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Showing posts from April, 2015

Dream Homes on Real Terms

Designing For Reality We all have our ideal home sketch tucked away somewhere, if only in our minds. If you find yourself driving around looking at vacant lots and touring new homes then maybe you are ready for the next step. Building your own home is challenging and fun. The first step is determining what you can afford. Some lenders or builders will push you to borrow the most you possibly can and convince you that you can afford an even bigger dream. In the construction world, that approach could easily backfire. The cost of building your ideal home is really just the start. Until you have a full picture of the associated issues, including everything from topographic surveys and septic systems to permits and contingency budgets (oh yes) you would be wise to be a little more conservative--at least in the paper stage. Now that may sound a little odd coming from a lender. When you've been on both sides of the table, you know it might be nice to have a little left over to furnish

Flip your Fridge program - cool idea - literally!

Turn in that old cranky, drippy, energy-guzzler for a sleek quiet more modern version that will save you some cold hard cash: Refrigerators 15 years or older use twice as much energy as a new ENERGY STAR refrigerator. Consumers can save as much as $260-350 over the next five years and reduce their carbon footprint by 7,900 pounds when replacing an old refrigerator with a new ENERGY STAR certified model. Recycling old refrigerators save energy, money and help protect the climate. Keeping all that old refrigerant and foam from getting into the environment could prevent an extra 10,000 pounds of greenhouse gas  The average refrigerator aged 10 years or older contains more than 120 pounds of recyclable steel emissions If all refrigerators sold in the US were ENERGY STAR cetified, the energy cost savings would grow to more than $400 million each year and 8 billion pounds of annual greenhouse gas emissions would be prevented. That is the equivalent to the emissions from 750,0