Designing Southwest Florida Inc

Energy Effeciency

Energy efficiency is more than a buzzword, it's building with the homeowner in mind. A more efficiently designed home can save the homeowner in their monthly energy bills, it can reduce maintenance costs, and it can drastically improve indoor air quality. An efficiently designed home can also help reduce indoor moisture, this can improve overall comfort at any temperature as well as prevent mold and mildew. Another benefit from a more efficient build is constant indoor temperature, this can prevent premature cracking in baseboard, caulking, grout, and any wood product inside your home.

Value Engineering

Value Engineering is a systematic analysis of the functions of various components and materials to lower the cost of goods, products and services. What that means in English is we can use our experience to inform you of what is the most cost effective way to accomplish your goals. A real world example of this, is us advising our clients to slightly adjust window sizing to take advantage of the cost savings accompanied by using standard sizes vs custom where it's not needed or change the materials used on the large glass sliding door they want leading out to the patio.

Designing for longevity

When we design a project for longevity we take feedback from the contractors in the field on what products or elements arent living up to expectations after their warranty expires. Those items are purposefully excluded from our designs. One such element we exclude is felt paper underlayment for roofing, we exclude this because several roofing contractors have reported back that when they are called to replace the roof covering on a project the felt paper has degraded to the point of it barely being there, however the the self adhere type of underlayment still looks brand new by the time the roof needs to be replaced. So by using self adhered vapor open underlayment we get a proper long lasting seal from water intrusion as well as the system allowing humidity to escape, preventing the roof sheathing from rotting and needing to be replaced.

Above code minimum

Code minimums are the worst that you can make your structure and still be as safe as the state deems sufficient.That being said, every 3 years the code updates with new additions and improvements to the code making it more stringent and or more energy efficient. However, there is no real reason you have to wait for the bureaucracy to catch up to today's or tomorrow's improved techniques and material science. you can implement the new techniques that fit with the end goals of your dream home, whether its energy efficiency or improved indoor air quality, or having a home that is sonically isolated from you new neighbors or a home that has a consistent humidity and temperature. we are here to help you design the best home that suits you needs and budget current code or better.

Complete Design Package

We are in the design business, so you don't have to be. We want to make your experience as seamless as possible, because of this, once you start your project with us, we can generate all the pieces you will need for a county or city submission, such as

• Architectural Plans
• Structurally engineered sheets and detailS
• Engineered truss layout with truss profiles
• Septic Design
• Boundary Survey
• Energy Calculations