Reclaimed & Salvaged Home Building Material Use

jchait — Tue, 20 May 2008 23:48:28 -0400

I recently read a great article, Bronx-based Rebuilders Source shows it's easy building green, from the NY Daily News.

There were some pretty interesting points in the article. For example, they note, "There are more than 1,000 building material reuse stores in the country, according to the Pittsburgh-based Building Materials Reuse Association." I had no idea there were so many. Of course I knew they existed, because we frequented one in New Mexico while home building; also I just like reuse, but you just don't hear about them. Every time I mention one to someone they say, "Huh?" Maybe some better advertising is in order.

The article focuses on a Bronx-based Rebuilders Source, a project of Green Worker Cooperatives. The store notes that their goal, or hopes anyhow, include selling, "300 tons of used building materials each year." That's great.

Read the whole article.

In any case, it got me thinking, or wondering at least why more folks don't know about reuse stores. People act so surprised about them. I did a post a while back related to this topic; Building A Reclaimed House - Where To Find Used Materials, but thought I'd list a few I left out before, because if you're rebuilding, building new, or just making over one room, reused is one of the best ways to go material wise.

More reuse materials:

Builder 2 Builder: This site is very cool. You can see pictures of the actual reuse materials online, for the most part, and there's a great Demolition / Deconstruction Notices section, so you can find materials quick, or try to claim them before someone else does.

2007 Guide to Architectural Antiques and Antique Lumber Companies

The ReUse People of America for California, Washington, and Colorado

Renovators Resource Inc for Nova Scotia

Building Materials Resource Center for Boston

For a gigantic list visit Eco Business Links - many local options like the ones above, for Vermont, California, Oregon, the UK, and more.

Building A Reclaimed House - Where To Find Used Materials

jchait — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 02:15:07 -0400

Building a homes with a lot of reclaimed materials sounds cool - if you can find the goods. Luckily, locating material for reuse in home remodeling or home builidng is not that difficult. What's hard is the time it takes to find the right materials for your home projects - be it building anew, or simply adding on to an already standing home. There's a lot to choose from in relation to reclamied materials, so make an initial plan about the items you need, i.e. "Door" and be flexible with your imagination.

Now where to look...

1. Habitat ReStores: ReStores are shops that sell nice quality used building supplies and other home project materials. Their prices are higher up on the resale market but much lower than supplies you'd buy new. Proceeds from ReStores help build Habitat houses within a given community, which is a bonus of shopping there. I love the ReStore shops I've been in. The materials are usually very high quality and unique.

2. The Building Materials Reuse Association (BMRA): sThis non-profit is an educational resource for those interested in deconstruction and the reuse plus recycling of recovered building materials. They offer a handy directory of reuse stores at their website.

3. Deconstruction companies: You can contact companies locally and learn about sales they may be having of salvaged building materials.

4. The Reclaimed Wood Council: This organization can giveyou all the basics about reclaimed wood and hook you up with real reclaimed wood specilaity companies.

5. Your basic salvage shop, thrift store, antique dealer, garage sale, and more: Any place that sells used goods has the potential to sell something you might want to use for your house. These places won't of course sell floor planks or a ton of scrap metal, but they may very well have cubboards, sinks, tubs, and more up for grabs. Just be careful of quality at places like these.

6. Cheap stuff: Online resources like Freecycle and Craigslist have made it super cheap to find almost anything you need. One issue here is quality and another is safety. Never allow folks to bring a "deal" to your home. Meet up in public, with a pal tagging along. However, you can score some pretty decent stuff.

7. Free stuff!: Dumpster diving, asking friends, looking around a junk yard and colleges with building programs all may offer free and usable goods. Some junk yards charge for items some don't you'll have to check around. The downside waiting around and searching for the perfect product of course takes a lot of time. The up side; well, it is free.

There are plenty of other places you can score reused or recycled materials for home building purposes. I'm sure this is a topic we'll re-visit.

Used Goods for Building

Reclaimed & Salvaged Home Building Material Use

Building A Reclaimed House - Where To Find Used Materials