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HBA HOME BUILDING NEWS
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BUildiNg YOUR BUSiNeSS
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MAY, 2013
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HBApdx.org
HBA
pdx
.
org
Sustain
Ability
Green & sustAinABle BuildinG, deVelopment & educAtion •
mAy, 2013
A day of industry education, networking and insight
Although EcoVative Home
Performance Conference &
Expo won a National Associa-
tion Excellence Award for its
2012 conference, 2013 brought
a new kind of energy. With an
increase of 100 attendees over
last year, every class was full
and all the exhibitor aisles were
loud with business chatter. The
industry came together for a
full day of learning, networking
and celebrating. The bottom-
line is: EcoVative BuildRight
was a fantastic conference, and
if you missed it – don’t miss it
again. But, more importantly,
the high-quality of the infor-
mation presented to confer-
ence attendees is of benefit to
our whole industry. Below you
will find excerpts from the pre-
sentations that were delivered
at the conference. If you want
more – make sure to come to
next year’s conference!
EcoVative BuildRight was a fantastic conference, and if you missed it - don’t miss it again
Conference vendors enjoyed the chance to talk one-on-one with attendees about their products
and services.
A large crowd was engrossed in the Keynote session sponsored by OrePac and featuring Mark LaLiberte on building responsibly.
Attendees, sponsors and participants had an opportunity connect on the expo floor, during lunch and
class-room breaks.
The conference registration area and Ride & Drive Lounge was a comfortable place for attendees to
take a break and make additional connections.
Alternative Fuel Fleet vehicles were available for attendees to test drive.
Avoiding Water Intrusion:
Common leak locations to watch
out for:
• Window openings, particularly
at corner trim joints
• Intersection of walls with floors
or slab-on-grade
• Intersection of walls with
exterior balconies/walkways
• Siding lowest course too close
to soil or concrete
• Siding lowest courses wetted
by sprinkler spray
• Handrail connections; rail caps
(especially fences)
• Belly bands and other plant-on
trim
• Confined rakes (gutter ends)
Amount of water needed to
Cause Decay:
• Assume a roughly 16 square
foot area of ½ inch thick wood
siding or sheathing
• Assume a moisture content
change from normal (dry) 10%
to 30% required to grow decay
fungi
• Amount of water required that
must be absorbed into the
wood siding or sheathing just
to raise its moisture content
that amount is about 1 gallon!
• Laboratory wall leak drainage
test results suggest that at least
10 times as much water drains
out of a wall as is absorbed by
the wall components
• Thus, water leaks into walls
must be relatively large (many
gallons) when decay occurs
Integrating High Performance
Construction Practices and
Documentation:
Elements of a Written Best
Practice Manual
• Definition
• Mobilization Requirements
• Material Standards and
Responsibility
• Installation Standards
• Supervision Requirements
• Installation Details
• Documentation and Checklists
Conclusions from the Portland
Housing Market Update:
• Increasing Portland population
– both current and projected
• Consistent strengthening in
employment
• Low inventories of “normal”
housing stock
• Uncertain foreclosure
environment
• High levels of demand (ratios
close to pre-recession levels)
• Low interest rate environment
Reducing Homeowner
Litigation: Common Sense
Business Tools for Mitigating
Losses:
• Plan well
• Manage homeowner
expectations
• Establish objective
performance standards and
simple payment provisions
• Shift risk and liability
• Develop meaningful and
practical remedies and dispute-
resolution procedures
Using the EPS Score to Sell
More Homes:
• The EPS is an asset-based
performance metric
• It’s a a tool for strategic
engagement of customers
and markets
• It’s a resource to give visibility
and awareness to energy-
efficient features of a home
Key Metrics on the EPS score
sheet:
• Energy Score
• Operating Costs
• Carbon Impacts
Social Networking for the
Building Industry:
Definitions for Social
Networking:
• ONLINE: Social networking is an
online conversation that takes
place between two or more
people
• OFFLINE: Social networking is
an offline conversation that
takes place between two or
more people
• No marketing is free – Social
networking is a major
investment of your time
Tech Tools:
6 Apps that will help you get
connected in the field:
• Goodnotes
• Penultimate
• Dropbox
• Evernote
• Quickoffice Pro HD
• Logmein.
CONFERENCE KEY TAKE-AWAYS: