Are you in the market for a new house? Looking to buy a green home made with eco friendly materials from an earth-minded realtor or home builder?
Then I've got the perfect research and buyers guide for you.
Here, you'll find all sorts of practical information for buying, renting, or building the perfect eco friendly home, regardless of your budget or space requirements.
What does it mean to you to live in an eco friendly house anyway?
When you think of an eco friendly house, what's the first thing that comes to mind?
A Mud Hut?
Eco Friendly Solar Panels?
Dull Eco Paint?
When people consider what it means to live in an eco friendly house, their mind often goes first to some of the most popular green improvements that many people make to their homes to increase their green characteristics.
But, more than just making a few changes here and there, are some fundamental features you may want to think about when trying to decide how to make your living situation greener. Some important ones that come to mind are:
As you can see, there's a variety of ways you can live in a green home, and it doesn't have to mean living in a space that's less beautiful or functional for your purposes. Let's explore each of these options briefly.
Eco friendly homes can mean multi-family homes and prefabricated homes. By their very nature, multi-family homes are more efficient in terms of resource, energy, and water consumption. But what exactly is a multi-family home?
It's a building in which several homes share common walls and rooflines, mechanical systems, and outdoor environments. These can be condo buildings, apartment complexes, fourplexes, and even duplexes.
Prefabricated homes come with many of the same benefits since constructing them in a confined environment allows the companies to save energy and resources, although they don't come with the same space savings as multi-units.
You can find eco friendly multi-family home designs by checking out resources such as these:
American homes have been increasing in size ever since the 1950s, even though the average family size has continued to shrink. In fact, today, we generally have three times more square feet per person than we once did.
More space means a greater loss of farmland and wilderness and a much higher use of construction materials. Smaller homes, on the other hand, stress the importance of using less space per person in order to conserve natural resources and land. Some people go to the extreme, living in 95 square feet or even less per person! But as the Small House Society notes, small really is a relative term.
A small house for you may be a larger house for someone in another country. But if you're able to downsize compared to your neighbors, you could reap the rewards in the long run. Think of the money you could save on utility costs, furniture, and other household expenses?
So the next time you're in the market for a new eco friendly home, instead of looking for the biggest place your money can afford, try to go for a home that provides just enough space for you to live in. You can do this by:
If you're really committed to finding green, eco friendly homes, you may wish to seek out an intentional community to join. These groups of families live in eco villages, cohousing arrangements, communes, or alternative communities. Each of them stresses the importance of social, political, spiritual and ecological sustainability and so the groups are normally based around shared ideals.
These groups often integrate many eco friendly home practices to live more earth-sensitive lives together in community. They do this by:
Today, there are generally three main eco friendly home certification systems, as follows:
Today, there are many savvy real estate agents who realize that there is a growing interest in the eco friendly homes for sale. They have recognized the niche that is green home buying and building and have chosen to specialize in this field in order to carve out for themselves a specialty that is certain to grow exponentially over the next few years and decades.
These individuals understand eco friendly home plans and are aware of all the factors that go into a green home. For instance, they look for the following qualities in the green homes that they represent:
With these characteristics in mind, a green realtor will be able to look through their listings to find homes that have these features. They understand inside and out what an eco friendly home design looks like and can ferret out the genuinely green options on the market.
But how do you know a truly green realtor from one who is just pretending to know about eco friendly home building and buying? Of course, you first want to ensure your realtor is accredited by the National Association of Realtors. Next, look for a realtor with a green certification, such as:
Locating a real estate agent with any or all of these training and certificate programs under their belts will have an edge and be able to give you expert advice in finding that perfect eco friendly home for your next move.
When you think about going green at home, it can seem a bit overwhelming the sheer number of changes that need to be considered. However, you can take a deep breath and relax knowing that tiny changes each day can make a huge impact over time.
If you would like to create a healthy, eco friendly environment in your home there are simple steps you can work into your routine and will even save you money in the process. One easy adjustment to put into action is to review the cleaning products that you use around the house.
The benefits of changing your cleaning products away from toxic ingredients to more natural ones are:
The first step is to assess what is in your cleaning bucket and read the labels. If a cleaning product has a label that says 'POISON', 'TOXIC', or 'DANGER', these things don't simply fade away into the air after use. Besides the added benefit of preventing accidental poisoning of children, you can clean just as well with ingredients nature has created for us.
Related Eco Topics of Interest:
Go to Eco Friendly Energy
Go to Eco Friendly Living
Go to Eco Friendly Stores
Popular Eco Community Pages:
Create YOUR Declaration of Eco Friendliness Profile
Be HEARD at the United Nations of Green Eco Friendly Citizen forums
Share YOUR Eco Friendly Moment-of-Truth Confessions
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