So we’re a little late in working on our new year resolutions – but we’ve got legitimate excuses! We completed and closed three homes from late January to late February, had a couple of successful open houses, travelled to Austin as part of the HBA Rally Day (and got to discuss issues with a Texas state representative), and so on. We’ve had a yellow legal pad all filled out with our ideas for the new year, but just haven’t had the time to record it electronically. So, here goes:
1) We’re going to introduce two new recurring topics – “From the builder’s corner” and “From the designer’s corner.”
The builder’s corner will be covered by Michael and will cover a range of topics from current activities (Rally Day) to tips and tricks Michael has learned from his multi-decade experience as a builder.
The designer’s corner will be covered by Michael’s lovely wife, Jane, who works closely with all our clients to provide design ideas during the architectural drawing phase as well as assisting clients with their product selection. Jane will be writing about things that provide a little inspiration to her that she’d like to share.
On an on-going basis, we will also be posting what we’ve always written about – whatever strikes our fancy! I enjoy critically examining the finance/economic side of our business like the Case-Shiller reports and banking and appraisal issues and will turn that same eye to developments in the “green” side of building as well. We are committed to building in a way that makes sense for the way we all live. That means both the “green” in your pocketbook as well as being “green” and building and designing high performance homes. Being “green” means different things to different people, and we enjoy discussing and refining what it means to us and to our lucky homeowners.
2) Gather data on the energy use of our existing homes. We have gotten several non-solicited comments from our current homeowners that they can’t believe how low their electric and gas utility bills are. This is great feedback for us. In some ways, the science of high-performance home building is tough to prove. It’s easy for us to tell potential clients that a house will save them money because we built it a particular way, but, unless we have documented proof of that, most people just nod their heads politely and ignore it. The facts are clear – there are simple things we can do to the design of your home to save you money operating that home. Well, sort of. If you keep your house like an igloo in the summer and a sauna in the winter, we can’t help you with that. We can only design the house to perform well, it’s up to you to operate it in a responsible manner.
3) We’re also going to be updating our Facebook page more often. What do you mean you haven’t “liked” Classic Urban Homes on Facebook? Get on it! And share it with your friends as well! We’ll be posting picture updates and things of that sort more often over there.
4) Finish updating our main website! We’ve been working on making behind-the-scenes changes for a while. We’ll have a better platform to showcase our homes. Time to knuckle down and get it done.
5) Find some undiscovered parts of town! There are so many fun little niches in this city like Forest Hills and Lakewood. We want to build your house in all of them!
6) Continue our education! One of the most overlooked parts of being a successful building company is continuing education. We have made it a high priority to continue learning and, most importantly, practicing what we learn. Building science changes all the time – there are always new and better ways to do things. Sometimes they’re more money, sometimes they’re less. Sometimes the benefit from doing something is huge. Those are the things we want to know about!
7) Continue your education! One of the reasons we have this blog is so that our potential customers can really see what we’re about and what we stand for. The simple fact is that there are plenty of good home builders in Dallas. It’s up to us to tell you why we think you should use Classic Urban Homes to build your next home. Once you’ve got an idea about what you think we’re all about – we’d love for you to call our other homeowners so they can tell you what they think. There’s no better research that you can do than to call references. We’ll gladly given them all to you – homeowners, bankers, and vendors. You should know that we build good houses, are financially strong, and pay our bills on time. We will be here to support the warranty on your house – something we seriously doubt all builders will be able to do.
So there it is – our plans for the year. Along the way, we’d like to build a couple of homes for some new clients. We’re deep in conversation with multiple people now, so so far, so good!
