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Grand Homes has been one of the longest standing partners of Homes for Hope. Their commitment to the mission of Homes for Hope and HOPE International has enabled us to help hundreds of thousands of families around the world. Grand Homes and their trade partners are able to use their god given talents to help support the families of third world countries with micro-finance loans. The micro-finance loans, provided by HOPE International, empower underserved families around the world to pull themselves out of poverty by providing them with access to discipleship, business training, and small loans. These resources enable them to start and/or expand a small business that provides for their families needs without relying on handouts.

Our MarkSystems Community User of the Month is Carrie Roeger with Windsong Properties, located in Georgia. Carrie is the Chief Operating Officer (COO) for Windsong Properties; they build on average 90 new homes per year and specialize in the Active Adult segment.

Shinn Builder Partnerships was created to help local and regional builders achieve success and be competitive with national builders. We do this by connecting our members with manufacturers for the best pricing, service, and support. In addition to the manufacturers, we are pleased to connect you with a group of service providers that can help you with a host of operational support. We have worked personally with each of these providers and can endorse them unconditionally.

Six new, professionally decorated Coach and Paired Villa model homes – representing a brand-new product line for Mattamy – are now open, as is a new sales center.

Door hardware brand Kwikset has unveiled a new Bluetooth-enabled smart lock that combines the latest smart technology but comes at an affordable price.

With their scale, dramatic designs, and innovation, kitchen spigots get all the love, but manufacturers are stepping up the style of their lavatory faucets as well.

A well-designed deck is still one of the most popular outdoor amenities among homeowners, and one of the hottest ways to install one is with a seamless, hidden-fastener look.

Smart home features are becoming more and more common in U.S. households. While the needs of each home vary, residential tech automation can involve energy management, digital security, app-controlled entertainment, lighting, climate control, smart appliances, and various AI (artificial intelligence) hubs and gadgets. According to a 2019 report by Statista, one-third of all homes in the United States use some form of smart home technology, and it is predicted that over half will have it by 2023. What does this mean for new home builders? Will they be competing with tech companies for business? The structural home builder warranty experts at PWSC take a deep dive into the evolving requisites of residential developers and explain how they can stay ahead of the smart home wave and protect their profits by incorporating risk management solutions.

Do your employees know what you think they do well? Do you have regular coaching/feedback sessions with your team to improve their performance and moral?

Company adopts new brand strategy and unveils its new logo. Arthur Rutenberg Homes, Clearwater, Florida said Wednesday it has changed its name to AR Homes and introduced a new brand identity strategy representing the company’s expansion and evolution while honoring the legacy of its founder.

Fischer Homes just completed a new decorated model in Louisville and is hosting a grand opening to celebrate. The grand opening for the new Avery Coastal Classic model will take place on Saturday, September 28 and Sunday, September 29 from noon to 4 p.m. at the community of Summit Parks in La Grange, Kentucky.

McCall Homes, along with their participating trade partners and suppliers, recently completed their 2nd Home for Hope project, successfully raising over $100,000 in support of HOPE International. The profits from this home will help provide microloans, savings services, discipleship, and business training to over 17,333 entrepreneurs living in underserved communities around the world, empowering them to provide for themselves by starting or growing a small business.

Bora-Care with Mold-Care is the company’s classic termite-control treatment with added protection against mold and fungi. According to Nisus, the borate-based wood preservative requires a single application to diffuse into the wood in a house and create a protective barrier. It can be applied either directly during the dry-in phase of construction or to high-risk areas after construction.

Like kitchens, homeowners want their bathrooms to be functional spaces where they can clean up with ease. But, today’s buyers are also looking for transitional or contemporary wet rooms that ‘wow’ on first look. Whether you’re looking for products for a spacious master bath or first-floor powder room, the following products showcase the latest trends and innovations in bath design.

Gerber’s Treysta rough-in tub and shower valve offers flexible features that make for easy installation, including: an accessible mounting system; vertical inlets that can be installed next to studs in PEX applications; and quarter-turn service stops that can open and close in the slots with a flathead screwdriver. Treysta also has solutions for applications with cold expansion PEX and Crimp PEX, as well as back-to-back installations and reversed hot and cold inlets.

The Propane Education & Research Council’s Propane Training Academy has a new online course available that provides builders and developers with an overview of community propane systems.

Mattamy Homes on Thursday named a new president for its Southeast Florida Division. Dan Grosswald joined the organization in August, reporting to Pete Skelly, CEO of Mattamy Homes US. Mr. Grosswald will be responsible for all aspects of Mattamy's land development and home building business in Southeast Florida.

