Parade of Homes 2010
Develop a Landscape Plan to Fit Your Budget
Article From HouseLogic.com By: Laura Fisher Kaiser Published: September 18, 2009
The success of any landscaping project depends on having a plan and sticking to it.
Landscaping is one of the surest ways to pump up the value of your property. According to research by Virginia Cooperative Extension, going from a plain lawn and a concrete driveway to a well-landscaped lot raises a home's perceived value by 12.7%. The opposite is also true: A "minimal" landscaping job-a thoughtless smattering of scraggly plants-actually detracts from home value.
How much should you invest in upgrading your landscape? Professionals recommend budgeting 10% of your home's value. But the important thing to remember is that success doesn't depend on how much you spend. "Landscaping doesn't have to be expensive, just well planned," says Carl Heldmann, author of "Be Your Own House Contractor." Here's how to get started on a landscape plan of your own.
First, consult a pro
To figure out how to allocate your landscape dollars, start by picking the brain of a pro. Even if you have a naturally green thumb, a trained professional can save you from wasting money on wrongheaded ideas and open your eyes to possibilities you haven't considered. There are various types of landscape pros (http://www.asla.org/nonmembers/publicrelations/guidejobs.htm), and their expertise is priced accordingly.
If your yard has major issues or you have grand ambitions, consider hiring a certified landscape architect to design a comprehensive plan that includes such things as irrigation, lighting, architectural features, soil conditioning, and, of course, the growing stuff. A verbal consultation costs about $100-$150; a detailed plan can run from $300 to $2,500. The American Society of Landscape Architects (http://www.asla.org) offers a state-by-state "firm finder" on its website.
Landscape designers (http://www.apld.com/index_main.asp) typically charge less than degreed landscape architects and are a good choice for simpler projects that don't require construction. Horticulturists specialize in plants, not necessarily design. Then there are landscape contractors, the design-build firms of yard work. Start by asking friends whose gardens you admire for recommendations. Your local home and garden center is another good source for contacts.
Set your priorities
Before you get any dirt under your nails-or hire someone to get dirty-you need to make two lists: a) what you want and b) what your property needs. These aren't necessarily mutually exclusive, but the exercise is important for setting priorities. It would be folly to spend big bucks on an outdoor kitchen before resolving potentially disastrous issues such as a diseased tree or drainage problems (http://www.houselogic.com/articles/7-signs-you-may-have-a-drainage-problem/).
The first question that a professional will likely ask is: What do you see yourself doing in your yard? Hosting Sunday barbecues? Doing the crossword puzzle in a hammock? Swimming laps? Growing vegetables? Clip pictures of outdoor spaces you like and don't like to clarify the feeling you're trying to achieve.
Remember that part of your landscape budget will go toward the "b" list. Those are things that may not lend themselves to sexy magazine spreads but can protect your property value-not to mention enhance your quality of life-by lowering water bills, reducing the need to mow or rake, or blocking the view of your neighbor who hot-tubs in the buff. We're talking about practical considerations such as irrigation, fencing, lighting, equipment storage, privacy, and security.
Create a "floor plan" to target costs
To ballpark costs for materials and labor, think in terms of square footage, which is how landscapers charge. According to Costhelper.com, (http://www.costhelper.com/cost/home-garden/landscape-design.html) hiring someone to create a "naturalistic garden" averages $11 a square foot; the cost can double for a formal garden with walls and water features. And don't forget to factor in long-term maintenance such as mowing, mulching, and pruning. (Sweat equity, anyone?)
If you're designing your own plan, start by measuring your property or getting a plat survey from the county. You might even be able to find a topographical map indicating features like slopes and swales. You can sketch the basic layout to scale using old-fashioned graph paper or landscape design software. Prices have come down considerably on the latter, but quality varies widely, so check online reviews before purchasing. A free option: Google's Sketchup (http://sketchup.google.com), with cool apps for trees, pavers, shrubs, outbuildings, and the like.
Once you have the parameters, create a floor plan, marking off different sections just as you would rooms of a house. The front path is the foyer, there might be a "dining room" with a picnic table, a shady "bedroom" for a hammock, a "rec room" with play equipment. Consider the costs for each area of your plan, including materials, equipment, furnishings, greenery, and any specialized labor like irrigation or electricity.
Think long term
If your ambitions exceed your wallet (and whose do not?), go back to your priority list and pick a section or projects to tackle as your budget permits, advises Angela Dye, principal designer/president of A Dye Design, a landscaping firm in Phoenix, Ariz. "What is the absolute most important thing you need to have done?" she asks. "What is bugging you most?"
