NexGen ICF

What is the standard being set for developers and builders? The standard is being set for developers and builders, but it's unclear what it is. The responsibility for determining and enforcing these standards is not well-defined. Down payment requirements for new homes vary significantly across the country, with some locations requiring 100% down and others allowing builders to collect no money upfront. Companies offering competitive wages and benefits struggle to compete with businesses that employ undocumented workers or subcontractor labor so far down an LLC paperwork chain that everyone is confused, unorganized and unwilling to search for the truth.

Builders are handcuffed by rules of engagement that are not consistent. End users are backed into a corner based on the knowledge given to them by a particular advice giver whether paid or unpaid; professional or not; right or wrong. The process is never the same and the goals often differ. American Society has created a pampered and spoiled workforce that does not have the end user’s best interest at heart. Wages continue to increase as the quality of craftsmanship sadly declines. The proposition: Pay more/get less…Not the intent of the American Dream. The American government does not recognize common sense practices, nor does it implement them when it comes to building them. For example, mother nature wins the battle against infrastructure, housing, and code. It takes building code and sinks it right alongside the most current nail pattern structure in a 2x12 ledger or LVL specced floor beam. The number of natural disasters that occurred in the last decade is eerily very high, with some sources indicating several over 100 billion-dollar disasters in the United States alone. The cost to American taxpayers and professionals of natural disasters in the last decade is in the trillions of dollars. How much of that value was built to code and failed-miserably? Worse yet, how much of that was unpermitted, not to code-built structures? The amount of damage caused by unpermitted structures in natural disasters is likely significant, but data is not readily available. In a world obsessed with generating data, the irony is that this data is unavailable.

Arguments to actual answers to those questions are always going to be subjective and data can be skewed to either side of the spectrum. Use common sense to see what is foreseen and present. How is it that in 2024 we still have multiple states and regions that (1) don’t have a code to follow or (2) a code that is 10 plus years from being implemented. Codes are set to create a baseline standard. The fastest growing US States are Utah, Idaho, Texas, North Dakota, Nevada, Colorado, Washington, Florida, Arizona, and South Carolina. Now look at each one of these states below in the chart and see the expectation set for construction purposes. Look at the accountability.

Architects spec things that benefit them the most and that make the developers understand exact, true costs. Look around at Developer A, B, or C in a local area. They will not build your house with the same people they hire for theirs. They will not use the same materials as they do for theirs. In fact, they won’t live anywhere near the magical development they “pride themselves” in building. The whole system and process is broken. It’s spreadsheet contractors with a pampered weak workforce incapable or unwilling to do something out of their comfort zone. It’s the end users being pushed into what they want, not pulling the people they are paying to work for them. It’s also a lack of accountability and action by policy makers, Washington, and lobbyist groups.

Today we have more tools, equipment, and resources than ever before. However, history has countless examples of production masterpieces where man created structures in time frames that could not and would not exist today. Government contracts awarded in months and the execution of such faster and in shorter time frames then bureaucratic functions can vote, plan and approve. Fun fact-usually these large projects from the past were executed with minimal injuries and less deaths and they were built long before OSHA and “safety meetings”. The inflation and cost of building has not remained proportional to what we get and when.

This blog is meant to be disruptive and break the status quo. It is meant to take commercial GC’s and challenge them to do better. It is meant to portray a system that isn’t working to the best of its ability and can be fixed with time. There are absolutely job sites in North America right now that civilians could not execute in a fraction of the time as they were done in 1930. There are also endless amounts of buildings that are getting executed currently in NA that won’t stand a chance to still be standing in 90 years. We have technology, we have equipment, and we have money. What we don’t have is enough people to show up or care. What we do have is a society of builders afraid to learn, fail, or step out of their comfort zone. We have very little chance to find 7,200 workers to wheelbarrow and bucket concrete. We have very little chance to form and pour over 3,000 yards of concrete in 1 day-even with a pump truck.

