All Forum Posts by: Matt Vaughn

We're building LEED Certified and LEED Silver for next to zero cost increase. Gold and Platinum, in the buildings I've built, have had a cost delta, usually because of high-end strategies like geothermal and solar. The success of the green building movement in recent years has had great affect on materials such that manufacturers are often selling as standard (no cost increase), products that help owners achieve their LEED goals.

If I were building my own building, I would invest in a LEED silver design. I kid you not, in D.C., it wouldn't need to cost a penny extra (minus cost of the LEED certification itself) with an architect that knows what he's doing. The reason I'd go for silver is that you'd get the PR benefit of LEED (which has real value), without increasing cost per square foot.

@Ray Browne

Not to be a bore, but here's some paint science. The bulk of the smell you're experiencing are volatile organic compounds (VOC's) within the paint. While there are a lot of tricks to mask the odor or minimize it, the chemicals within the paint are actually off-gassing and will continue to do so for some time. The actual off-gassing of paint will continue up to 4 years after the paint was applied. The doesn't mean you'll smell it this long, but these compounds will continue to go airborne during that time.

Best management practices for increasing the speed of off gassing and decreasing odors include the above mentioned and simple flushouts or bakeouts. A flush out is just running fans to bring fresh air into the building( recommended 14,000 CFM/square foot of building space). A bake out is heating the building to relatively high temperatures. This increase activity in the paint and encourages the off-gassing to accelerate.

That said, I painted my daughter's room with 0 VOC paint and within 15 minutes you couldn't even smell that you had painted.

I think that's good advice, but I'm always skeptical of the actual Square footages provided in the MLS. Sometimes identical floor plans have very different square foot ages because one is counting the basement or something.

Does anyone have suggestions for how to account for this issue in your comps?

@Jeffrey Collins , I'd be curious what makes you want to get into commercial?

I'm late to the game here, but let me tell you how I, a general contractor, enforce my subcontracts. @Mark Mynhier , I can tell you want this to be cooperative, so this is what I'd do.

Meet with him and develop a recovery schedule. Identify all remaining features of work, and agree to a schedule to get done on an activity by activity basis(date when tile completes, date when paint completes, etc.). Let him know that this is worse than the contracted schedule but that you want to work with him so that both companies can succeed. Tell him that you do not want to enforce liquidated damages as allowed by your contract, but that failure to comply with the recovery schedule will force you to do that.

I would recommend doing something similar for the larger job right off the bat.

And finally, you'll need to follow up in a weekly or biweekly basis to compare actual progress to the agreed upon schedule. Hope this helps.

@J Scott , I'd be curious to hear who your contractor and architect ended up being. Would you recommend them?

this is a good suggestion. Concrete is not the correct direct substrate for untreated wood (unless it's cedar). This problem may be primarily because there's no direct contact with concrete and only secondarily because it's near a bathroom.

I'm probably too late, @bonnie b. but concert should not be in direct contact with untreated wood. The cement from the concrete will cause wood to dry rot. So the suggestion to use a vapor barrier was a good one for this reason as we'll. Let us know what you decided to do.

Congrats on your first successful deal! Generally speaking, whT part of MD are you working in?

Great feedback, so what I'm understanding (I think) is that becoming a broker would allow me access to MLIS which is a much more powerful tool and may resolve some of my issues.

Is it unheard of to develop a relationship with your broker so as to allow their client access to the MLIS without being a broker?