Well this year has been a big year for remodeling! The good news is that the remodeling projects this year have been larger than in years past. So instead of basement finishes, porch additions, and covered decks— which we love doing, by the way— this year has had its share of larger kitchen and bath remodels and even large room additions. Maybe this a sign that things are picking up.

Right now we have a new custom home going (we just poured the footers) in Shelby County, and we have several other homes we’re bidding. Another trend we’re seeing here is unexperienced remodelers taking homeowners’ money and not finishing the job. We’ve come into two jobs recently where this was the case. We’ll be touching on this in some future blog articles.

Consulting Projects 

When you get a little gray on top of your head, people start coming to you for wisdom. After almost 40 years of custom building, we have started to do a little consulting with younger builders and architects. It’s a good feeling to give back. We did some of this type of consultative building back in the early 90s, and we’ve seen some opportunities for it again the last few years.

Industry News

We’re going to be touching on industry topics over at the P.L. Lyons blog in the upcoming weeks and months. With my involvement in the HBAL leadership as Vice President, along with my knowledge of codes issues, I have a lot of insights I’d like to share with our audience. Some of the topics will be:

• 6-8% is not a bad rate, and why we can’t sustain 4-5% mortgages anyway
• We’re running out of lots in the Greater Louisville area
• The multifamily boom
• The disparity in the Louisville building market
• National builders are buying up most of the local developments
• How private knowledge and investors can solve our local development woes