Current Housing Indicators |
| CURRENT | PREVIOUS | ||
| Existing Home Sales | 5.03m | ▲ | 4.89m |
| New Home Sales | 590,000 | ▼ | 601,000 |
| Housing Starts | 1.065m | ▼ | 1.071m |
| Building Permits | 978,000 | ▼ | 1.061m |
| HMI | 20 | UNCH | 20 |
| Existing Home Prices | $195,900 | ▼ (annually) | $213,500 |
| New Home Prices | $244,100 | ▼ (annually) | $250,800 |
More Videos
- Home Foreclosures: Crisis Is Only Getting Deeper
- Home Prices: Glass Still Seems Half Empty
- Green Building: Are the Big Builders On Board?
- As Greenwich Goes..? Maybe Rich Aren't Immune In Housing Crisis
- Congress And Housing Rescue--Nothing Yet That Really Helps
- Big Builder Stocks: Why They're Not Much Of A Buy
- Countrywide: Could It Just Go Under And Go Away?
- Construction Job Losses: I Think We're Missing Something Here
- Builders Facing Facts: No Congressional Bail-Out
- Homebuilders Back On Capitol Hill--And Still Feeling Ignored
- Home Foreclosures: Crisis Is Only Getting Deeper
- Your First Move For Thursday May 15th
- Web Extra: Ship Shape Trade
- Sudden Death: Athenahealth, Alcoa and More
- Emerging Money: Turkey
- Mad Mail: Back in the Saddle with Garmin?
- Pops & Drops: Nike, Whole Foods...
- Lightning Round OT: Ameritrade, Deere and More
- Future Trade: Entertainment
- Social Anxiety
- Top Gun
- Your First Move For Thursday May 15th
- US Economy Shows More Weakness in Latest Reports
- Bonds Gain Following Indicators That Economy Still Weak
- Trump Sells Palm Beach House for $100 Million
- Rough Economy Now Hitting CEO Paychecks
- Foreclosure Fallout: Condo Owners Pay for Neighbors
- European Earnings: Beer, BT Shine
- Gutierrez: US, China Need to Fight Protectionism
- BT Buoys Flat Markets; Barclays Weighs
- Barclays Profit Drops After $1.95 Billion Writedown
- Europe Comeback: Germany Drives Euro-Zone Growth
 |
So I was surprised to read a study that claims none of America’s 13 largest publicly traded home builders has, “fully embraced the emerging market of sustainable building design and construction.”
Calvert Group, an investment management group, conducted the study with collaboration from the Boston College Institute for Responsible Investment.
“The biggest challenge facing this group is that, for the most part, they have not acknowledged that there is a market for green homes or that they have a role in serving or promoting it,” says the report.
The study does, however, rank the builders in terms of environmental sustainability. Los Angeles-based KB Home [KBH
Loading...
(%)
] gets the top kudos, while Hovnanian Enterprises [HOV
Loading...
(%)
], MDC [MDC
Loading...
(%)
], Standard Pacific [SPF
Loading...
(%)
] and NVR [NVR
Loading...
(%)
] are on the so-called “sustainability bottom rung.”
The survey used four “green indicators”: energy use, building-material use, water use, and land use. In the end, it finds that the industry “has a long way to go.” I find this curious since the green building industry -- and I realize this includes appliances and raw materials, etc. -- has grown to about $40 billion, and it actually lags behind Europe. Builders have estimated that by the end of this decade 10 percent of all new homes will be “green.”
I guess you could surmise that most green building is being done by the small to mid-sized private home builders. But I do know that some big guys, like Lennar [LEN
Loading...
(%)
], are actively working on being more green. A recent article in Builder Magazine tells of how Lennar constructed and tore down 40 prototype homes at an air base in California in order to experiment with “green technologies.”
Like everything else that’s costly and complicated, going green will be a slow process, especially for big builders who have enough trouble just staying in business nowadays. Yet another victim of the housing downturn: no extra cash to invest in greener pastures.
Questions? Comments?
Del.icio.us
Digg It
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes