How to Plan, Contract, and Build Your Own Home, Fifth Edition: Green Edition (Paperback)

About the Book
Whether the decision is made to purchase a new home or an existing home, buying a house is a major investment. The possibilities and pitfalls are endless! Anyone interested in taking on new construction must be familiar with building jargon and be ready to enter into a close relationship with a general contractor who builds houses for a living.

How To Plan, Contract, and Build Your Own Home—Green Edition will provide readers with the information that they need to confidently proceed with the building process and not leave major/consequential decisions to contractors. Readers will learn how to match the home they want to a building site; how to arrange rooms; where to locate fixtures; and how to work with a contractor so that they end up with a home that provides maximum enjoyment and value within budget. In addition to providing soup to nuts information on the home building process, readers will have the latest information on how to incorporate sustainable features into their homes—increasing energy efficiency—and reduce overall construction costs.

Features

• Six new chapters on sustainability/green issues
• Updated chapters that include information from the USGBC’s guidelines for new home construction—LEED-Homes
• Chapters updated to include sustainability options
• Information on photovoltaics and thermal passive solar design
• Updated Checklists and summary points that highlight important considerations

Market / Audience
Real Estate Managers (361,000); Real Estate Brokers and Sales Agents (500,000); Construction Managers (430,000)

Benefit to the Customer
Custom home buyers and those who want to build their own homes now have a complete guide that includes that latest green building/sustainable information.

About the Authors
Richard M. Scutella (Cincinnati, OH) has written several books on new construction, home buying, home maintenance, and safety, including Homebuyer’s Checklist, Second Edition (Tab Books; 1993), and the first four editions of this book. He has designed and supervised the construction of many new homes and has specialized in tracking the evolution of energy-efficient residential and commercial building materials and equipment systems.

Dave Heberle (Erie, PA) is the author of McGraw-Hill’s Construction Safety Manual and the co-author of the first four editions of this book. A former environmental and safety consultant, he currently manages investment real estate and is completing a series of tightly focused reports on available financial incentives and other strategies for reducing residential and commercial energy costs.

Written by experienced instructors and builders, and used by savvy homebuilders to put up thousands of homes, How to Plan, Contract and Build Your Own Home will help you: Select and prepare a site; Make informed decisions on types of construction, framing, foundations, and layouts; Plan for home office use, communications upgrades, "smart house" technology, and more; Design a home that will serve your needs throughout your life; Perform construction tasks safely and efficiently; Install the newest and most economical and efficient types of insulation, roofing, plumbing, wiring, and more; Build amenities such as decks, patios, gazebos, sidewalks, and driveways; Make do-it-yourself vs. subcontracting decisions; Plan when you'll move in with a helpful calendar-style checklist; Select the right mortgage.
Featuring a reader-friendly style loaded with icons and sidebars pointing out safety considerations, problem alerts, and elaboration on specific topics, this one-stop, do-it-yourself home-building package makes any dream house a reality. It even tells you how to maintain and improve your home once it's done! --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.