A carefully conceived plan will keep you on track during this gradual transformation, both in terms of vision and budget. And remember that patience pays off. "Additions or renovations can start losing value once completed," says Jim Lapides, spokesman for the American Society of Landscape Architects. "A landscape literally grows in value over time."
Laura Fisher Kaiser is a contributing editor to Interior Design magazine and a former editor at This Old House magazine. The secret to her Washington, D.C., garden is blood, sweat, tears, and mosquito repellent.
Start a Shared Tool Co-op
Article From HouseLogic.com By: Carl Vogel Published: March 09, 2010
Save money and have access to a truly stunning tool collection by starting a neighbor-to-neighbor lending program or a tool library.
The amount you save by borrowing a table saw the two or three times a year you need it, rather than buying one, is so great that neighborhoods around the country have formalized the process with tool-sharing programs. Neighbors organize a process to lend each other specific tools, and establish tool libraries that loan tools to members.
The benefits aren't just economic: Pooling tools is good for the environment (fewer tools manufactured means less waste down the road), it's a great way to get to know your neighbors, and it's helpful to anyone who wants to keep up their property without spending a lot of money for tools.
Starting a tool library is a bigger job than a neighborhood tool-sharing program, but it has some clear advantages. Members don't have to deal with the hassles of lending out their property. The scale can be much larger-tool libraries (http://www.toolbank.org) in Berkeley and Atlanta serve the whole city. And, if the library is incorporated as a nonprofit (or becomes associated with an existing local nonprofit), donations of money and tools are tax-deductible.
Both tool-sharing programs and tool libraries require some key decisions that you and other organizers (and it's best to do this project with some partners) should consider before starting:
Raising money
It costs money to start and run a tool library, even one run by volunteers. You should be able to set up and equip a new tool library for about $2,000, experts say. Typical annual membership fees range from $20 to $60. Some libraries charge 2% to 3% of the cost of a tool when it's checked out. If your organization is a nonprofit, you may want to seek funding grants from local foundations.
Building inventory
For a tool-sharing program, ask everyone to list the tools they're willing to loan out. For a library, ask neighbors for tool donations, and purchase new tools with membership-fee funds. "Seventy-five percent of our power tools we purchased new, and 100% of our hand tools have been donated. It's been a big surprise for us-at least once a month someone wants to donate nice tools," says Michael Froehlich, the co-founder of the West Philly Tool Library.
Once open, choose new tools to add based on what is popular, and ask members for suggestions. Avoid troublesome tools, such as paint sprayers that often need repair and gas-powered machines that require smelly, explosive fuel.
Tool storage
In a tool-sharing program, everyone keeps their tools at home, but a library needs a storage facility. Rent gets expensive, so free space that's easy to get to for members is vital. Options to consider: a member's garage, donated space from a local business, or excess capacity at a local nonprofit.
Set the rules
Be clear on how long someone can keep a tool-a week with the option to renew once or twice is common. Set penalties for overdue tools. If a borrower breaks a neighbor's tool, they have to replace it, but tool libraries typically pay for repairs, unless there's evidence of serious misuse. Berkeley's tool library has a good set of rules to consider as a model.
Keeping track
Once a program has more than a few dozen tools, keeping on top of what's available, what's checked out, and when it's due becomes complicated. Off-the-shelf library database programs are relatively easy to modify for a tool inventory-consider a bar code set to make check-out and return a snap. For a tool-sharing program, a simple Google Docs spreadsheet (http://docs.google.com) may be all you need.
Buying insurance
A liability waiver, especially for use of power tools, is a good idea. A tool-sharing program probably doesn't require liability insurance, and tool libraries have to decide if they feel more comfortable with such coverage. Consider storefront insurance, though, in case anyone is injured while at your location.
Once you launch a tool-lending program, you may be surprised at how quickly it catches on. "Start very simply, and it can grow organically for what people want," says Dustin Zuckerman, the founder of the Santa Rosa Tool Library (http://www.borrowtools.org/) in California, which expanded in two years from an inventory of 15 tools to more than 1,700 tools today. "You have the potential to create an organization that people love."
Carl Vogel, a Chicago-based freelance writer and former editor of The Neighborhood Works magazine, has written about public policy and community organizing and development for more than 15 years. Besides a basic toolbox and his beloved shop-vac, there isn't a tool he wouldn't mind borrowing rather than owning.
7 Gardening Mistakes to Avoid
Article From HouseLogic.com By: Oliver Marks Published: March 15, 2010
Novice gardeners can get their landscapes off to a healthy start by heeding some tried-and-true tips from the pros.
Gardening is just about the simplest do-it-yourself home improvement work there is. If you can dig a hole, turn on a spigot, and snip a dead flower off a vine, you've got the basic skills down. Still, you do have to make some judgment calls, so it helps to know the ground rules, so to speak, that can help you avoid making some rookie mistakes.