Take the time to recruit your builder or your professional driving the ship. There are Power 5 college athletic teams currently recruiting. They look for that next special player to not only execute a game plan, but fit a portrait of what they want. The program’s why, and their culture vary from the people/person they want to the player’s character and coachability. Coaches want adaptable players that can change on the fly-unphased by something new. Game plans may very well change at half-time. Playing on the road may provide logistical challenges and require patience and grit. If an end user does not believe in something they will believe in everything and everyone with an opinion. Simple solution! Make something…anything…as a goal. Make that something, something better and go recruit the next star student athlete, call him student builder to execute your build.

I am a tradesman and a highly trained, skilled “blue collar worker” - as they call it. I am a 45 year old white male, married to an educator. I have a problem with the path my 3 kids, 4 nieces and nephews, and most other kids that age that I know, are being forced and manipulated to take, or at least start. College for my entire adult life has been deemed and proclaimed the ultimate right of passage. It has become the finish line for highschool students and the last step prior to adulting. Both public and private schools base their success on total scholarship money collected by their students. High schools compete for college placement results and statistics, and I’m sure they inflate them like a varsity basketball starting lineup (I’m 6 foot 5 and look 6 foot eight kids in the eyes).

I personally attended 2 years of junior college with no real reason, except to play sports. Sure, I was an honor roll student and tried, but my heart and mind were never truly engaged. I got my associate degree and then moved to Colorado. Breckenridge, CO specifically Peak 9. I knew kids my age moving there to ski and party. They were frowned upon majorly by our parents and friends of our parents. Imagine the stress I felt dropping out of college to not enroll in another school. No one, including me, knew it at the time but those 2.5 years I spent there, which was the same time frame it would have been for my bachelor’s degree, created the foundation and the education of my life. I visited a different school and academy. I enrolled at the school of hard knocks and into the construction field as a carpenter. I was signing up to work for a non-union construction company, meaning I was only there for a paycheck. The questions going through my mind at that time would be: (1)what does a non-union construction company degree look like? (2) What kind of certificate do I get to waive? (3) And, what about the social standard and label for my parents? How embarrassing! Lucky for my family Facebook was nowhere near ready to showcase and demoralize the family name. Lucky for them they couldn’t watch all the other 20-year-old boys that were one to two years away from a real degree from a real institution.

Let me summarize: It was supposed to be my junior year in college, 1999 when I arrived in Colorado with a red Ford Ranger and everything I owned under a roll top cover. Obviously, not very much. I was going to live in a hotel room, and I was going to get $25 a day for food and an hourly wage of about $30 per hour as a subcontractor-whatever that was. All I knew is that I didn’t get money taken out for taxes. As time evolved and as I got to learn and listen to others, I began to understand the term “write-off” and the advantage for me to buy things. When I say “buy things” I don’t mean Air Jordans, FUBU clothes and cd’s like my college friends. I mean tools and equipment. I began to collect assets. Man, I was learning. I was learning how to build a 6-story hotel. I was learning the progressions of all other trades and what they did exactly. I was slowly learning real life business and profit. I didn’t ski with my college aged friends or really hang out with them at all because I was not like them. It quickly became obvious this career choice was not popular with my peers and friends. How could I become a man without this paper saying I had a BS or a BA.

Either way, April 2002 saw me arrive back home, ironically enough, the same time as my graduated, college educated friends. I pushed through and celebrated for them and with them as their parents threw graduation parties. Every party created the same question, “When are you going back to school? Is this little life experiment over? Are you ready to grow up…?” as I heard it. Now, let’s examine how the class of 1997 moved back to small town, rural Illinois. My college friends brought their fancy clothes and shoes home with a degree and serious debt. They had loans that some of them had to pay and loans that some parents chose to pay. Either way, much less money than when they started. Credit cards were maxed out because they had to have fun and keep up with their classmates’ spending habits. They came home with their parents and a single dorm full of things ready to join the workforce and ready to move back in with mom and dad. I, on the other hand, drove my new black Chevy ¾ ton extended cab truck with my new shiny black 16’x7’ enclosed trailer full of tools. Many of which were unopened as I never found the time to open them. I had cash and in addition, learned some real-life concepts of investments and what to do with all this hard-earned money. I was 22, single, and homeless. I had everything I needed to start my adult life debt free and with a skill I could take anywhere with me, a skill that created opportunities, and a skill that is now a lost art.