As bathrooms increasingly resemble personalized spa-like sanctuaries, stylish bath accessories that keep clutter at bay and maximize storage are in high demand. The classic-inspired Invari Bath Collection includes a single robe hook, cabinet knobs and pulls, an open-post toilet paper holder, and towel bars. A variety of finishes, including a new Brilliance Gold (8-inch towel bar shown) is available.

Vinyl still gets a bad rap, despite recent environmental impact studies suggesting it isn’t as bad for the planet as once thought. And alternative cladding options continue to grab market share.

Icynene’s Classic Ultra spray foam is an open-cell foam insulation with greater cohesion than the company’s past products. The GreenGuard Gold-certified insulation can be sprayed in a wide variety of temperatures, making it appropriate for any climate, the company claims. It achieves an R-value of 3.7 per inch and has a core density of 0.5 pound per cubic foot.

Every year, Professional Builder takes the pulse of the industry with the Top 100 Products. These are the building products in which its readers were the most interested during the previous year. For 2019, seven Builder Partnerships manufacturers were tapped for recognition.

Royal® Building Products, a Westlake company and leading manufacturer of exterior building products, has announced the launch of Celect® Canvas Cellular Siding, an unpainted version of its industry-leading cellular composite siding.

Many industry publications are talking about a construction labor shortage. Even though we concur, the proposed solutions are global and require efforts and initiatives outside the operations of the home building company. However, each builder can successfully control and implement certain solutions in their companies to overcome the shortage of labor in the market.

The nation’s largest franchisor of custom homebuilders, Arthur Rutenberg Homes, has appointed Jim Rosewater as its new CEO. Rosewater, formerly chief operating officer, takes the helm as part of a strategic succession plan focused on doubling company growth over the next five years and expanding Arthur Rutenberg Homes’ national footprint.

The classic elegance of marble is universally appealing for almost any interior environment. Marble-look tile makes the luxurious stone more modern, usable, durable, and even affordable in a range of surface applications. Porcelain tile construction makes the look of marble more versatile than ever with three Emser Tile collections that uniquely marry the inherent beauty of marble with the trusted durability of tile.

Kichler Lighting LLC, a leader in innovative lighting and ceiling fans, helps home owners design with light to emphasize favorite spaces, increase safety, and utilize more efficient task lighting. Kichler Lighting's LED integrated lighting options reinforce light layering and help to set the room's lighting effect based on desired ambiance and intended purpose.

Whichever surface home buyers choose, builders can help them protect their investment . It wasn’t too long ago when prospective home buyers would set up smartphone alerts for MLS descriptions that mentioned granite countertops. These days, “quartz” is just as likely to be the term they plug into their real estate searches. 

At Shinn Builder Partnerships, we are committed to continuously improving our programs and services. We are dedicated to providing our builder members with a simple and efficient rebate submission process and timely rebate payments. With a focus on accuracy, ease and efficiency, we’re excited to announce two rebate program improvements.

Shinn Builder Partnerships is pleased to announce the addition of RGS Energy into the Builder Partnerships program.

To succeed, manufacturers have to do more than build great products—they have to build goodwill, establishing beneficial partnerships with the contractors that buy and install their products. To do this, they look for new ways to provide the tools and resources needed to help their partners build up their own businesses.

Tracking Certificates of Insurance (COIs) is one of the most mind numbing activities for a builder. Despite all of the work trying to ensure insurance compliance, how do you know the form you are given is still active? How do you know the form is even real? After all the work, has your risk of catastrophe for your business even reduced? Every builder should find this unacceptable, given the amount of technology at our fingertips.

In the 26 years we have conducted the financial study, we have accumulated a landmark historical record of home building companies’ financial and operational performance: the challenges, the changes, the adjustments, the improvements, the victories, the defeats, and the comebacks. It has been a privilege to have gained your trust to allow me access to the most sensitive information from your companies. I thank all of you for your continued participation and support.

The new home construction process is the easiest and most affordable time to install a Generac standby generator. When it’s installed during the wiring of the house, it allows the homeowner to save substantially on installation costs. Add these savings together with financing options and the ability to roll costs into the mortgage, and new home construction becomes the ideal time for home owners to find value in a standby generator.

Building homes is a complex and risk-heavy operation. It takes tons of materials, dozens of different specialized trades, and tremendous logistics to close a property. To manage the many hidden risks, insurance is a necessary tool. While purchasing every required type of insurance coverage can effectively reduce risk on a build, poor insurance compliance execution can lead to disaster.