Mistake #1: Making changes too soon
Take the excitement of buying a home, add a nice stretch of spring weather, and you get a lot of enthusiasm for doing yard work. That's great; seize the day, but don't jump into wholesale landscape changes, like pulling out plants or reorganizing the layout quite yet.
"That weed that you want to yank out in the spring might turn out to be a gorgeous fall-blooming vine," says Gary Blondell, owner of Gary's Gardens, a nursery in Severna Park, Md. Plus, it takes time to learn the landscape and figure out exactly what changes make sense.
Avoid this by: Living with the landscape for a full year, so you can observe it in all seasons.
Mistake #2: Planting too close together
You buy a wheelbarrow full of young shrubs and perennials and plant them in a pleasing arrangement. But if they look properly spaced now, they're actually way too close together.
Unless you're creating an evergreen hedge, when the idea is packing things tightly together, the immature plantings will grow into each other in a few years and struggle to compete for sun, water, and soil nutrients. You'll either have to dig them up and transplant them-or possibly throw them away.
Avoid this by: Following the spacing requirements on the plant label-even though the results will look absurdly sparse at first.
Mistake #3: Planting without a plan
Putting in new garden beds without a long-term landscape plan is like tiling, painting, and wallpapering your house before you figure out your future remodeling plans: There's a good chance you'll have to undo your efforts in the near future.
Avoid this by: Drawing a simple, bird's eye view sketch of your yard, and figuring out the rough location of any future construction-additions, patios, outbuildings, pools-so you can plant around them.
A good local nursery or home improvement store can help you with your design. Or you can hire a landscape designer to create a starter plan for as little as $250 to $500. Find a professional at the Association of Professional Landscape Designers (http://www.apld.com) or the American Society of Landscape Architects ( http://www.asla.org).
Mistake #4: Neglecting the root ball
Even the hardiest plants need a little help getting their roots established in their new locations. But just turning on the sprinkler every day to douse the foliage isn't enough to ensure that they get the nutrients and hydration they need. You have to get the water to a plant's nerve center--the root ball below ground--or it's going to be stunted or short-lived.
Avoid this by: Placing the hose near the root ball and setting the water to a trickle for about 20 to 30 minutes. Do this twice a week-more during hot, dry spells-for the first four to 12 weeks. Choosing the right irrigation system can help with this task while saving water (http://www.houselogic.com/articles/water-saving-irrigation-strategies/).
Mistake #5: Ignoring your yard's sun conditions
Too many nursery shoppers pick plants based only on looks-not the growing conditions they need, which are almost always indicated on a label wrapped around the trunk or a marker pressed into the soil. "They put a sun-loving perennial under a dense tree or something that wants partial shade out in full-day sunshine," says Blondell. "It looks great for about a week, and then it begins to die."
Avoid this by: Watching the spot where you're going to put the plant and estimating the amount of sun it gets over the course of the day during the growing season. To translate that to the language on plant labels, use this key:
Mistake #6: Misusing irrigation systems
An automatic irrigation system is a luxury that allows you to keep your landscape hydrated throughout the growing season with almost no effort. Unfortunately, with the wrong settings, it can also bring disease, root rot, and an untimely death to the plants in your landscape.
"People tend to set their systems to come on for 15 or 20 minutes each morning," says Blondell. "That provides a nice saturation of the surface, but not a deep penetrating soak to reach the roots of large shrubs and trees." And a deeper soak is better for the lawn, too, because it promotes deep root systems.
Avoid this by: Watering for longer intervals-say, 40 to 60 minutes-only two to three times a week. Check with the company that maintains your irrigation system for local recommendations.
Mistake #7: Not budgeting for landscaping during construction projects
Whether you're building a house or an addition, the bulldozers that excavate the job and the pickups that park on the lawn will damage the grass, trees, and shrubs. And the new building configuration will call for new landscape plantings.
Unfortunately, homeowners don't often include money in their budgets for this work. So you wind up with a beautiful new family room, screened porch, or solarium, with a few azaleas thrown in around the foundation as an afterthought.
Avoid this by: Allocating 10 to 20 percent of your construction budget to the landscape-both hardscaping and plants-or at least making plans to spend that money as soon as possible after the construction job is complete.
A former carpenter and newspaper reporter, Oliver Marks has been writing about home improvements for 16 years. He's entering his second summer at his house and has big plans for upgrading its scraggly foundation plantings.
5 Programs for Improving Local Waste Recycling
Article From HouseLogic.com By: Jane Hodges Published: February 02, 2010
Unique waste recycling programs help save tax dollars by diverting trash from the landfill and into the recycling stream.
