With interest rates higher than a few years ago, many are reluctant to sell their house and finance a new purchase with higher rates. If you were planning such a move to optimize your home, maybe it’s time to take another look at possibilities on your existing home–it’s likely there are more possibilities than you thought! Our experience with many renovations and new homes allows us to solve for multiple objectives–that’s the power of performance-informed design.
At a minimum, it’s always a good idea to tackle the low-hanging fruit of weatherization. DIY at the least, or get a professional audit to determine more exact ways to upgrade your thermal envelope. We can help with recommendations to auditing firms, and these improvements usually pay for themselves within a few years.
Beyond weatherization, a home can achieve decarbonization with a comprehensive retrofit, including insulation/air sealing and changing mechanical systems and appliances. This is more of an investment, but it can result in a home which is much more comfortable, resilient, healthy, and tech-enabled. This flow chart shows the range of strategies to consider. As you can see, it’s complex, but our consulting can provide a tailored plan for your home.
In addition to the decarbonization work, there are a myriad of design adjustments which can make a big difference in the experience of your space. We look to biophilic design principles while solving for performance, structural, and deferred maintenance problems to increase the enjoyment of your home. Often a relocated door, additional skylight, or expanded window can transform an important part of the home.
An example is on Tom Bassett-Dilley’s house, which he decarbonized and made fully net zero in 2021-22: the back room was originally a porch, poorly enclosed in the 1940s, with single-pane windows that were falling apart, a sloping floor, and virtually no insulation–a miserable space, but also the gateway to the back yard.
By rotating the exterior stair parallel to the back wall and extending the roof to overhang the stairs, a small back porch with covered stairs was created; new, large windows were added to connect with the back yard, and the overhang provides ample protection from summer sun. From misery to joy, while improving performance—that’s the power of design!
We offer several options to chart a path for single family residences–our typical process for remodeling, which involves measuring and drawing the house, followed by design and retrofit planning in close collaboration with the owners, resulting in a plan and contractor budget pricing. The other choice is a higher-level option without detailed measurements or drawings, but a walk-through followed by a report with concept options and “order of magnitude” cost options (from us, not a contractor). Let us know if you’d like to talk–great possibilities may await!