Catskills - Sullivan County - Ulster County Real Estate -- Catskill Farms Journal

For all of you blog followers, you will recognize this house as one that had barely begun 8 weeks ago. Presently we are painting the exterior, laying the floor in the interior and beginning to make final arrangements for the the soft landing into closing out another deal. Basically, we've reinvented what construction can be - instead of an over-budget, delayed, aggravating headache, we've invented a system where each house is done on time, each house is on budget and each house design and collaboration is high-speed but so well organized and so well-planned to play to our homeowners' strengths (busy but Internet savvy - picky but flexible - interested in collaboration but not to the extent of locating each and every outlet, light fixture, trim detail, etc...). And it works - for the last 2 years, we have slam dunked our new homeowners into their homes with nary a hiccup (unless self-created hiccup, which we are powerless to stop). We have set the bar so high in terms of service, process, creativity, speed and value that at this point our competitors can do nothing but helplessly toss verbal assaults at us - in terms of creating meaningful competition, they seem to have given up on that.

It's all quintessentially perfect and perfectly new. There won't be a surprise for these guys when they move in, no extra expense, no septic to replace, well pump to fix, foundation wall to analyze.

We like to 'stick' our 1x12 wide plank flooring for a few days prior to installation to allow it to acclimate.

1x6 edge and center (commonly referred to as beadboard) defining the angles of the porch.

PrePaint and pre-porch post installation. This porch will get a standing seam galvanized metal roof.

We do a lot of green things to our homes - without all the malarkey of LEED certification, NHBA bureaucracy or the like. James and I spent the better part of 2 months examining how to green a structure and what we could do to achieve LEED status in our homes, etc... What we finally concluded was pretty simple - that homes are pretty green to begin with, and the path to LEED certification was more an effort in paperwork, inspections and frankly, bullshit than anything else. Probably in big commercial projects, the positive impact can be more readily established, but for residential construction, - mostly malarkey. An everyday example would be like this - I bought a toothbrush and efficiently bought the toothpaste at the same time thus saving gas (2 points - if I would have recycled a toothbrush, 3 points). I organized my team (my family) submitted the paperwork, and called the inspector when I was brushing my teeth to validate and verify that I was not leaving the water on while brushing (2 points - if the whole family brushes their teeth at the same time, 3 points). Verified that I did not put too much toothpaste the brush (2 points, using baking soda, 3 points), and on and on. In the end, it seems like if a small builder has the staff to babysit a very intensive paperwork and coordination effort, LEED certification is yours for the taking. James and I wanted to offer a real green house, not a rubber stamped green house, not a green house that has a check list of performance criteria but no real improved performance - we wanted to offer a better-performing house and so we dug in real deep and figured out we could do that at the lowest possible cost. Because in the end, it's all about the money. Our homes are out of the park green - they are small (half the size or less than the average american home), we use lots of salvaged and recycled materials, we use spray foam insulation, our boilers are efficient, our house placement is smart, our covered porches protect from sun and wind, we recommend on-demand tankless water heaters, and mostly and foremost, our homes are built to standards that are high and ever increasing.

We love spray foam insulation - for a couple of thousand dollars, the integrity of the building envelope can be improved substantially and measurably. We are using a product with 47% renewable ingredients including 27% soy. The benefit of spray foam insulation over old fashioned pink fiberglass is the ability of the spray foam to eliminate air penetration and heat loss. Here is the back of the truck - a laboratory of sorts. I was such a believer that this is the wave of the future - that the old pink panther will be rapidly set aside - that we set up a business specializing in insulating homes. Catskill Farms now believes the number 1 thing a homeowner can do to increase their homes efficiency and lower their heating costs is to upgrade to spray foam insulation.

There's the stone facing going up the chimney.

And a pictorial history of this home's construction, which began - believe it or not - in mid-July.

The story of Cottage 23 - as we like to say, the proof is always in the pudding.

Consequences of playing badminton barefooted.

Brother Steve and his son Josh on the court.

Me with my patented 'slamma jamma', playing along side Steve's other son Eli. After 40 yrs of kickin' his butt in every sport, Steve showed up 'ready to play' and took me down 2 out of 3 games with some steller and impressive play.

Mom inside the barn where the party was going to be held.

Steve's daughter Sarah watching over Lucas in his new wagon.

Lisa and her friend Amy.

Me and Amy's man Adam.

Brother Steve.

Crawford Road neighbor Theresa who helps takes care of Lucas.

Me climbing a tree in order to cut a branch that was interfering with the badminton court.

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There he is - driving his new car, a birthday present. He's nearly a full 365 days now and he got lots of neat stuff down at my Dad's in Lancaster PA - where I was born and raised, before heading off to the University of Pittsburgh, travel to the far seas, NYC and then upstate NY in Sullivan County. Here's the family below just after a big badminton match against my brother.

And Lucas' birthday present from me - a 9 week old chocolate lab puppy. A big hearty male who had never been away from his momma.

Lancaster is a magical place with lots of industrious persons and healthy animals.