Recycling waste helps communities decrease the need for landfills, reduces pollution, and can raise a city's profile as a "green" place to live. A good waste recycling program indirectly influences home values and community wealth because cities that succeed at recycling spend less on trash disposal, leaving more money for other needs such as schools, parks, and police.
Want to encourage local government to improve recycling options in your community? Consider advocating for one of these five novel recycling programs:
1. Create recycling rewards
RecycleBank (http://www.recyclebank.com) partners with cities, haulers, and merchants to reward consumers. The program provides homeowners with bar-coded recycling receptacles that haulers weigh and scan at pick-up. Homeowners earn points for each pound recycled, and redeem points for discounts at local stores.
The company says rewards average $15 to $20 per month at local grocery stores, or run higher for other purchases (such as 10% off jewelry or electronics). In Ivyland, Pa., average monthly recycling under RecycleBank grew to 34 pounds from 17 pounds per household.
The downside: While about 250 cities have the program, and in a tight economy, your local leaders may hesitate to pay upfront costs. Philadelphia used a federal grant to launch its RecycleBank program.
2. Consider 'Pay as You Throw'
To motivate recycling, some cities offer Pay as You Throw (http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/conserve/tools/payt/tools/smart-bet/index.htm) garbage billing, where consumers pay for garbage by weight rather than by flat fee. Homeowners who recycle and compost more throw less into garbage and therefore pay less for garbage service.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says Pay as You Throw saved San Jose, Calif., $4 million annually. A Duke University study found Pay as You Throw increases recycling participation by 32% to 59%, depending on a city's recycling levels at launch.
The downside: Illegal dumping rose in some cities using these programs, so encourage local government to establish new (or higher) dumping penalties when they launch Pay as You Throw.
3. Go 'single stream'
When cities let consumers throw all recyclables-cans, paper, bottles, and some plastics-into one bin, recycling is easier. When it's easier to recycle, more people do it. Called "single stream" recycling, it increased recycling in Madison, Wis., 25% the year it was implemented, and the city's net recycling cost per household dropped by about $1.
The downside: It costs money to adjust existing recycling infrastructure and to add city staff to sort recycled items. The upfront costs may be recouped if residents recycle more.
4. Green the trash collection process
Cities are replacing their own trash cans with BigBelly (http://www.bigbellysolar.com/) solar-powered trash compactors to reduce the drive-around time required by waste haulers. The BigBelly uses solar power to compact the trash and wireless technology to notify haulers when the compactor is full. That reduces the number of times haulers must come to collect from a particular trash can and increases the amount of garbage going into the can before it's filled.
Philadelphia officials estimate the 500 BigBelly cans they're deploying will lower the city's garbage collection costs by $850,000 during the first year of use.
The downside: Your town's elected official may hesitate to install BigBelly products because the cans are expensive. Cities may also need to assess whether overall trash volumes, or trash levels at a particular location, makes them justifiable.
5. Communicate beyond the curb
Just because local garbage haulers don't take all recyclables at the curb doesn't mean that the city or a locally-run recycling or reuse program can't recycle them. If provided with the right information, consumers can save on dump fees that typically start at $10 (depending on their city and transfer station policies), keep their unwanted items out of landfills, and maybe make money off their junk.
Spur your city to communicate online and off line about local recycle and reuse programs, and bring new programs to leaders' attention. For example, Kashless (http://www.kashless.org) lets people post used items they want to give away (or find) for free, creating a marketplace for swaps and providing consumers with "green action" reward points that translate into discounts at local stores
GreenDisk (http://www.greendisk.com/) charges $6.95 to recycle up to 20 pounds of computer-related waste.
Salvage stores like Seattle's Second Use (http://www.seconduse.com); Brattleboro, Vermont-based ReNew Salvage (http://www.renewsalvage.org); or The Rebuilding Center (http://www.rebuildingcenter.org) in Portland, Ore., re-sell old building materials to folks eager to source historic materials.
Gardeners with overflow edibles can channel food into local city harvest programs, keeping even more food waste out of their garbage. Neighborhood Fruit (http://www.neighborhoodfruit.com) offers a guide to sharing, and finding, excess produce.
The downside: City officials may hesitate to endorse non-profit or for-profit businesses that pick up where city services leave off, so you may need to persuade local government to mention these businesses as resources that are available locally-but not necessarily "city-approved" organizations.
Jane Hodges has written about real estate for publications including The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC.com, and The Seattle Times. She lives in Seattle in a 1966 raised rancher with an excellent retro granite fireplace. She and her husband recycle and compost food scraps daily.