[Greenbuilding] Green real estate market

[Keith Winston]

It is borderline crazy to think statements like "geothermal adds 1/4 of 
it's value to resale" have anything substantial to them at all. Even 
comments about resale value of kitchen and bathroom improvements are 
probably most often meaningless: what were the kitchen and bathroom like 
beforehand? How much of a "deal" did you get on the job, and did you 
finish them to par, subpar, or superpar (!) with the rest of the house? 
How close is the house value to the value that your neighborhood can 
sustain (there's some point, in almost any neighborhood, that you just 
can't sell a house for more).

Besides all that, I've gotten tragically bad quotes for geothermal on 
the last several attempts (a new one just 2 days ago) ranging from $45k 
to $85k! These are not mansions! It might be hard to recover a large 
fraction of an $85k geothermal system.

But, we don't know what the local real estate market will be like when 
you go to sell. We don't what energy prices will be, nor if the country 
will have undergone a huge sea-level change regarding energy efficiency 
(looks like it could happen any day now, but that's been true for years).

So I'm sorry to be a bit pessimistic, but I'd say: make changes that you 
find satisfying, useful, and feel right. Make your house work for you 
(since you aren't doing this to flip the house), and you'll likely do as 
well as anything... That said, I'd encourage significant energy 
efficiency measures, and solar and... because those are right (by my 
standards), because they might save you money sooner than you think, and 
you might even get a break from the bank on your loan (sometimes it 
happens).

You might also choose to think ahead in terms of accommodating solar 
thermal or PV on the roof, if you're changing a roof line.

Good luck!

Keith


Steve Tripp wrote:
> I'm new to the list and have done some searching through the archives, but
> have not seen a discussion regarding resale value of green homes.
>
> My wife and I are remodeling and hope to make our home as weather tight as
> possible as well as use recycled and sustainable materials wherever
> possible.  We do not plan on selling the house anytime soon, but I wanted to
> find out if our planned improvements would increase the market value.  I was
> told that geothermal heating-cooling systems will add 1/4 of its cost to the
> value of the house and that quality weather tight windows and doors will not
> add enough to the value of a home to make them worthwhile.
>
> We still plan to make the changes we want, but now am wondering what kind of
> uphill battle I may have with the bank if I cannot show that we are adding
> more to the value of the home.
>
> Do green homes sell?
>
> Thanks in advance for any insight you may provide.
> Steve Tripp
>
>   

-- 
Keith Winston
Earth Sun Energy Systems
Hyattsville, MD 20781
301-980-6325
send me mail at 
keith at the company below
www.EarthSunEnergy.com