Renovating your home can be both incredibly rewarding and extremely stressful, sometimes in equal parts. Large sums of money can be required and your house will sometimes seem to be ransacked in the process.  Depending on the scope of your project, you may decide to live in your home during your renovation. Home ReBuilders had been renovating homes for over 30 years and we have a few helpful tips you may want to consider during your “construction camping”.

The first things to think about are the scope and scale of your project. A second floor addition during a hot and rainy summer coupled with a kitchen renovation may be too challenging for even the heartiest homeowner. Keeping a home to an acceptable temperature can be a challenge when the roof comes off. If your renovation includes both kitchen and baths, staying home may not be the best choice. Washing dishes in the tub is hard enough, if the tiler is also trying to set tile in said tub, it may be impossible.

Many people decide to stay in their home during construction and there are several ways to make this as pleasant as possible with a bit of planning. If you are embarking on a kitchen project, it is important to set up some type of temporary kitchen. When the words “temporary kitchen” are used, you should be envisioning a microwave balancing on a toilet in an unused guest bath and an old fridge rolled into the corner of a family room. The important thing is to find a designated spot to house a hot plate, toaster oven, a few pans and a good collection of paper and plastic utensils. Often, we can salvage a few old kitchen cabinets and place then in an appropriate spot for use. A sheet of plywood can be used to make a countertop and sometimes a laundry sink can become your best friend. Plastic storage bins may be a good place to store your kitchen supplies to protect them from unavoidable construction dust.

Pets and children can provide some other unique challenges during construction. If you have a safe spot to confine your pet and they can handle the noise and disruption, they can certainly stay with you during construction. Doggy daycares are also everywhere these days and may be a good option during the day when most construction is going on.  Children’s naps are precious to parents but can sometimes be challenging to impossible to accomodate with a quiet house during construction. If a grandparent is near by or extending a nap at a childcare facility is an option, these may help.

Another tip is to try and be as organized as possible as your home is turned upside down. Important documents that you may need to access may be best housed in a plastic portable file bin. Design decisions and notes regarding selections and product orders may also need a similar spot.

A well timed vacation may also be a welcomed break from construction. Just confirm with your project manager that all deciosions have been made and job site meetings don’t need your input. At the end of the dust and upset will be a house that provides the best home for you and your family. It will all be worth it in the end. We promise.

The design and building plans will need your approval and sometimes finding the kitchen pendant of your dreams that is no longer available, in the finish you need, or in your budget can seem like earth rotation stopping problems.

Just as fashion runs in a cyclical pattern, home design trends also tend to repeat themselves.  The neon colors of the eighties, something that seemed so outdated in the nineties, are popping up everywhere today.  The brass fixtures, hardware and plumbing that we in the industry have been pulling out and replacing for clients for the last 20 years, well get ready, they are coming back. Not necessarily in the same way.  The shiny builder brass will hopefully never return.  But after decades of cool polished chrome and satin nickels, the trend is shifting to warmer metals.  A brass with a slightly matte finish, maybe a bit of age is showing its face in cabinet harware, lighting fixtures, and plumbing.  The key to this look, like most things, is keeping the trend minimal.  A simple light fixture or perhalps a bar sink adds interest and is trendy, a whole houseful is dated.  And the old rule of thumb, that the faucet should match the cabinet hardware, forget it. Mixing is just fine. So keep your eyes open for the trend. We promise, it’s out there!

Home Builders Announce Housing Finance System Reform Plan

WASHINGTON, March 2 – The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) today announced a new comprehensive framework for housing finance system reform that would transition Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to a new mortgage securitization system for single-family and multifamily conventional mortgages.

“Our plan seeks to overhaul the housing finance system to ensure that housing credit is available and affordable in the future and is delivered through a competitive, efficient, sound, safe and stable system,” said NAHB Chairman Barry Rutenberg, a home builder from Gainesville, Fla.

To achieve this goal, Rutenberg said the system must include private, federal and state sources of housing capital; offer a reasonable menu of sound mortgage products for both single-family and multifamily housing that is governed by prudent underwriting standards and adequate oversight and regulation; and provide a federal backstop to ensure that 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages are available at reasonable interest rates and terms.

Replacing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac with a new securitization system for conventional mortgages backed by private capital and a privately funded federal mortgage-backed securities fund must be done in an orderly fashion over time. During this phase-in period, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would remain operational until the alternative system is fully functioning.

Under this scenario, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would be gradually replaced by private housing finance entities (HFEs) that would be chartered to purchase single-family and multifamily mortgages from loan originators and package the loans into securities for sale to investors worldwide. The federal government would guarantee the securities, not the mortgages.

The HFEs would only purchase mortgages that are well understood and have reasonable risk characteristics, such as standard 30-year fixed-rate loans. The HFEs would operate under the oversight of a strong independent regulatory agency to ensure all aspects of safety and soundness. NAHB believes the 12 regional Federal Home Loan Banks could serve as HFEs.

Federal support to the conventional mortgage of the future would consist of a privately funded insurance fund where the government would guarantee its solvency in a manner similar to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s backing of the fund that insures savings deposits. Under this system, mortgage originators would pay premiums to capitalize the insurance fund, which would cover losses and ensure full payment to investors. The federal government would be required to pay investors only if the insurance fund was depleted.

“The intent is for the government to be in a secondary position and to be the insurer of last resort in order to reduce the risk to taxpayers,” said Rutenberg.

NAHB’s housing finance reform blueprint also proposes to:

• Restart a carefully regulated fully private mortgage-backed securities system. NAHB believes reforms are needed in the system for rating mortgage-backed securities and is supporting the development of new securities ratings agencies that would use criteria developed by securities investors to assure objective evaluations and avoid conflicts of interest.

• Continue the role of the federal government housing agencies. The housing finance support roles of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Federal Housing Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Department of Agriculture and the Government National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae) would be preserved.

• Enhance the position of state and local housing finance agencies (HFAs) as a source of housing funds. The HFAs should have a more prominent housing finance role through the development of original programs for new homes and multifamily rental units involving partnering with federal and private providers of housing capital.

• Expand the role of the Federal Home Loan Banks (FHLBanks) in the housing finance system. The FHLBanks should continue their current activities to serve as an ongoing liquidity source for institutions providing housing credit. Existing programs, such as the FHLBanks’ mortgage purchase programs, should be enhanced by allowing the banks to move beyond portfolio purchases to securitization.

• Repair flaws that produced the housing boom and bust. It is extremely important to continue and complete steps to close the gaps in standards and oversight that allowed and facilitated the improper and illegal activities in financial and mortgage markets. This should be done by undertaking a series of comprehensive reforms to ensure sound mortgage products and prudent underwriting; requiring sound mortgage securities structures and full transparency for investors; and imposing adequate oversight on previously unregulated segments of the mortgage and financial markets.