Waiting for the other house to drop
This spring, my office had two client-households close on homes that they planned to tear down and replace. Both went modular. I wrote about the first one, when it landed in July. The second one just landed.
This house is twice as big as the one that landed at the end of July.
Because of its size, I learned something new about modular design: thirteen feet is the magic number for room width. A room can be as long as you want it, but width beyond thirteen feet takes a little extra work. My client’s master bedroom is more than thirteen feet wide. Part of it was in one box and part of it is in the other. Their family room was too wide, too, so it had to have a police escort from New Hampshire for highway safety.
The land these clients wanted had a house on it. The house was much loved by an extended family. It was outdated, but still very serviceable as a nice family home. It had a new bathroom, lots of nice woodwork and wood floors, some good light fixtures, sinks, and appliances. This created an ethical dilemma for my clients: How to mitigate the waste of good house materials.
To minimize the waste, they had the house de-constructed by ReStore workers. ReStore is a branch of Habitat for Humanity. It takes the reusable items out of a house before demolition. The building materials are then donated to a store for resale and reuse. The bathroom and kitchen fixtures, some lighting fixtures, appliances, the wood floors, and wood trim were all removed instead of getting demolished. Habitat gets the money. Some builder gets to use old hardwood flooring again. Win-win.
Household building materials are a major source of waste. I was pleased to hear about ReStore. I am pleased to pass on information about this good idea.
Has anyone tried it? Who else is doing a good job of reusing household materials?
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Habitat for Humanity is an awesome organization and I’m happy to hear your clients were able to utilize the Restore program.
I volunteer on the site committee for Habitat for Humanity, North Central Mass.-Hudson build. We recently purchased a lot in Hudson for $50,000 using CPA funds and will begin construction this spring. The cost of building the modest 3 bedroom, 1.5 bath, 1,200 sq/ft ranch style house is about $125,000. That includes the septic system.
Some people think Habitat families are given a house free. No! The family goes through a selection process. The process includes their ability to pay back the cost of the house with an interest free mortgage.
Our fundraising committee has been working hard organizing auctions, dances, and even a concert by Holly Near (spelling?). We were lucky- a local appliance store is donating the kitchen appliances and a local Heating and Air Conditioning Company is donating the heating system with the help of their supplier.
If you ever have a chance to go to a Habitat for Humanity Fundraiser-go! They’re always fun and if you go to an auction you’re most likely to come out ahead.
Please note: when you make a monetary donation to Habitat for Humanity for a specific project, the name of the project needs to be on your check or the moneys are deposited it the general fund. Example: Habitat for Humanity, North Central Mass.-Hudson build.
deconstruction rarely comes even close to making financial sense because of the labor costs. Its great that it worked, but habitat is definitely the best resource because of the free labor.
Every single solitary modular home I have seen ranks impressively well on tackiness depth charts....nothing more than out-sized mobile homes....
Dear Sebastian Dangerfield.
The fact that your experience is so limited is sad, and hardly something one should be advertising to the whole world with the misplaced sense of pride in your lack of knowledge one senses from your comment.
I live in a regular home, but if I take you around my neighborhood, you will not be able to tell which one of my neighbors lives in a prefab home. Had I not seen it during construction, I would not be able to tell either.
Live and Learn...
In addition to the ReStore program, there are others doing similar work. My parents' house was recently torn down by the buyer and they had a nonprofit called "Greengoat" come in over teh course of a weekend they sold off and helped remove everything useful in the hosue. Kitchen countertops, bathroom vanities, doorknobs, carpeting, everything. I believe they're online so a simple google search would get you to their site, which ends in dot org, not dot com. Hope that resource helps someone else repurpose materials. We were thrilled to have a chance to reclaim some of my parents' fixtures and landscaping.
This blogger might want to review your comment before posting it.
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