GreenGeezer

"Green Homes for Sale" Pick of the Week

This beautiful straw-bale and solar home in Tennessee uses passive solar design elements in the large, shaded, wraparound porch and large overhangs to provide cooling shade.  The floor is laid on six inches of styrofoam insulation, so you can walk around in your bare feet all year long.

"The straw walls are approximately 2 ft thick which gives it the super insulated R-VALUE of R-55. The ceiling is insulated with fiberglass to a depth of 3 ft for an R-VALUE of R-100. This is what is known as a super insulated home and is extremely energy efficient. All windows are vinyl double pane argon gas filled to protect from ultra-violet damage and have low E tinting for energy efficiency."  The house is located near Nashville, on a hill in the woods.

Home for Sale at Ecovillage at Ithaca

There is a unit for sale at Ecovillage at Ithaca, a co-housing community.  As explained on the Cohousing Association of America website, "cohousing communities combine the advantages of private homes with the benefits of more sustainable living, including shared common facilities and ongoing connections with neighbors." Cohousing communities also emphasize sustainability, and this one is no exception, featuring:

• an organic CSA vegetable farm and U-Pick berry farm
• office spaces for cottage industry
• a neighborhood root cellar
• community gardens and varied natural areas
• 80% planned green space

The unit for sale includes two bedrooms, full bath and large walk-in closet and half bath downstairs.  The price, at $197,000, seems moderate.  More pictures here.

"Green Homes for Sale" pick of the week: Athens, OH

This affordable green home in Athens, Ohio uses some of my favorite green features: hydronic radiant floor heating, lots of insulation, and water-saving dual flush toilets and rain barrel diverters.  It has a compact floor plan and yet has four bedrooms.  I'll be those clerestory windows also allow for great air circulation,  and along with shade trees negate the need for air conditioning. Check out the full listing at the Green Homes for Sale website.

"Green Homes for Sale" Pick of the Week -- Fredericksburg, TX

This beautiful straw bale home in Texas hill country is designed to foster natural air flow and, even though it has a conventional forced-air furnace, its utility bills are modest.

"All interior exposed lumber is reclaimed longleaf/heart pine. Clerestory design allows for natural air flow when heating/cooling system is not used. All faucets/shower heads/toilets feature low-flow design."  Find full information at Green Homes for Sale.

Pre-Fab Green Home in Sag Harbor, NY

Yesterday's New York Times featured an affordable (for the Hamptons) pre-fab home as a prototype which the architect, Laszlo Kiss, will live in with his wife.  The design has standard design elements such as a front and back cedar porch, and a translucent pergola, but what makes it special is its green features:

• Geothermal heating system
• Solar PV panels that will provide electricity and sell back excess power to the grid
• Light fixtures what will only accept CFLs
• Five sets of sliding glass doors and L-shaped windows which will allow passive solar heat

One of my favorite things about the house is that it is designed to make flexible use of space and is generous with its inclusion of storage.   Oh yeah, and it can be assembled quickly right from the factory. "The Kiss House design is 'exactly the kind of innovative thinking we need to make green homes that large numbers of people can embrace and afford,' said Neal Lewis, president of the Neighborhood Network of Long Island, a nonprofit alternative energy organization.'"  Treehugger shows the house layout and this image in their coverage of this article.

Green Financing Available for Energy-Efficient Homes

Today's Chicago Tribune has an article on "green mortgages"  just in time for your Spring home purchase or remodel. Some of the incentives being offered include:

• Bank of America will discount closing costs up to $1,000 for energy-efficient homes
• Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac offer "energy-efficient mortgages"
• FHA offers a popular energy mortgage that offers extra money for renovation.  The energy savings make the homes more affordable, which is part of the FHA mission

More information is available at My Energy Loan.com

"Green Homes for Sale" Pick of the Week

The past week has left me little time to post, but here's  a great green home in Golden, Colorado with a whole house water filtration system and whole house solar system.  I can't tell how well it is insulated from the description.  Well, here's your chance to be "off the grid" and have some real solitude.  I like the fact that it looks like an old mountain cabin, though it is newly built.  The view of mountains and forest isn't too shabby, either, though it would be a long walk to town....

"Green Homes for Sale" Pick of the Week

This nice little home in Moab, Utah  is a great example of passive solar design and gardening with native plants.  What makes it a green home?

"Pressed adobe block made on site with local clays. Rough cut lumber locally milled from dead standing timber. Floors colored cement and sealed with water based non toxic sealer called "Safe Seal". Interior walls finished with gypsum plaster and colored with local clays. All of the interior doors are recycled. Lots of Natural Light. Landscaping is all regional plants that are drought tolerant on drip system with timers."

 

"Listed Green" Pick of the Week in Nashville, Tennessee

This green home in Nashville, Tennessee is a real beauty, and I hear that Nashville is really happening these days -- sounds like a place that a green geezer could be happy in.  All that music, and Jack White (White Stripes) and his wife and new baby live near there in a small country town that is becoming the  place for musicians seeking peace and quiet....but I digress.   I have been following Listed Green, the MLS for green homes for some time now and will try to share "picks of the week" with some regularity.   The units in this condo building are the "most energy efficient units ever offered in the state of Tennessee, and are LEED Gold certified, and are winners of the Governor's Environmental Stewardship Award."   Buy here and your utilities will be paid for two years! 

Home for Sale at Vermont's Cobb Hill

Vermont's Cobb Hill Cohousing Community has a home for sale.  In the best endorsement of the community, the sellers are not moving away, just moving up the hill to a different house:

"The home is a private unit (one bedroom) in the Common House of Cobb Hill.  Share huge beautiful kitchen with other apartment dwellers and community.   Includes den, fireplace, laundry, root cellar, finished attic, wood shop with all kinds of tools, and much more."

Cobb Hill was founded by Donella Meadows, the author of Limits to Growth.