Home Front: Folsom home is as 'green' as it gets

To drive up to the three- bedroom, two-bath bungalow being assembled in a historic residential neighborhood near downtown Folsom, you'd never suspect it's anything monumental.

But in the 600 block of Mormon Street, Folsom builder Robert Walter and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District are building what both call one of the most energy-efficient homes being constructed in the country.

The ambition is lofty. But a more practical award awaits the eventual buyer: a combined $24 or so a month for gas and electricity bills.

Walter and SMUD are aiming to make the house LEED Platinum. That's a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design designation for sustainable home building reached just once in California, according to the U.S. Green Building Council in Washington, D.C.

That was two years ago at a $1 million, four-bedroom home in Santa Monica, dubbed by Business Week magazine as "the greenest house on the planet." It was built by Steve Glenn, founder of the Web software firm PeopleLink Inc.

SMUD, which has put Sacramento at the forefront of energy efficiency with 4,000 solar homes under contract, is putting $70,000 into the Folsom house. It calls the 1,950-square-foot home the "House of the Future."

Today, the walls are up and the roof is on the beige-colored house designed in a 1920s Craftsman style. Behind the two-story main house rises a 740-square-foot apartment above a one-story garage.

When opened to visitors in late summer – and marketed for about $680,000 – the home will be a showcase of techniques aimed at creating homes that produce nearly all the energy they consume. By 2020, California's goal for new homes is to produce all the energy they consume.

Yes, the price tag may sound high, but it's a custom home, and "these technologies will come down in price," Walter says.

Winning a LEED Platinum designation is about how the home is built, too, said Walter, who spent 20 years building production homes in the area before starting his own company. It's about less lumber and recycling more waste, about efficient use of water and placing the home in a socially responsible location. In this case, it's on a vacant lot in a historic older neighborhood.

"This is the next generation," said Mike Keese, project manager with SMUD's energy efficiency group. "We're putting on a lot more solar electric (at 3,850 watts, almost twice the standard unit). We're also adding solar hot water and how to use that to heat the home."

The home will also be well-insulated, he said, like a Thermos.

But don't worry, he said, when asked about the "sick building" syndrome that has plagued some sealed-tight office buildings. State-of-the-art systems will filter outdoor air through the house, even with windows and doors closed, he said. Eventually, much of this will be standard in new homes, he said.

"You need to build some of these and test it," Keese said. "We know some of these things work. But we need to put them into an effective package so we go to builders in a year or two and say, 'This is the new package.' Not just to save 50 to 60 percent of the electricity and gas bill, but to save 80 percent."

For Walter, the Folsom house is a return to a plan he had in mind after graduating from California State University, Chico, in 1982.

"That was my interest, to start a solar home building company," he said. "I took a 20-year diversion."

Walter spent some of that time as Sacramento division president and an overseer of four Western divisions for Morrison Homes of Georgia – now, after a recent merger, Arizona-based Taylor Morrison Homes.

Why Folsom for his first independently built house?

"My wife and I live in Folsom, and we love the neighborhood," Walter said.

Don't hold your breath

In the arcane world of reverse mortgages, you can wait a long time for change. Two years ago, when we wrote our first story on reverse mortgages – where the house pays you instead of the other way around – we were told about the many important changes coming.

People would be able to borrow more money than the federally mandated limit – $362,000 in the Sacramento area – and be able to use their reverse mortgages to buy homes. And the government would even insure more of them.

A few days ago, we revisited the issue in an article that was published Wednesday, and the same people from the same groups were saying the same things: There are bills in Congress to make all these changes soon. They are still pending, as they were pending before.

In the meantime, if you have questions about reverse mortgages, the Sacramento-based California Senior Legal Hotline has some answers. Call (916) 551-2140 or toll free (800) 222-1753.

Help on homeownership

Finally, if you're looking for a new home or trying hard to hang onto the one you have, take note of the 12th annual Homeownership Fair scheduled for 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on June 14.

It's at the Samuel Pannell Meadowview Community Center, 2450 Meadowview Road. The sponsor, Sacramento Regional Partners in Homeownership, has lined up classes and one-on-one chats with real estate and finance pros.

Classes will explain the process and terms of buying a home, down-payment help and credit scores. They'll deal with mortgage default and foreclosure, and how to avoid loans that sound good but cause trouble. For more information: www.OwnAHomeFair.com or (916) 646-2005.

About the writer:

• Call The Bee's Jim Wasserman, (916) 321-1102. Read his Home Front blog at www.sacbee.com/blogs.