Florida; Richmond, Virginia; Tucson, Arizona; and Charlotte, North Carolina, according to RealtyTrac, are the best).

2) Can you do it with cash? Because lending is still strict and it’s faster and easier to pay in cash for both the property and the renovations.

3) Stick to a budget, because even though you’re flipping a house, you still need to be conservative about how you spend.

4) Be prepared to wait at least 90 days after completing renovations to selling, because of paperwork, additional appraisals, and more paperwork. You may even want to think about renting it out for a while as you wait so you don’t lose money.

IronWill’s framers stand up another wall.  At this rate, I may have the owners in by Christmas!

See how to frame a first floor over a basement (plus a fence) in under two minutes!

These framers get the job done…fast!

We just finished designing these two new ads for South Bay Digs magazine.  South Bay Digs is a niche real estate publication serving the ‘micro’ South Bay market. Published every two weeks, South Bay Digs is distributed in the affluent coast neighborhoods of Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach and the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

I put my 5-year-old to work helping to strip the foundation forms on this project.