Veteran freelancer focusing mostly on remodeling, construction, small business, home design and lifestyle topics for national consumer and trade publications.
Why 'built-to-rent' homes are the new hot trend in housing market
When people think of renting, they typically imagine a unit in an apartment building or maybe a part of or even a whole house. They don’t usually think of a newly constructed house built with a renter — not a buyer —in mind. But there are a growing number of these build-to-rent single-family communities in the United States (about 6% of new single-family homes, according to real estate adviser RCLCO), including some in the Rochester area.
Can Naming Your Freelance Business Raise Your Income?
If you were a business looking for a writer, would you hire Robin Flanigan or The Kinetic Pen? Holly Leber Simmons or Red Pen Editorial? Elna Cain or Innovative Ink?
Flanigan, Simmons, and Cain are all freelance writers whose business name is different from their own. Should you do the same?
Uptick in Backyard Dwellings Gets Pandemic Push
When Kevin Yost began working from home last spring due to the pandemic, he set himself up at his San Francisco area home's dining room table. But with sensitive material on his laptop, he needed more privacy from his wife, who often worked from home, and two teenage children. Yost discovered a solution in his own backyard.
How to Nurture Trade Partner Relationships
WEBINAR ON DEMAND
The past decade has seen a decline in the number of subcontractors and trade partners due to a shortage in newer workers entering the industry, older workers aging out, and many businesses downsizing or disappearing during the Great Recession.
In this webinar, learn specific ways to nurture relationships with trade partners and subcontractors and keep them feeling part of the team. Highlights include:
-Ideas for how to show appreciation for subcontractors
-Why it’s a good idea to diversify your subcontractor base
-How to nurture those relationships going forward
AKC's Family Dog March-April 2020
Diagnosed in 20% to 40% of dogs, separation anxiety can affect your pet far into the future. A new device has shown promise in helping dogs and their owners cope.
Breathe Easier—Healthy Homes Go Mainstream
While the idea that homes can be healthy places that nurture their inhabitants and promote wellness isn’t new, that idea is now being more sharply defined and codified in ways that could change building practices and further heighten consumer awareness—especially in light of the COVID-19 health crisis and people’s need to do more tasks at home.
Just Right
Make downsized living feel larger. Whether you’re in a smaller house, an apartment, a condo or even a “tiny home,” there are modern, eco-friendly, Goldilocks appliances that are just right for your space.
AKC's Family Dog
Some nights Katie North and her fiancé find themselves in their Oakland, California, kitchen doing a little cheerleading, a little jazz scat singing, a little dancing and clapping all in the name of getting Rugger, their 12-year-old springer spaniel mix, to eat. “He usually stands there, asleep at the wheel; we have to get him excited enough to eat. It’s absurd; he wants entertainment with his meal.”
While most dogs don’t require dinner and a floor show, plenty of dog owners find themselves as frustrated as North. How do you get those picky eaters to nose in on their bowls?
I made bad financial decisions in hopes of fixing my marriage
Money is wrapped up in all kinds of unpleasant emotions. Shame, embarrassment, fear, regret. We all experience these feelings about our money at one time or another, but we’ll be damned if we actually talk about it. This essay is part of the Financially Naked series -- where people have the space to bare all about their most vulnerable financial experiences, mistakes, and regrets.
Kitchen Before & After: See This Welcoming Tudor Revival Kitchen
By swapping spaces, a couple gain a bright, welcoming kitchen all set for get-togethers. See all the little details of this stunning Tudor Revival kitchen remodel.
Built For Wellness
Independent schools have moved wellness out of the gym and into spaces where everyone can benefit.
Wellness on a Grand Scale
The goal for Lake Nona, an 11,000-acre master planned community in Orlando, Fla., was to create the ideal place to “inspire human potential,” says Karlee Kunkle, senior communications manager for Tavistock Development Co. “We say health and well-being start in your home, not when you get to the doctor’s office,” she says.
Alexa, Build Me a House
Voice-controlled smart homes are now on Amazon’s roadmap, as demand for cheaper prefab houses grows
Vincent Paguia’s new house caused quite a spectacle when it arrived in his neighborhood in the beach town of Half Moon Bay, about 25 miles south of San Francisco. It took just three hours and some very heavy machinery to crane all the ready-made modules of his home into place, lifting them off the back of two semis that pulled up in front of his lot. The new 1,300-square-foot family home had bee...
Driving success by getting people and projects on the same page
It’s a familiar construction industry story: A small contractor starts to grow, hire more people, take on larger jobs and expand its portfolio. Everything moves smoothly — until it doesn’t.
That’s how it went for Hartzell Construction in Pompano Beach, Florida, which began life as a roof-cleaning and painting company more than 70 years ago. Today it employs 150 staff and subcontractors and does everything from concrete restoration to fencing and railing fabrication to commercial and residenti...
Digging In At The Vista at CC Young
The Vista consolidates all of CC Young's licensed care operations into one building. It also adds 220 residences, many of which are adaptable to varying levels of care to meet demographic shifts.