Have you ever noticed that some companies just never have job openings? They seem to attract the best people, and those people never leave. How do they do that? It is a critical question to answer in today’s job market because we are at effective full employment; talented people will have their choice of positions.

Incentivizing your staff can increase sales and create an uplifting work environment by rewarding employees for their hard work in achieving the goals you have set for them. A positive and motivational work environment will attract top- notch employees and encourage them to stay for the long run — and create memorable experiences while they invest their time with you.

Top home builders know that investing in their people contributes directly to their company’s success. Builders receive a significant return when they provide career development and training opportunities. Here are three ways employee training boosts profitability.

Emerson, a leader in the thermostat and HVAC controls industry, announced its top-rated Sensi™ smart thermostats have received the ENERGY STAR® certification, an official endorsement of the products’ energy-saving and cost-efficient benefits for consumers.

According to the “Construction Technology Trends 2018 Report,” approximately 81 percent of construction companies indicated that they planned to spend more on technology in the current year compared to the previous year. Some of that investment involves replacing outdated software or upgrading to more integrated, user-friendly software.

Helping builders identify where to save money and where to invest is a large part of my efforts here at Builder Partnerships. A key element of that analysis is a new product feasibility exercise that I walk my builder clients through.

It’s a fact; home buyers are not satisfied with the storage in their homes upon move-in. They spend an average of $4,550 on home improvement projects within the first three months of moving in, according to Realtor.com. By providing the right storage solutions, your home buyers can move in with ease and you can profit. The experts at Organized Living are ready to help you capture those profits with these top five closet trends.

Across the organization, discipline is essential for the efficient execution of processes and procedures. You must stay disciplined to ensure your organization operates the way you intend. Otherwise, you may notice a slip in policies and procedures and it may become a scramble to complete tasks and meet deadlines as people create workarounds to do it the ‘easy way’.

Each year, Shinn Builder Partnerships presents the Lee Evans Award for Management Excellence to one builder who displays exceptionally sound management principles. The award was created by Lee S. Evans to recognize builders who have made significant progress in improving their processes to streamline their organizations and achieve superior profits, while delivering a high-quality product to the customer.

If you were lucky enough to grab a spot at this year’s sold-out Executive Summit in Breckenridge, you had the opportunity to gain a fresh perspective on a concept Chuck Shinn has been teaching to home builders for more than 50 years.

Perhaps no meeting in the new home process gets as little attention as the closing appointment. While it admittedly is a fairly mechanical process of signing one’s name about 75 times and exchanging a (usually large) check for possession, we can still make it hospitable. The appointment usually takes only about an hour, but preparation and planning can generate dividends beyond the exchange of funds for keys. Here are nine tips for making the closing a great experience for your buyers.

It's the year of purple. Stephanie Pierce, director of design and trends at MasterBrand Cabinets, shared her thoughts on Pantone's choice for the 2018 Color of the Year, Ultra Violet.

Business is very good for most builders today, and the immediate future looks promising. Since ours is a complex and complicated industry, there is still a need to be vigilant in monitoring your business plan. Keeping a watchful eye on hard costs, variances, and administrative “creep” is certainly advisable.

In December 2017, Builder Partnerships Founder Charles C. Shinn Jr., PhD, shared his annual economic analysis and his 2018 housing forecast. Here, we share his complete analysis, with the addition of pertinent statistics from the end of 2017 and the first weeks of this year.

We often say that this business comes down to the numbers. A home building company will start the year with an objective and develop plans for each functional area. If all goes according to plan, they will collectively meet the objective. One “number” that is often overlooked in the planning phase is the capacity of the trades. The typical purchasing manager hopes enough trades are in each cost group, but does not have a true system to know for sure. “Hoping we are good” should not be part of the plan.

This year, Frigidaire celebrates 100 years of meaningful innovation, including inventing the first home refrigerator, the first home freezer, and the first room air conditioner. Their newest innovations build upon the brand’s 100-year legacy of offering appliances that make preparation, cooking, and clean-up quicker and easier.

In January, Builder Partnerships members responded to an industry survey from Professional Builder on kitchen and bath features. Our members made up more than half the builders included in the survey, so you might be particularly interested in the results.

In the world of home building today, information is power. That doesn’t only mean you need the ability to generate and manage timely, reliable information internally to keep your business strong and growing. It also demands that you deliver equally timely and accurate information to prospects and do so in a way that cuts through the clutter and motivates them to become buyers.

