Working with Contractors
Expertise and Training
While Green Building Science is not new, many contractors have yet to familiarize themselves with the kind of practices and technologies Energy Wise Residential Remodeling requires.
GreenEarthEquities offers both extensive training for Renovators as well as tips on how you can locate and/or educate Contractors on the value and benifits of our Energy, WOW and Done packages.
Excuse Me, That Thing You Just Did… You Can’t Do That!
Its been fun this last year listening to people, from Renovators to Investors, real estate agents to contractors, bankers to government officials, tell me it’s impossible to do complete remodels with deep energy retrofits and sell them at a profit. ”Difficult anytime and Impossible in this economy,” they say. But since that is exactly what we’ve developed over this last year, it leads to an interesting conversation.
It happened again today. An old friend and I were re-connecting and in the catching up, he expressed surprise that I was flipping houses with full energy retrofits. “I didn’t think you could do that in this market.”
Where does all this negativity and pessimism come from? The main thing I can think of is an over-indulgence in mainstream media consumption. Followed by “Conventional Wisdom & Urban Legend,” stuff passed around at the water cooler and golf course….No basis in reality required.
Since pessimism is so prevalent, and its consumption is so detrimental to one’s success, my advice is that if a person wants to be successful as an Energy Wise House Flipper, they would do well to go on a Media and Gossip Fast.
This is good advice for any contrarian who determines to swim against the current of the main stream. But wait, there’s more! To maintain forward progress swimming against the main stream, you must not only close your ears to the mainstream media and friends who repeat its negative mantras… You’ll have to filter carefully the advice of experts of your own industry.
Being an Energy-Wise Renovating House Flipping Investor requires some knowledge of three industries, Real Estate, Remodeling, and Building Performance-Green Building. The main stream in each of those industries repeats the pessimism of the general mainstream media. So a successful Energy Wise House Flipper will find themselves swimming against the current, even in the industries that he or she is demonstrating success in.
My friend is a contractor, a very good one, probably the best one in his trade in our city. Why was he surprised that I’m being successful at Energy Wise House Flipping? I say the culprit is the pessimism that he hears at his supply house, and from the general contractors he works for and the coffee shop talk combined with the nightly news…… just too much negativity for a human brain to stay positive in.
Am I saying to be an ostrich and stick your head in the sand? Not exactly. But what if the sand is in sand bags and bullets are whizzing overhead? Negativity bullets come at you every time you turn on the news. Maybe you’d better duck behind those sand bags. It’s easy, just turn it off.
It’s been said that the brain is like a computer, and GIGO is the number one rule, Garbage In, Garbage Out. In the case of ingesting negative and pessimistic garbage, the garbage that comes out is the inability to believe and act decisively.
Over in the Real Estate Investing Stream, most seminar gurus will tell you, “Now is not a time for flipping, just buy and hold” and “just put in the minimum to make it clean and safe, you’ll never make a return on that energy stuff.”
The main stream in Building Performance is primarily occupied with building an industry around programs and the incentive monies which are flooding into our economy. Dont get me wrong, that’s not a bad idea. Its just not the input an Energy Wise House Flipper needs to be focused on.
To Summarize: If you want to be successful as an Energy Wise House Flipping Investor (or any kind of a contrarian,) a Media Fast might be in order. Or at least some critical filtering. One filtering question might be: “What was this “expert” saying 3 years ago?” If he missed it so bad then, why should I listen to him now? Another might be to listen to people who are actually doing what you want to do, rather than academics,media people, and other spectators who prognosticate and repeat each others’ stuff.
Next week I’ll have lunch with my friend. I think we’ll meet in one of my energy wise renovation projects. Maybe the real thing will be enough to counter all the negative he’s heard. Maybe he’ll jump in and swim upstream with me. Maybe. Maybe you’d like to be a contrarian and swim upstream. Email me. I’m looking to build anArmy of Contrarians…. and I’m willing to help anyone who will turn the TV off.
Additional Working with Contractors Information
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4864 E. University A&B Fresno CA 93727
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