A Quick Sheathing Lesson

This photo is of an exterior wall of a home we are rebuilding. It shows how air passing through the exterior wall has been filtered by the fiberglass insulation. What appears to be staining on the yellow fiberglass is actually years of particulates, pollutants, being filtered from the air entering the house. So you thought buying replacement windows would prevent air infiltration?

Why do you care about air infiltration? 1. Most of the pollutants do get through into the home. 2. The air getting in is hot in the summer and cold in the winter and costs you. 3. Wet air is drawn to dry air. In the summer your, most likely, over-sized HVAC unit short cycles and can't remove the humidity and you argue with your spouse over the thermostat. Yes, you care about air infiltration. The best part? The home pictured was built to Georgia code. This a tiny example of a huge shortcut that can be taken to make your home profitable to a "to code" builder.

How do you do it properly? Sheath with Huber's Zip System and use open cell spray foam insulation. It will add 12k to a large project and pay you back within a few years financially and immediately from an air quality point of view. How do you repair an existing home? Rip off all the existing siding, sheathing, insulation or re-size your HVAC, add HEPA air filtration, add a dehumidifier. Both of these options are bordering on ridiculous. The point? Cheap goes down to the bones. Ask a 3rd party construction science group to recommend a builder or remodeler. An example is Southface in Atlanta. You could go with an EarthCraft builder or Remodeler. Or you could make your life easier and just hire me.