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Living large is becoming a relic of the past
Kelly Sharp Interior Design, Furnishings & FixturesGood news: The U.S. housing market will continue to thrive regardless of the economy. The homebuilder market has been growing from an amended economy, supporting housing market and rising confidence. The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) discovered that builder confidence for new single-family homes has risen to its highest level since 2005 according to The Wall Street Journal.
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Construction gains mixed in July, but outlook remains positive
Michael J. Berens Construction & Building MaterialsConstruction sector gains continued to seesaw month-to-month between modest increases and modest dips at the start of the third quarter. However, most sectors are trending positive for year-to-date and year-over-year, with some experiencing bounces at prerecession levels.
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Millennials squeezed out of housing market
Michael J. Berens Interior Design, Furnishings & FixturesThis was supposed to be the year when millennials threw off their chains of dependence and flocked to the housing market. Instead, more millennials now are living with their families than at the height of the Great Recession, according to a new study from the Pew Research Center.
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Concrete jungle redefined: How urban agriculture improves wellness
Bianca Gibson Facilities & GroundsFrom urban farms to green roofs and school gardens, urban agriculture's popularity has steadily increased in recent years — and for good reason. Urban agriculture plants a seed of wellness by improving physical and mental health, community revitalization and environmental awareness. Anyone who lives in an urban setting can engage in this movement and begin to take back their land and health one plant at a time.
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Construction contracts: It’s better to be friendly, fair
Nate Budde Construction & Building MaterialsConstruction contracts can be long and complicated documents, and form the basis of the relationships between the signing parties. Generally speaking, parties at the top of the contracting chain have more leverage, and can use their contracts to shift financial risk down the contracting chain. Despite the ability to shift this financial risk, and the real and worthwhile desire of all companies to protect themselves, it makes more sense over the long run, and in terms of building repeatable and lucrative relationships, to contract fairly.
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Bucking the trends: What homeowners really want
Michael J. Berens Interior Design, Furnishings & FixturesAs the year began, kitchen and bath trend forecasters made their pronouncements about what changes we should expect to see in 2015. Now that we are more than halfway through the year and heading into the fall design and remodeling season, are those trends indeed trending? There were some hits and some misses. If one were to choose one word that describes what the majority of homeowners want, it would be "pragmatic." Style matters, but function rules.
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How smart technology can put an end to thermostat wars
Michael J. Berens Facilities & GroundsWashington Post columnist Petula Dvorak hit an icy nerve with her recent piece on gender disputes over thermal comfort in office spaces. "Every single woman I talked to in downtown Washington on a hot, humid July afternoon was thawing out," Dvorak writes. "It's the time of year desperate women rely on cardigans, pashminas and space heaters to make it through the workweek in their frigid offices. And their male colleagues barely notice."
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Sitting may be killing us, but standing all day is just as bad
Cait Harrison Business Management, Services & Risk ManagementWe know sitting all day in an office chair is killing us, and there's no shortage of stories in the news telling us so. And while you should limit sitting, standing for long periods isn't that much better, according to a new study. The research, published in Human Factors, the Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, found that workers who stood all day experienced significant muscle fatigue, regardless of age and gender.
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Being fair can improve your construction business
Nate Budde Construction & Building MaterialsHonesty, respect, integrity, ethics. These values are the backbone of any successful business. In the construction industry, every party on a project is so interconnected that these four values are not just important to a single party or one contract, but are fundamental to the entire project.
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Putting a third ‘i’ in building
Michael J. Berens Construction & Building MaterialsToday's built environments are all about performance — and not just building performance. Yes, on the engineering side, they have to deliver on energy and water conservation, improved indoor air quality, reduced waste, resilience and more. Increasingly, they also are being asked to influence the behaviors of occupants and to safeguard their health and wellness, as well as their privacy and safety.
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