It’s Halloween and we’ve all seen the movies­– a family moves into a new home­, excited for a fresh start– but they don’t realize there are scary things lurking behind the walls! No, it’s not ghosts and goblins but unexpected situations that pop up when they least expect it. Help your customers gain peace of...

At the end of 2019, Multifamily was on the rise in growth as more people wanted to live near where they worked and played–in fast-paced cities bustling with activity and nightlife. However, things changed quickly with the introduction of COVID and there was a shift toward outer-suburban single-family home ownership. What impact will this have...

For about six months now, COVID has been the sometimes-ignored, sometimes-omnipresent elephant in the room. We adjust our business models and activities. We try to pursue business as usual with new tools and techniques. We go into denial. We try to cope. And we just freak out every now and then about all of the...

by John Galante I’ve just put the finishing touches on our Quarterly Housing Stat Pack a compilation of government and association market reports and forecasts. The numbers tell the story of the pandemic’s impact on the new home market. Starts are projected to be down about 10% in 2020, but up about the same amount...

by Erin Chartier We are all looking for a little more space in our homes these days. Americans spend nearly 90% of their time indoors but with the current state of the world and everyone at home… things start to feel a little crowded! Homebuilders working with landscape designers and outdoor lighting professionals have the...

Establishing stock personas is a common business planning and marketing technique. It helps businesses think deeply, personally and emotionally about buyers and their core values, priorities and typical activities. Personas can help builders ideate tech packages as part of their merchandising process and can be used to hook buyers on extensive home tech options packages,...

There’s been a pretty massive reordering of application priorities for new homes in the wake of the COVID pandemic. For the previous 3-5 years, there had been a decided shift from AV and Networking to Smart Home Security as top of the list. Now the tables are turned. Homeowners are stuck at home, sometimes using...

Presenting home tech options room-by-room is one of the easiest and most intuitive ways of achieving great sell-through. Buyers evaluate homes room-by-room, thinking about what they are going to do and experience in specific rooms. With a little knowledge, builder sales staff can walk through the tech products and applications that go with common activities...

I sat down with Savant president, JC Murphy, to discuss Hyannis, MA-based manufacturer Savant Systems’ pending acquisition of GE Lighting and its implications for builders and multifamily companies. Announced on May 27 and set to close June 30, the deal combines Savant’s smart home control and AV product expertise with GE Lighting’s product portfolio of...

  When TecHome Builder launched in 2001, its dual mission was to help builders make strong progress on incorporating technology into their homes and applying technology to their business processes and operations. The latter we call the Solutions side of our business. TecHome Builder went on hiatus 2008-2013, but when we relaunched it in 2014...

With COVID constraining in-person marketing and sales, builders are upping their digital marketing and selling game. We studied the trends in our 2020 Re-Vision Survey earlier this year and have been in touch with some of the leading marketing and sales solution providers. In that process, we identified 4 cornerstone application areas: Lead Gen Web...

You’d have had to be on another planet to not see that video conferencing is on fire as a top application. The market for video conferencing gear and services is projected to double to nearly $12 billion  annually by 2027 by TechRepublic, and I think that underestimates attachment sales like mounts and large screen displays,...

Beating the drum just one more time (for now!) on home tech merchandising—this time focusing on the luxury custom market. The concept of merchandising for Luxury Home selling isn’t terribly intuitive, because most custom builders’ value proposition is “whatever you want or dream–we can deliver”. On its face, that’s the antithesis of merchandising, where tech...

Last week’s blog was titled Beating the Drum on Tech Merchandising. I’m continuing to bang that drum! This time on what may be the most critical of all merchandising decisions. The development of your tech standard and options scheme. When you think of merchandising and its origins in retail stores, standard offers don’t come to mind....

One of the rules of business communications I’ve subscribed to 100% in the last few years is the need for repetition. My mind tends to fly from topic to topic and I often get bored with a message long before it’s starting to sink in with the audience. So I’m not going to make that...

I’m a bit of a data hound. I like looking at big tables of numbers, applying formulas to them and identifying patterns and big picture changes. Maybe that’s the lure of the construction industry, economics and baseball for me. There are so many statistics to slice and dice and play with. Did you know Lou...

At the beginning of April, we put guest and sponsorship outreach efforts on hold and focused on researching changes in sales and marketing practices in our client base and on what home tech applications might be on the rise in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. We are about done collecting results from this 2020...

Dear Technology & Housing Industry Colleagues, This month marks the launch of the TecHome Builder blog and webcast series as we expand the information and advice we’ll be providing online. I will be the principal contributor to the blog for starters and principal host and chief provocateur of the webcast series. It’s been a while since...