Just over a year ago, we reported on the custom home built for Barry and Anne Weston by M Squared Builders & Designers. The design of this 1,848 square foot home consists of three bedrooms and two baths, with two of the bedrooms also functioning as offices. In place of a formal dining room, an oversized nook accommodates the Weston’s drop leaf dining table. Using the table leaf and the kitchen bar, they have comfortably seated as many as 12 for a meal, and they’ve been pleased to have a place for overnight guests to sleep in their offices when needed.

The kitchen/nook area is reminiscent of Barry’s grandmother’s “social kitchen:” It’s large enough to accommodate arm chairs and lamps for after dinner conversation and reading. The kitchen features large drawers under the counter instead of cabinets, relieving Anne from having to get on her hands and knees to search for Tupperware lids, among other often-hard-to-find items. The nook’s sliding glass doors open to the deck, in which the Westons requested heavy gauge wire vs. deck rails, so they could easily view the tranquil woods beyond the deck.

“Every day we’ve lived here, either Barry or I have said, out loud, ‘I love our house’ says Anne.  “We let Michele Myers, the President of M Squared Builders and Designers, know how happy we are every time we see her. Michele’s process is very, very good. She had us make a lot of decisions up front, which worked tremendously to our advantage. She was a dream to work with, and if we were to ever build another home, there’s no question… We would work again with M Squared.”

“We took the path of Sarah Susanka in The Not So Big House,” Anne continues. “We asked ourselves, ‘what do we need the space for and what are we going to do with the space?’ We let the space be determined by our activities, not the other way around. The house is no bigger than it needs to be; it’s the right size for us. Activities have been combined for rooms and I’m delighted to have simplified my life. I no longer have to clean, maintain, or pay taxes on a huge home. It’s been liberating!”

The energy efficiency of this home features a high efficiency wood stove, which produced the vast majority of the heat the home needed this past winter from wood on their property and from another property in the neighborhood where trees were being removed for a new home to be built.  “Barry enjoys chopping wood and we both strive to be good stewards of the environment,” Anne comments.  The Westons used their heat pump only twice last winter: Once, when some work was being done inside their home while they were out of town, and they wanted the workers to perform in comfort; and again while Barry was recuperating after surgery due to a cross-country skiing accident. “We just have a darn energy efficient house, and it was proven during the snow and ice we experienced last winter,” says Anne.

The Westons opted for a solar photovoltaic system from Southern Energy Management that allows them to produce electricity. This system resulted in a power bill of $.20 last month. Yes, you read that correctly… Their power bill was 20 cents for the month of April! “We have a real time gauge on how much power is being produced and how much power is being used by our solar panels, so we can time how and when to use power,” Anne explains. “It’s been a learning curve for us and an interesting science project. If I’d just read during the day instead of at night last month, we could have gotten our power bill to below zero! Of course if we want power, air conditioning, or heat at specific times, we can do that and still have very low power bills, but it’s been fun to work at getting the bill as low as possible. For example, Barry put a note on our toaster that says ‘toaster = 1000 watts.’ If we wait for the gauge to show us that power is being produced at 1000 watts, we can use the toaster at no charge. If I do laundry at the right time, I can leverage our own electricity production, while also utilizing the power company at its best time too. It’s win-win for everyone.”

“We get a lot of compliments on our home, and sometimes we get comments about how well everything fits together.” says Anne.” I can’t stay quiet when those statements are made… I let people know that we had a very good idea of what we wanted from the beginning, and we were actively involved throughout the building process. We asked around before choosing a builder and quickly learned that Michele Myers is a name many people know. She’s respected. We were told that she listens to her customers; we found her listening skills to be exceptional. I think she was as intrigued by us and what we wanted to accomplish as we were with her. If a builder gives you a sense that he or she is going to ‘wing it,’ my advice to you is to beware of that builder. Nothing is simple about the building process. A good builder, like Michele, walks you through the process step by step. Michele’s plan and kitchen designer were both fantastic, and all of our pre-planning paid off. Michele’s attention to detail and quality was truly amazing… It was fascinating to see how our requests came to fruition. No one should ever think he or she will wind up with a fabulous home without thinking through it very carefully. Michele and her team did that with us, and we love the result. We’ve been thrilled to show our home to friends and family, so that others can see that their dreams can become a reality too.”

So there you have it, another glowing report on M Squared Builders & Designers. What are you waiting for? Learn more about the green, healthy, and energy efficient practices of M Squared Builders & Designers today! Visit www.msquaredbuilders.com, or call 919-620-8535.