Toronto Real Estate Board President’s Col­umn as it appears each Fri­day in the Toronto Sun’s Resale Homes and Con­dos section

When it comes to char­ac­ter, you just can’t beat the charm of an older home. Newly con­structed homes how­ever, come with their own unique assets, one of the most note­wor­thy of which is energy efficiency.

From the roof to the foun­da­tion, a num­ber of inno­v­a­tive build­ing prac­tices often go into con­struct­ing today’s green­est homes.

Roof shin­gles for exam­ple, are now avail­able in recy­cled mate­ri­als. Envi­ron­men­tally friendly spray foam insu­la­tion, which can help pre­vent damp­ness, keep out pol­lu­tants and con­tribute to struc­tural strength, is even par­tially made with recy­cled materials.

Roofs, walls and floors can be insu­lated as well with spe­cial struc­tural pan­els that con­sist of two lay­ers of board with insu­lat­ing foam in between them. The forms that are used to mould a home’s poured con­crete foun­da­tion can now also be found with insu­lat­ing abil­ity, and bar­ri­ers that pre­vent damp­ness from ris­ing into the foun­da­tion can be used at this stage of con­struc­tion as well. Even exte­rior cladding is now insu­lated to offer greater energy efficiency.

If you pre­fer an older home though, there are many sim­ple ways to make it more energy effi­cient and envi­ron­men­tally friendly.

Start with an Energy Star pro­gram­ma­ble ther­mo­stat that will save on heat­ing and cool­ing costs when you’re not home. You can take this approach a step fur­ther by invest­ing in a new high effi­ciency fur­nace or air con­di­tioner. Adding insu­la­tion to the attic of your home will offer reduced energy costs for years to come as well.

A tank-less water heater will also save on energy costs by pro­vid­ing only the amount of heated water that you need rather than main­tain­ing it in a cylinder.

Even mak­ing minor changes can have an impact, like choos­ing energy effi­cient light bulbs – Com­pact Flu­o­res­cent Lamps (CFLs) are good and Light Emit­ting Diodes (LEDs) are even better.

If you’re plan­ning to make cos­metic changes to your home you can do your part for the envi­ron­ment by choos­ing wood floor­ing, and even car­pet, made with recy­cled con­tent. Look for low VOC paints and stains as well, which reduce the num­ber of unsta­ble, carbon-containing com­pounds that enter the air and react with other elements.

In the bath­room, you can keep more money in your pocket by installing low-flow faucets, show­er­heads and toilets.

Replac­ing old win­dows with low-E argon-filled units that have the Energy Star sym­bol can make a dra­matic dif­fer­ence to your home’s energy effi­ciency as well.

Chang­ing your old appli­ances with new Energy Star machines is also a great way to reduce energy con­sump­tion while enhanc­ing the over­all appeal of your home.

Beyond enjoy­ing the aes­thet­ics, cost sav­ings and ful­fill­ment asso­ci­ated with help­ing the envi­ron­ment, you can also con­sider get­ting an energy audit to take full advan­tage of a num­ber of gov­ern­ment rebates for energy-saving home improve­ments. Please visit www​.Toron​to​Re​alEstate​Board​.com to learn more about them.

Regard­less of the approach you choose, remem­ber that noth­ing can sub­sti­tute for good-old fash­ioned con­ser­va­tion. Remem­ber that the energy you save today may well be the energy that is needed tomorrow.

Tom Lebour is Pres­i­dent of the Toronto Real Estate Board, a pro­fes­sional asso­ci­a­tion that rep­re­sents 28,000 Real­tors in the Greater Toronto Area.

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Con­tact the Jef­frey Team for more infor­ma­tion  -  416−388−1960

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toronto exte­rior cladding

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