What I didn’t have was an apprenticeship on paper. If I wanted to join the union for a career and for the prestigious label I would need to start over. I was already ahead of the apprenticeship program as I was building $5 million dollar houses and a hotel for 2.5 years with skilled, career carpenters that would prove way more valuable than what an instructor could teach in a classroom setting. It's just not comparable. After all, I was working with guys that could write, and should write the book on how to build things, in real life, in real conditions, and every day. These guys have lived through the school of hard knox as well as proven to all those around them they deserve the title of craftsman. The counter to that was to mock up something in a controlled environment like a classroom and with an instructor who may or may not have ever built in the real world. I continued my path for the next 15-20 years as an independent contractor and usually trying to run a business as well. I never received a W2 and I always worked for myself. Nothing was ever as easy or as good as an 18-22 year old learning, traveling, and figuring out the obvious, common sense things about life, small business, and construction.

What does it all mean today? Society continues to place more emphasis on where you are going to college vs. what you are going to do next. Society is more interested in creating the status quo vs creating those that challenge it. In a post-pandemic world the trends are declining at an alarming rate. These trends started prior to the pandemic but exponentially and alarmingly continue. According to The Hudson Institute the average age of a tradesman is 55 and the supply of skilled workers in the US will not catch up to the demand until 2050. For every 5 skilled workers retiring there are 2 to fill it. The ratios differ tremendously based on the source, but one thing is consistent-there is never a stat that shows millennials or Gen Z’ers bringing more than departing baby boomers. In another study, industrialskilltrades.com has the average age of skilled workers at 43 with 27% retiring in the next 10 years. 10,000 baby boomers retire every day so the reality is that any one, any time can get a job.

“Dirty jobs”are not as flashy or as impressive as working in a high rise with an Armani Suit, but according to who? I have watched several tradesmen make more money, drive better cars, and for sure build better houses for themselves (with their own hands) than many white collar workers. I have seen guys in worn out and torn flannel shirts and calloused hands be worth $10,000,000 and essentially have white collar people on retainer-working for them. Sadly, I have also watched the ability of people dwindle significantly because companies are too busy to train because there is too much work to do. I have watched the willingness to work falter because the same able body person can bag an online grocery order in a controlled environment for $18-$20 per hour. I have watched the passion of workers taking pride in their work completely be removed from a thought process.

A skilled craftsman builder can take any material: wood, steel, or concrete and build it level, plumb and square. A skilled craftsman can find efficiencies and better ways. The problem is specialization into specific, smaller categorized areas has created stagnant, and unwilling to challenge themselves, “pros.” Liabilities and sue happy people have created a society afraid to take a risk or step out of the norm or comfort zone. This is why the most talented, blue collar skilled craftsmen are hard to find. They have grit and persistence. They stepped out of the norm at some point, probably at the choice of hammer or book. Skilled craftsmen are needed and never should feel like less. A skilled craftsman has more than the requested 10,000 hours as described by Malcom Gladwell in Outliers. You will know them when you see them as the amount of time spent has placed them in, and above the label of “Pro”. Labels and titles do not, however, define them. Nor should potential customers questioning their worth. An “overpaid” doctor or lawyer rarely has their path questioned or their rates under the microscope. However, that same doctor or lawyer will question that electrician for getting the light bulb to turn on.

