Tales of woe riddle the residential real-estate market. For those in the apartment market, however, the picture isn’t quite so bleak. Apartment-vacancy rates are low, and values have climbed in recent years. Sales activity has tapered off some as lenders tighten the rules, but opportunities are still there for those with cash or well-positioned for financing.

Data management when things go wrong—really wrong!

When businesses think about disaster preparedness, they often think of a fire or another sort of cataclysmic occurrence. But there are other events—hardware failures, software failures, prolonged power outages—that vex companies on a more consistent basis.

This month, the Spokane Home Builders Association plans to launch its green-home-construction certification program, called Built Green of the Inland Northwest. SHBA is unveiling details about the environmentally sustainable building initiative and will begin marketing it during the Premier Home Improvement Show April 18-20.

Built Green, a local version of the Built Green Washington state program, includes guidelines for building homes to green standards, with five levels of certification available to builders and their clients. BUILDING magazine sat down recently with SHBA Executive Officer Joel White to discuss the new program.

As home sales have slowed, more homeowners have taken on projects remodeling what they have rather than moving on to something new. But what kind of time and money is involved in such an endeavor? And is there a return on that investment?

BUILDING magazine sat down recently with Tim Frothingham to talk about preparing for a remodel. Frothingham is a contractor who has worked in the construction industry for more than 30 years and operated his own remodeling company, Frothingham Builders, for 16 years. He says most of the homes he remodels were built before World War II and that 85-90 percent of his projects have involved making improvements to homes on Spokane’s South Hill.