Home Improvement - Building and Renovating

Architects and builders have been saying for years: "Good design doesn't cost the earth, but poor design does." Do you have a project coming up. Do you want to add a shed or garage or maybe a cabin at the lake. If you have some land hidden away in the forest and maybe you would like to build yourself a nice home and save heaps. There are ways to save a lot of money if you are prepared to do a bit of hard work yourself. You could use recycled building materials and save lots of cash. You can buy at auctions and save lots of cash. There are other ways to save lots if you want a real budget project.
Long before "sustainable" and "environmentally friendly" became public statements, the professionals already knew all about the energy-saving possibilities of a well designed home. First of all we need to dispel some myths. There is nothing wrong with using recycled building materials. In fact, you will find that some of the old lumber that was used years ago is a better quality than you can get today. The trees were bigger in those days and the lumber that was cut from them was just better. It is well seasoned now and certainly is not going to shrink any more which is a plus. If it still has the old nails sticking out of it everywhere you will have to de-nail it. Usually they will just break off when you bend them a couple of times. When you are cutting and shaping this lumber just be careful not to cut through any nails as you will be always sharpening your saw blade. Getting a nail back into this old hard lumber can be difficult too and you may have to drill for each nail. All in all, a bit of extra work but when it is done you will have a solid stable job that is not going to move from shrinkage.
Unfortunately, they were often forced to conform to "houses must face the street", rooms had to conform to what worked in the past rather than what was best for local conditions. Second hand lumber is usually fairly cheap to pick up because there are not many who are prepared to put in the work. If you check out demolition sites you can often pick it up for free because the demolition gang are only interested in any prime items and usually dump the rest. If you are going to use recycled lumber on a new job it will pay to check with the local building authorities first because sometimes they like to inspect it before you use it. Another source of cheap lumber of all sorts is at clearance auctions.
Because of this many structures are not in line with today's standards of sustainability. Across Australia, and in some other countries in the world, new houses and renos are required by law to provide minimum standards of energy efficiency. While these laws vary from state to state, country to country, all require a 4-star or 5-star energy efficiency rating.
The homebuyer then has to decide on whether to pay out the extra cash at construction, or have regular and continuing savings in the future.
The critical component in sustainable design is the building's orientation on the land. Not only the direction the house faces but particularly way the windows are facing. In small buildings (houses) orientation allows the proper control of summer and winter heat loads which penetrate through a building's outer shell.
Research needs to be done on movement of sun, slope of land, prevailing breezes, existing trees and vegetation and any other special characteristics in each individual state/territory. Different climate zones within the area must also be taken into consideration. Strategies for the tropics are different to those in temperate or alpine areas.