178: Sustainable is the New Sexy Series: High Performance Homes for a Healthier Lifestyle

Todd Gamboa, President of Building Trust LLC, and Matt Daigle, CEO & Founder at Rise, join us on this episode 178 of Art of Construction. On this third episode in our series on sustainability recorded live from the Rise booth at IBS 2020 we spoke with Todd Gamboa. Todd has been in the building industry for more than 30 years, managing private and public homebuilding companies. As a building science expert, radio show host, sales trainer and public speaker, he has educated thousands of homebuilders, architects, contractors, code officials, appraisers, and realtors across the country on how to build, inspect and sell high performance homes.  Early in our conversation Todd made a statement that surely resonates with many in the sustainable homebuilding space: "Price per square foot is the most erroneous form of measurement you can ever apply to a home.." Instead, he argues, one must look at the cost of ownership over time in order to understand the true price of a home. To Todd, the main roadblock that's gotten in the way of expanding sustainable homebuilding practices industry-wide has been builders and realtors ignorance on the difference between these two price points, and how to relay that difference to consumers. In order to truly go green, Todd argues, each section of the building industry needs to be trained and educated on how they specifically can contribute to a high-performance home, and how the benefits of that higher performance can be expressed to the homebuilder, the homebuyer and the home-seller in terms they understand. The final selling point? Healthier, more sustainable homes are not just about saving a bit of money in energy bills, or rescuing a couple trees. It's about an entirely new lifestyle; a healthier way of being.  Join Devon and Matt as they go on a journey with Todd to learn about his long career educating those in the homebuilding industries on high performance building, what excites him most about sustainable homebuilding currently, and what the future holds for going green within the Art of Construction.