In today’s political fights and arguments, unemployment seems to be important. It is a tough figure to calculate and the rate can be adjusted to match whatever side of the story you want it to be. Let's look at a staggering number and theory: Workforce participation rate. This is the number of able-bodied people who are participating in the workforce or actively seeking work in our country. According to online statistics, specifically resources.skillwork.com the current civilian labor force participation rate is hovering around 62%. That means 38% of eligible people could be working but choose not to. Of that number over 7,000,000 able bodied males from mid-twenties to their mid-fifties are just sitting out! Not even looking for work. Why? How many of these people are in that label and demographic because it is more acceptable in their mind to not work vs. fit a negative façade or label of a non-college graduate. How many of these people have spent the time and effort going to college to get a degree that are unemployable, unusable, or not needed. Never will a person putting the effort in to learn a trade end up jobless, unless they choose to be.

Here is what I know and what I challenge others, specifically highschool grads to look at. College does not lead to success as the only option. College is something that can be done any time in life as pre or post profession. A skilled trade goes nowhere. The knowledge doesn’t expire or run out. The knowledge can be used throughout life and for many helpful, personal reasons. The knowledge provides opportunities for future success. Imagine becoming an apprentice in carpentry/building. That knowledge and skill set allows for an architecture, engineering, or business degree. My story lays the groundwork and the facts. The only real difference from 1999 to 2023 is that now, the money to be made makes this a no-brainer. The ability to make 6 figures per year exists today, Day 1 after high school graduation. The ability to save 6 figures a year in college per year is also then calculated. The argument can be made that in the 4 years of college the financial swing alone makes complete sense. The argument can also be made that in the same 4 years, who is more employable year 5? The person that’s been working and gaining a skill, or the person that has spent 4 years obtaining a degree in, say communications.

Encourage today’s youth to grab the hammer by day, the books by night. Get the best of both worlds and become that blue collar worker with the white collar education. Get them to understand the importance of the skill and let the rest fall into place.

I have been a builder and a remodeler for 20 plus years. I have been looking at and playing with development strategies and concepts for a few years. As a builder there are a few boxes I look to check in each and every build:

• Sustainability

• Efficiency

• Safety

• Health

The goal is to provide the best products for my clients and ICF (insulated concrete forms) allow this to happen. ICF with all the concepts closely related drive my plans, my budgets, and my concepts. Value engineering and designs are dictated and closely followed. Budgets and costs are usually more but allow the end user to look well into the future. The future for me is centuries, not decades. Generational homes are defined as a household made up of 3 or more generations living together under one roof. The U.S. population living in generational homes has more than doubled over the past 5 decades. This fact and definition of generational homes is what current Americans understand as to be the definition, the concept, and the strategy. I, however, do not. When designing a house, I look at a “generational home” to be passed from one generation to the next, to the next and to the next. I want the client’s home to be used by grandkids of their grandkids. Can this build outlast and outdo anything else around it? Can this build challenge and even compete against the crazy elements mother nature has for it? As a builder it is important for me to design and build from the inside out meaning the guts and bones, not the skin and façade. Facades are replaceable and change. But only if the structure remains intact. If I install a 40-year warranty exterior trim package it should look super nice and sell the property. Sadly, in 40 years it will need to be replaced with another material and a new trendy, cute material. What about that next 40 years? And the next after that? The fluff over the rot or over the broken bones will be a recipe for failure. It is a plan to eventually impact an owner significantly. It is a plan to take an innocent, under educated consumer and put them in a real financial burden and situation which is why most homes in NA are not sold to or occupied by someone 25 years or more younger than a previous, related owner. The choice is made by someone at some point to manipulate the façade or cover up/hide the problem. This someone will know the problem exists, therefore removing it from their conscious and their family.

As a remodeler and a house flipper I look at the bones, always. I look to see if the bones can be or should be covered. I look to fix the problems and focus less on the fluff. I am forced to decide what is/is not important. The problem lies in the disconnect of what is financially rewarded and what is not. A home appraisal has little consideration related to what can’t be seen. A home appraisal is no longer an inspection, but an evaluation. It is an evaluation-based system as no one can validate something that is not seen or visible. The evaluation, therefore, gives 0 value for the bones or the systems connected to it.

