BrokerIPTV Real Estate News and Videos

BrokerIPTV: Today we are talking with John Keith, President of Harvard communities. John thanks for being with us, I appreciate it.

John Keith: Nice to see you.

BrokerIPTV: I want to talk about whats going on in the building industry. There are lots of people who are trying to build friendly, energy efficient, green type of homes, why now?

John Keith: Well, people have been doing that for a while, it has never been more timely than it is now and it is pretty clear why that is, energy cost are going up, oil is over $100 a barrel, electricity prices are going up, natural gas prices are going up. So I think on the energy efficiency side, people are looking to save some money and then also I think more people than ever are interested in being a good citizen of the planet and reducing our carbon footprint and using less natural resources.

BrokerIPTV: What about - is their any type of certification program for a builder out there who wants to go in this direction?

John Keith: Yeah, that's really a question, because there are a lot of certification programs and there is lot of confusion out there, because I call them good house keeping seals of approval. There is probably 50 different programs out there, the one here in Colorado that's most well known is Colorado Build Green or build green Colorado which is one of the leading programs in a country, LED for homes, LEED leadership in energy design is another big national program that's getting more and more publicity, but it confusing, because there is really an alphabet soup out there of certification programs.

BrokerIPTV: Will a home have like a seal of approval that this is certified green or certified energy efficient?

John Keith: Well, green and energy efficient are not completely synonyms.

BrokerIPTV: Correct.

John Keith: The green is big umbrella and under that umbrella there are lot of different components, energy efficiency being one, another one we focus on a lot is indoor air quality or healthy indoor environment. There is another program called energy star, you mentioned a seal or a stamp, we put a bronze plat on everyone of our house saying they are energy start certified, and again that focuses mostly on energy efficiency.

BrokerIPTV: I can see on a 25 year old ranch, I would like my house to be a little bit more green, I dont even know where I should being, what is the number one thing I should do?

John Keith: What a good question. The first things you should do is go find in energy audit company, some company to come in do a quick couple of hour audit of your house and they will show you where are leeks. So, you want to plug the leeks, you want to insulates some walls, you want to make sure you doors and windows are whether strip, really simple stuff. The next thing you probably want to do is reduce your electrical demand use compact florescent white bulbs instead of incandescent, you can save 70% on your lighting needs, by just switching to compact florescent and you can shut the plasma TV off a little bit and make sure what they called phantom loads in your house things that you plug into the wall that you dont regularly turn off, pull the plug out or have a power strip and turn them off.

BrokerIPTV: So my grandmother who unplugs the toaster and a clock was doing the right thing?

John Keith: She was before her time, definitely.

BrokerIPTV: Great, thanks very much. John I appreciate it.

John Keith: You are welcome.