I grew up in Lancaster, played a lot of baseball, and my old coach - one of Lancaster's most successful developer/builders - told me the last time I saw him about a year ago - he said never forget that being from Lancaster means you know the meaning of hard work, that Lancaster is community of hard honest workers - and to never forget the advantage that gives you out in the world - the clarity of purpose and the energy of the effort.

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Listen, the bottom line is it's too late to get too fancy with this post, and so I settle in to my writing position after a scotch (or two), and try and enunciate, extrapolate, explore and exonerate a wide ranging emotional palette. Bronson and Courtney came to us and imagined themselves in one of our cottages and signed up pretty quick which explains why today they closed on the house that will rehabilitate them after the battles of the workweek. Thing is - from start of planning to move in date is really never more than a few months - and all these people, families and partners who decide to build a house with us even though the thought of building a house seemed pretty mature, all these people experience a pretty well thought out, on budget, on schedule process. It's actually pretty amazing how we bring them in on time and on schedule - if anybody would have plenty of reason for excuses it would be me - with crazy icy snowy freezing winters and summers of continuous rain - we just don't make excuses. We just go ahead and do what we say - on time, on budget. The excuses are for other people's businesses and other people's business plans. We just find it easier to do what we say we are going to do.

And when you think about, doing what you say you are going to do is about the most out of fashion way to be that there is. Sure, you can tell white lies, manipulate the facts, deny the obvious, and scheme your way to riches or less, but the idea of shooting straight, telling it like it is - well, that's the essence of our homes, our business plan, our strategic manual. I posit that everyone (many persons, at least) can respect the business that owns up, fesses up, and attacks with all limbs together a goal - the fact that our goal couldn't be simpler - let's build homes, small homes, with a personality of the new owners and the builder combined, a new home that works, a new home that feeds back through it's emotional essence.

And that's why people buy older homes - it's because the history of the home feeds back, imbibes and intoxicates, tells a story and narrative, has memories that are soaked up in a rocking chair, 100 years later.

And some how, Catskill Farms instills our new homes with a sense of that architectural feedback. It's not easily done, the recipe more elusive than the rules of love.

Besides the elusive emotional feedback of the architectural essence of our homes, there is a very real pragmatic reason why we are the only game in town - in the picture above, the downed trees are cut into firewood, the ground is covered with topsoil and grass is planted and growing, and even the odd stump is strategically left unfettered, so revelers can stop and rest before heading to the next property adventure. The 'going the extra mile' is obvious to anyone who seeks to see.

The big clear Edison glass, simply framing the incandescent energy, picture shot from the upstairs landing looking out a big ass window into the scary Friday the 13th woods (just kidding - sorry all new homeowners).

Now, who's going to argue that this isn't a cool sink to come home to. Floor to ceiling subway tile and a great sink uniquely defining the only full bath in the house.

Below is a cool picture, - capture the elements - it's like one of those puzzles in the daily paper - can you find all the hidden elements in the picture. The 5 panel doors, the hand hewn beams, the steel cable rail, the sliding barn door on a track, the flat black door hinges and white on black door knobs.

The fireplace is nothing gaudy which only reinforces its beauty. Is there any higher compliment in today's America than restraint, elegance and simplicity?

Here you have some fine irregular rectangular stone, a local beam, and a local bluestone hearth.

The Owners had this swell idea to keep the area going down into the basement open and it's one of those eye opening design explorations that turned out to be genius. Opens up the first floor, and creates a neat little area going down stairs. In this pic, straight ahead is a closet, to the left a door to the basement, and the right a window to the outdoors (and scary Jason). I love that little wall hung radiator on the brick face with perfectly irregular quarried bluestone.

The kitchen is simple and complete with appliances, open shelves, farm sink, and view out back across the covered porch.

Living room to staircase to kitchen, lit by big schoolhouse light which I like a lot. Amplified by the first thing moved into the house - a guitar. Now you tell me - that's not a perfect compliment?

That's Kevin, one of our architects we like a lot.

And some custom wall paper in the powder room of the Owner's bloc in Tribeca. And seriously, that's the small unique customizations that make each home unique to the owners.

Great Schoolhouse light (or maybe it's the photographer).

Great Radiator Art. These things pump up the heat.

And the porches. This porch is big, rustic, and has speakers throughout.

But what really burns me about this photo is the fucking lumber left laying around. The point being is how many times did James Juan and Curtis walk over this lumber on the days leading up to closing and not think it was important to organize better, more sightly. I just wonder what went through their minds - "No big deal, this lumber spewed about when the new homeowners turn the corner to their new porch." Literally, my team was there the day of closing, the day before and the day before and no one thought arranging the lumber was an important presentation detail.

Very disappointing when trying to experiment with delegation.

There's Kevin again.

Here we got the stained sidings, painted rails and rough hewn rafter timbers.

Going up the stairs.

The Owners.

The refrigerator and radiator vying for most eye pleasing.

James in motion.

And the pretty picturesque exterior.

And so that's how I do it. Keep your eye on the ball, never underestimate the intelligence of your customer, and keep it all moving forward - come hell or high water..