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.

The Shame...

I have an admission. I added a second story to my own home a little over 5 years ago. We ran out of Hardie trim and added Windsor One corner board to my chimney because it was easier to purchase on the fly. I noticed last week that is is already rotten. Yes, rot on my own 5 year old project...unacceptable!

I have steered my clients away from using wood of any kind on their exterior for years. On my own home, on the area mentioned above, I used Windsor One which comes primed and then we primed the end cuts. This is the best exterior wood trim on the market today, but it didn't matter. Wood these days comes from smaller and smaller trees thus softer and softer wood. hardie and other manufacturers produce cementitious products to replace wood siding, trim, soffit, and nearly every other necessary exterior product. What is not made in a cementitious product is made from PVC. Why are cementitious products better? They are made of cement and wood fiber, they don't rot, they don't burn, carpenter bees do not eat them. Because they do not expand and contract very much they hold paint for an average of 20 years. Expect to repaint wood at least every 5 years and probably 3. A well done exterior is the key to long term sustainability. Eliminate rot which eliminates mold which helps eliminates bad air inside your home.

Your architect will most likely whine about authenticity and the natural aging of your home. Ask them if they will mind chipping in on the maintenance.

I can show you many examples of sided homes that have no wood on their exterior that would surprise you. I only build incredible homes and this is a small example of how to keep them looking and behaving that way.