APPLE VALLEY, Minn., Jan. 8, 2018 — Uponor announces the Uponor Pro Squad, an exclusive nationwide network of expertly trained plumbers and water specialists interested in leveraging the intelligent water technology of Phyn Plus, smart water assistant + shutoff, to grow their businesses.

No, we are not talking about how to reach millennials, which seems to be everyone’s target. Another market will be expanding for the next decade, is more affluent, and wants to move to new homes. Remember the baby boomers? This group is actually growing as they reach age 62, which is significant. They typically have paid off their mortgage or nearly so, and live in a home that no longer suits their lifestyle. Their home may be too large, require too much maintenance, or be too far from the grandkids.

Cost increases are on builders’ minds right now. It seems like prices for materials and labor are going up on every new bid. It’s across the board on building materials, with lumber prices being particularly volatile in response to the recent tariff on Canadian lumber.

Too many builders determine the sales price of their homes based on direct construction cost and land. They come up with a plan, establish the standard specifications, go out to bid, add up the costs, and put a markup on the costs to determine the sales price.

Most builders are eager to reduce the time it takes to build a home and hunt for tips on ways to make the hard cycle go more quickly. This is a worthy pursuit, as most builders intuitively understand that tightening the production schedule allows them to build more homes in a year without adding operating cost. Assuming a fixed number of superintendents, along with a fixed average number of homes that any one super can carry at a time, the most cost effective way to increase their production is to add more turns in a year.

Industry leaders offer insights and recommendations for growth and profitability in the coming months "With escalating construction costs, a shortage of skilled labor, and the increase in technology, it looks like the era for industrialization is upon us. It will change the industry as we know it. Builders will become assemblers of components that are built in factories.

Few resources are more valuable or cost-effective for home builders than the MarkSystems™ program from ECi Software Solutions.

What does it take to become the #1 ranked house wrap brand in the industry? Why do builders rate DuPont™ Tyvek® HomeWrap® as #1 in quality and the brand they use the most when purchasing a house wrap?

Trying to decide between new dECOLeather™ recycled leather veneer, faux leather, or 100% leather? dECOLeather™ has many attributes that make it a great choice for leather surfacing. Take a look at these pros and cons and make an educated decision about this unique new product by Formica Corporation.

Most manufacturers, especially in the building products industry, are highly competitive. They love to bring in athletes to give the keynote address for their annual sales meetings and customer events. Everyone loves — and can relate to — a good motivational speech about working hard, setting goals, overcoming obstacles to become champions, and setting aside personal ambitions to do what’s best for the team.

Housing closed out 2017 very strong. In fact, 2017 is tracking to be the strongest year in the housing recovery. Demand remains high, and most builders will start the year with a strong backlog. Inventory is low for both new and existing homes, and interest rates are still helping with affordability, although that bears watching as the Fed is predicted to raise interest rates three more times in 2018.

Builders are always looking for extra upgrade opportunities to maximize profits and ensure complete buyer satisfaction. Closet upgrades are exactly what your home buyers are looking for to improve the value of their new home and quality of their life; walk-in closets rank second on home buyers’ list of desired amenities, according to a survey by Zillow.

A woman home from military duty in the Middle East and now living in Atlanta met with the warranty manager and a manufacturer rep. She had a pistol in the back pocket of her jeans the entire time they inspected issues with her home’s siding. In Edmonton, a receptionist answered a call to hear a home owner say that he was on his “way to your main office with a bomb.”

Every year in late September, these decadently sweet, unhealthy treats appear in the stores in all kinds of varieties: traditional candy corn, Indian corn, mellow creme pumpkins, autumn mix, and assorted mellow cremes with different flavors and Halloween shapes.

If you ask 10 builders about their greatest struggle right now, nine will tell you it’s the production schedule. They see cycle times extending weeks longer than what was on the initial schedule at the time of release. This time drift doesn’t happen because framers now swing hammers slower than before. It is because the homes are sitting empty.

The home builder community has once again shown its heart for those in need of a helping hand. In late August, Chuck and Emma Shinn asked Builder Partnerships members and their friends in residential construction to consider supporting their annual involvement in Driving for Kids.

Glass — a material with origins that date back to several thousand years ago — is resurfacing in new, innovative ways throughout today’s residential and commercial spaces. From storefronts with all-glass windows to coffee tables with shadow boxes, glass reflects your personal style as well as a transparent design theme.