The Home Crowd

This is going on the short list of “Things I want”. Quiet Solution’s soundproof drywall boasts that one 5/8″ sheet is acoustically equal to (8) layers of standard 5/8″ drywall. Not many of us have the square footage to spare by packing in an additional 5 inches of drywall to the interior of your homes. Also, don’t count on any of your doors functioning properly to account for that. That would never happen of course, as it would be simpler just to construct a masonry wall, than build up a mountain of gypsum.

photo credit: djweitzner

Seeing as how the average interior wall has an STC (Sound Transmission Class) value of about 34, good enough to separate your family but still hear their conversations through the wall. Partition common walls separating apartments, townhomes and condos are required to have and STC of 50. Which is good enough to keep your business your own, yet still allows your neighbors to share their musical tastes with you….like it or not. Most of Quiet Solutions’ QuietRock products sport an STC of at least 50. They have an interactive sound example page at their website which allows you to experience the contrasting STC values as if a garage band was playing in the next room.

The best possible soundproofing solution they currently have has an STC value of 80, which is meant for home theaters and can be reached by adding two layers of their 1 3/8″ to a stud wall. This assembly, I imagine, when used in master bedroom applications, will bring upon the end of the phrase “Stop it! You’ll wake the kids!”

HGTV’s “I want that!” showcases the QuietRock product in the video below

There are other uses of course. Making your home feel solid and quiet and every sound in it’s place can be appreciated by everyone in your household. Finally get that media room/home theater you’ve always wanted? Now keep it ramped up way beyond bedtime. Oh, and those neighbors you have? You know the ones, the ones who, at best buy, go straight for the stereo demos and their accompanying volume knobs until products drop from the shelves, and your sanity drops from sight? Yeah, treat your exterior walls.

The downside of course for this product is the price. Prices start at 40$ (volume purchase) for a 4′x8′ sheet, and only go up from there with higher rated products. Standard drywall is of course, considerably less, but to gain a comparable STC rating using a combination of standard drywall, resilient channels and other various products would bring the project budget closer to what you would have spent by just ordering soundproof drywall.

- Quiet Solutions’ Website

This was featured on the front page of the San Jose Mercury News a couple of days ago. There’s a non-profit housing developer in San Jose which developed a 17 unit condo property blocks away from San Jose State Univ. aimed at the affordable housing crowd. Problem is, out of those 17 available ‘affordable’ units, only one has been sold in the eight months since ‘for sale’ signs went up. I’m not even sure if that’s counting the amount of time this project has been up for pre-sale.

Wait, what? The ‘affordable’ homes are supposed to be snatched up really quick, right? Well, yeah, in most markets they are, so long as they’re “Affordable”. These condos started out expensive, and have just received a price cut to “not as expensive”.

Two-bedroom condos at Villa Almendra once priced at $535,000 now are offered at $450,000. The units come with new appliances, two-car garages and granite countertops.

(From the San Jose Mercury News)

Now, of course, to qualify for affordable housing in santa clara county, the household (up to four) can’t earn an income of more than $84,900 annually. And with loan incentives, the mortgage payment can be brought down to a little over $2,300 a month. That is of course, before HOA fees, taxes, insurance, etc.

So, ‘Affordable’??? Not even close. However, many would be quick to point out that the San Jose/Silicon Valley area is one of the most expensive markets in the U.S. And right you are, if not THE most expensive metropolitan area in the country. From this I bring in the home cost-per-square-foot factor into the mix. Right now, the average cost-per-square-foot for the average home in this country is somewhere around $130 per square foot. In the major housing markets it has traditionally been more.

(From the Wall Street Journal)

And there it is! The writing on the Wall. San Jose checks in at $437 per square foot for a home, well above the $394 San Francisco and $286 New York,NY per-square-foot figures. Now you’d figure that an ‘affordable’ housing project would be considerably below that $437 magic number.

Well, according to the developer’s latest promotional material (http://www.nhssv.org/files/villa%20almandra.pdf), the average price per-square-foot was originally $412. With no sales, they dropped the price to $390 per-square-foot on average. From what the San Jose Mercury News article said, they’ve apparently dropped the price again. And on top of that, but has offered a free Prius to one of the next 8 buyers.

However, now the developer has opened up the sales to anyone, not just those who qualify into the ‘affordable’ category. So if you’ve got an available $2,300+ a month to live in a duplex/triplex condo, you’re in luck, because anyone who may have considered these properties previously, just stuck with commuting or found something actually affordable.

What should this project have been? A higher-density project instead of 6 separate duplex/triplex condo buildings sharing a double-loaded parking alley. Whose kids are realistically going to play on that 5 foot strip of front yard anyhow?

No word yet if the lone property owner is left holding the bag, covering the entire HOA responsibility for the whole project, paying landscapers for the upkeep.

For everyone who’s seen pictures of cargo ships and thought to themselves “Geez, I sure wish I could live in one of those shipping containers!”, well you’re in luck.  Developers are looking to build a seven-story condo project built from these containers in Salt Lake City.  “City Center Lofts” as it’s called, looks to take advantage of the sustainable qualities (i.e. recycling/re-use) of these used shipping containers which can cost 1000-3000 dollars each.

But “Lofts”, really?  We officially throw that word around too much.  When I see that giant steel shoebox with barn doors on one end, I don’t really think “Wow, that could be a great LOFT!”  ….. Maybe “Compartment”.  But then again, I guess we’re chunking at least 50K off each unit price when the project is called “City Center Compartments”.

I am however, intrigued by this idea.  The idea of using shipping containers as housing has been around for a long time, but hasn’t been much more than fixtures at travelling art installations.  Seeing this materialize may shape many views on sustainability.  The designer, Adam Kalkin, has built shipping container homes previously, but this project seems to have the largest scope of any of his listed works.

“Residential design using shipping containers. . .is still a novel approach anywhere in the country,” says Elizabeth Mitchell, director of the Utah chapter of the American Institute of Architects. “You’re re-using all the energy and raw materials that went into creating the shipping container rather than using new materials - it’s an element of sustainable design. But the architects who get into this are mostly intrigued, I think, by the aesthetic challenge of taking something industrial in appearance and transforming it into a place someone would want to call home.”

(From the Salt Lake Tribune via Grassroots Modern)

And here’s the link to the project page - City Center Lofts

Upsides     - Sustainability (Saving the world)/Being Hip, Trendy, and Modern

Downsides - You live in a storage container/The container is in Salt Lake City

And, you never know, it could spur a whole new surge in mobile homes..

photo credit: Spatial Mongrel