Americans are not educated enough in homes and the good, the bad, and the ugly related to them. Americans buy what they can see and don’t ask enough questions. Water intrusion has 0 value when looking at market value and what people will buy or what lenders will invest in. Wouldn’t it be in both party’s interest to reward the simple fix? Shouldn’t a home be valued for more if the bones are protected? To prove my point, let’s look at 2 identical homes. Everything is the same except one has a lifetime warranty from water intrusion and the other does not. As a consumer which would be preferred? How much more would a consumer pay to not have to deal with a soggy, musty, moldy basement? Would a consumer want to deal with a $20,000 expense to repair? What about the additional costs of replacing personal items, health problems related and the shear aggravation. How do pictures and memoires ruined rate? As a lender, the investment is not 100% secured or safe. What if the customer defaults on their loan because the cost to repair is justified to be more then walking away or defaulting on their loan? No one wins in this situation except the person that did the wrong thing when no one was looking.

Conversely, we can now take the same two houses and forget the water issues. There are still two identical houses except one is built to last and hand off to one generation after the other. It is energy efficient and has operational costs of 50% or more less per month. It has insurance costs of 50% or more less per month. It can happen and it does happen. However, the consumer and lender once again don’t evaluate or access the situation properly. As a builder, I don’t get the ROI to build ICF and to achieve the values I have listed previously. As a flipper or remodeler, I don’t get the ROI to fix the basement before I sell it “finished.” The unfortunate reality to all of this is that I can be prevented and accounted for but, it forces people to decide between profit and greed and right and wrong. Inspections are no longer that. They are evaluations by 3rd party individuals that get paid no matter what. How does it end? When do consumers looking to buy and invest worry about the bones and understanding the important stuff, not the visual stuff? When do lenders want to “secure” their loans? When do communities look to maintain and sustain values by really inspecting and evaluating? We can all agree it is better to hand property off to pedigree rather slap a band aide on it/cover it/sell it. As per the song by Maren Morris, “If the bones are good the rest don’t matter” could not be about relationships and love. It would make sense for it to be written for consumers looking to buy, build, or look for a home…a generational home.

Potential strategy of teaching consumers about housing is vastly under played. It overlooks many of the items I build and think about while accessing and wanting to make the best possible outcome. As a builder/remodeler it is too bad that our build costs associated for providing long term commitments are not valued proportional to the cost they save and protect other from paying towards. Education needs to come in the form of emotional connections vs. visual satisfaction. Educating the consumer’s memories from childhood vs. perceived adulthood wants could provide the proper information. For example, a 40-year adult may have grown up in a house built of ICF and sustainable products. They already understand it and can recall the non-issues they had. They can recall the conversations about utility costs their parents didn’t have at family or friend gatherings. They can recall the warm and cozy feeling they always had in the middle of winter. In the opposite direction, that same 40-year old may have married someone that lived in a basement that smelled moldy and musty. They may have even had water leaking into their basement bedroom. Chances are all these types of connections related to emotional responses; good and bad are buried into the consumer’s childhood. They are forgotten and buried much like the conscience of that mediocre builder cutting corners to make his own home nice or that house flipper looking to profit $50,000 vs. $45,000 by removing something they “should” do but not get a return on. If the memory isn’t directly related to themselves, they know someone who has witnessed or partaken on either side of the spectrum.

The consumer’s childhood memories and recall are lost to that nice new countertop and new, visually appealing, flooring (probably acting as a band-aide). The consumer’s adulthood self wants the ability to outshine their friends visually by appearance not by measurable visual stats, data, and computations. It is not cool to or trending to talk about a battery-back up sump pump pit that has 3 individual pumps. It is not cool or trending to talk about walls that are stabilized…for the lifetime of the structure. It is also not cool or trending to talk about what you don’t have which is why people with failing homes randomly discuss them and suddenly sell them.

Consumer’s have the info stored away and it is time for them to find it, start using it, and start the new trend of “generational homes” as not only an educational piece, but, a marketing piece.

NexGen ICF, LLC
PO Box 1526
Bettendorf, IA 52722

info@nexgenicf.com

877-NOW-4ICF