I'm east of y'all in far northern metro Atlanta. A few years ago I heard the most ungodly sound imaginable. Fool neighbor went out with a flashlight to try to locate it - he'd probably had 10 beers by that time of the night. His light picked up only glowing eyes, set wide apart in thick shrubs. The critter left. Next day I went online and found audio of possible animals. Results were panther, totally the same sound I'd heard. Called some state agency to report, can't recall now which one, just know it was the appropriate one. The young fool who answered suggested I go out into the thick undergrowth behind me to see if I could find tracks or scat. Nu-uh, I'm no fool. End of my story. Think his response gives credence to plantaholic's thoughts. See this, last paragraph, two posts above mine. Rosie, Sugar Hill, GA

HI Everybody!! SO happy to see this forum. I hope to learn a lot from everyone. I'm in LA on the Northshore, so not as close to the coast but close enough. I have some input on hurricane protection plantings. We live in a 100+ year old house and whoever planned the plantings here really knew what they were doing. Along both sides of our house we have Camellia trees and all over the yard are Live Oaks and Pecan trees. When Katrina came through we only lost one Live Oak and it was leaning a little already from a tropical storm. Luckily the lean was towards the woods! Anyway our house had very little damage while most homes in the area had a lot of damage. I really think the camellias helped keep much of the debris from hitting our house (they were rather beat up afterwards). After Katrina I am anti-pine tree. We saw too many of them snapped in half afterwards. I'm mostly a bulb and vegetable gardener myself but haven't been doing either for very long.

While David's example is useful, one shouldn't use other people's energy modeling results for making decisions about their own new build. Hire a 3rd party to do your own energy modeling. I agree with his main point that the sun, and how it impacts both the heating and cooling should be accounted for. If one does avoid west windows, like they should, it completely changes the percentages and individual cooling and heating costs can vary greatly. Comparing regular stick framing to SIPS is tough. IMO if you are going to make a stick frame perform at the same level of energy performance of SIPS, you will probably end up at about the same costs once you include the insulative sheathing and other air sealing exercises to get the stick framing there and its mainly in the labor. If you can get a good price on SIPs with an experienced crew it can be a fine way to go and not necessarily more expensive than traditional. While we see a slight upcharge from our electrician, plumbing should not be effected, it should be out of exterior walls anyway. For walls, the Huber zip + R is a product worth looking into for the south where we still have low levels of insulative sheathing code minimums. N. AL is in climate zone 3 but would prefer to see folks there build to the climate zone 4 minimums AT LEAST. Iam pretty familiar with some of the plateaus of N alabama and they get as cold as lower elevations in north TN/NC. Climate zone 3 in 2012 IECC minimums calls for cavity R20 (2x6) but you will probably get better performance with the alternative R13+5 (2x4 + ~1" of insulative sheathing). R49 roof is the upgrade you would need to achieve zone 4 energy performance minimums. A regular 2x6 wall is not going to perform as well as a 2x4 with R5 insulative sheathing in both energy and long term durability performance. SIPS become cost competitive with stick framing when we include this insulative sheathing as a best or better practice.

This is similar to many discussions we have had before, and I certainly don't want to wade into that discussion again, but a few comments. My concern is the cost of an architect...I have no idea how much it generally costs to consult with one or have them actually design something for you. Cost is a fairly flexible word. Many people use the word cost when they mean price and that has certainly become one of the meanings of cost. The price of an architect is pretty easy to determine, just discuss it with a variety of architects. However, a more traditional look at cost is the net economic sacrifice of a decision and that gets a lot harder to calculate, in this case, really impossible, but it is still worth considering. A simple calculation of net economic sacrifice would have to look at the total spent on an architect designed house (including architect) versus the total spent on non-architect designed homes. Another version of cost is total cost of ownership, which looks at everything you spend on a house, its value when you are done with it, the time before it no longer meets your needs (transaction costs), what you can sell it for then, and all the cost associated with owning the house while you lived in it. All of these are purely financial measures, there are other non-financial measures that might come into play for you. An architect may be hard to justify using simply price but total cost analysis might well change that decision. A total value analysis that includes quality of life issues may change it significantly. As a rather bad but somewhat appropriate analogy, if you had a flawless uncut diamond, who would you hire to cut it, a rather expensive master gemcutter or a rather cheap rookie gemcutter? Just because one costs less doesn't mean it creates more value. ------------------- Having said that, I am not really shilling for architects. There are some real hurdles involved with hiring an architect that I suspect is the real culprit in the 2%. Architect fees are largely non-deferrable and therefore more valuable than deferrable costs. The architect isn't going to take 20% and carry the rest for 360 payments. I suspect many people who have purchased land to start the process struggle to find the liquidity for architectural services. Additionally, the cost may not be reflected in appraisals as cost savings never are, and frankly, people overvalue houses as assets. They mistake appraisal or selling value for some sort of financial security even if they are paying more each month. Finally, house plans alone are essentially worth nothing, their value comes during and after construction of a house. Any payment for development of plans involves some risk. There is a legitimate risk that the house will never get built and the money will be wasted. While working with an architect may be more rewarding, there is certainly less risk involved with paying $1,500 for internet plans than there is paying an architect to develop plans. In the end, the decision to hire an architect or not, is dependent on your situation. Good luck.