HEALTHY RENOS

Renovating to higher performance levels with lifestyle benefits included requires thoughtful planning. Henri Belisle, president of TQ Construction and homeowner Dr Janet Simons discuss the planning process of a 1912 character home renovation.

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Co-Host: Mike Freedman, owner,  AI Technology & Design
Co-Host, podcast editor: Jennifer-Lee Gunson: jPod Creations
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Distributed by Buzzsprout

Henri Belisle, President, TQ Construction Ltd.

Henri Belisle is the President of TQ Construction, a family operated business founded over 35 years ago by his father Ralph Belisle. Henri is a Red Seal Carpenter trained at BCIT and is continually seeking to deepen his understanding of residential construction.
As a kid, Henri worked alongside his family in construction and developed an affinity for the design-build sector. While overseeing the day-to-day operations of the business, Henri is also 2nd Vice Chair of the Homebuilders Association Vancouver (HAVAN) Board of Directors, Vice-Chair of HAVAN RenoCouncil and Past-Chair of HAVAN Young Professional Committee.

 

Homeowner, Dr. Janet Simons, Medical Biochemist, Site Medical Lead, Pre and Post Analytical

I grew up in Kingston, Ontario, but also spent significant portions of my childhood in New York City, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Following my Bachelor’s of Science in Honours Biochemistry from the University of Waterloo, I completed my medical school and residency training in Internal Medicine and Medical Biochemistry at McMaster University. After my residency training, I moved to Vancouver to join the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at St. Paul’s Hospital.

In addition to my laboratory practice, I continue to enjoy clinical work in Internal Medicine. I am particularly interested in helping both the clinical services and the laboratory increase efficiency by improving communication and achieving better mutual understanding. When not in the hospital, I enjoy cycling, hiking, and exploring Vancouver’s restaurant scene.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3FG8VuFUo0

Jennifer-Lee:

Welcome to Measure Twice, Cut Once, the podcast from HAVAN, the Homebuilders Association Vancouver,

Mike:

It’s Season 3, and we’re exploring how our homes can improve our wellbeing.

Jennifer-Lee:

We’ll be looking at the impact of the air we breathe

Mike:

The water we drink

Jennifer-Lee:

And the acoustic levels in our homes

Mike:

Smart kitchens,

Jennifer-Lee:

Award-winning designs

Mike:

And leading-edge building construction.

Jennifer-Lee:

We ask the questions,

Mike:

So, you know how to make your home work for you.

Jennifer-Lee:

I’m Jennifer Lee Gunson

Mike:

And I’m Mike Freedman. Now that you hear why not hit subscribe and you’ll never miss an episode.

Jennifer-Lee:

Hey Mike, nice to be in the studio with the Measure Twice, Cut Once crew.

Mike:

Yes, it is Jennifer-Lee. Last episode, we caught up with Joe from Naikoon Contracting and Khang from Architrix Design Studio to discuss custom home building and design trends. Today we’re going to be focusing on renovation trends and how renovating above basic code can benefit the homeowner.

Jennifer-Lee:

This is a topic that is close to me as my family’s business focuses on custom home building and renovations as well. And as Joe said, in the last episode, there’s always a number to work too. Everyone has a budget. The key is to understand what is important to the homeowner and to set for priorities based on those goals.

Mike:

It sounds like we’re going to be talking about pre-renovation planning today.

Jennifer-Lee:

Yes. I believe this is to be the case.

Mike:

Well, let’s dig into it then and introduce today’s guest. We’re super fortunate to have Henri Belisle, owner of award-winning TQ construction

Jennifer-Lee:

And his client, Dr. Janet Simons. They’re going to discuss what it’s like working together while renovating a 1912 heritage house right here in Vancouver. And Henri you and I go way back. We have been on the U40 committee for quite a few years. I’ve obviously seen you a lot of events. We both come from a building family. So, I’m really excited to finally get to interview you today. But for people that don’t know you, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and TQ construction?

Henri:

So, my name’s Henri, I’m a contractor. I have a building problem. TQ Construction’s been around since probably about 1985. We’re a design build company. We started off kind of doing small projects. The company’s been around since, before I was born, my family started off doing small projects – started building stairs and decks, and then pretty quickly moved into renovations, and home building. And then the design build space, honestly, because when the company was growing, the level of design and kind of integration between designers, builders, architects, and the people on site, we found gaps being missed. And so, the design build model was kind of adopted from large projects into residential ones. And we were one of the first in town to do it. And so now we are a very, very happy and successful award-winning renovation and custom home building company. And I’m really excited to be taking on projects like we are with Janet now, where we’re taking on a, like doing large, complicated projects involving renovations and long-term planning and really finding out what’s best for the home.

Jennifer-Lee:

And you also are part of a family business, like you mentioned like myself. So, I know there’s a lot of stories there working with your family.

Henri:

Oh many. Yeah.

Mike:

Well, what’s really exciting. Janet’s here and getting to know Janet, we found something really neat out. Jennifer and Henry both are the children of builders and grew up around that. Janet, you grew up around construction and some innovative construction as well. Can you tell us a little about how you grew up and what sort of motivated you to do this project in this manner?

Janet:

So, one of the first things I grew up with construction is my parents bought an old house on the corner of the block that we lived on and gutted it and reno’d it. And we moved in there when I was in high school. And then my mother really got the building bug, and she went to trade school later in life and she learned to do carpentry and she got very interested in trades and construction, and she actually did build spec houses. And she was sort of like, as the co-general contractor, she didn’t have any formal experience, but she worked with a lot of people and she got really interested in passive house, particularly. So, she built a passive house on spec, and that was one of her big projects that she did. And so, you know, she really instilled in me like all this energy efficiency, but also just thinking about the quality of the construction and how that influences how a home performs and what it’s like to live in that house. And so that’s really where, when, when my husband and I were looking for a home, we realized there was nothing that was on the market that was going to be ready to go. And we were going to have to do some sort of renovation and we decided that we would just go do it all. <laugh> we were worried about scope creep. So, we just decided we would just buy a house that needed everything done. And that’s what we did

Henri:

Started from scope creep.

Janet:

Yeah. <laugh>.

Mike:

Well, what’s really exciting about this is when your mother was doing those projects, passive house, and net zero, wasn’t really a regular part of the conversation. So, in, in many ways your mom was an innovator for some of the stuff we talk about on a regular basis, which is really exciting. Can you talk a little bit more about the belief system that you had that motivated you specifically to create a passive house or an energy efficient house? Because obviously it’s not as price efficient to build that kind of home. What, what motivated you to want to build that type of home?

Janet:

I mean, I think besides my mother saying that she kill me, if I didn’t <laugh> I think really, if you’re doing a big project like this, yes, you’re going to spend a little bit more money focusing on some of these key things, but if you’re spending 10 or 20% more on construction and you’re saving 30, 40, 50% every month, year over year for the whole lifetime of the house, then that’s money well spent. And, you know, there is, so there’s the financial aspect, you know, energy prices who knows what’s going to happen, it’s going to get more and more expensive to heat and run our homes. So, your kind of ensuring yourself against the future for that kind of thing. If you have highly energy efficient home. And then there’s also just like the lifestyle, the personal choices that we want to make.

Janet:

So, knowing that my husband who has allergies has like clean filtered air during allergy season coming in through the filter. So, all of those things, you know, make it worthwhile to us when we’re not doing a full passive house. There is lots of reasons for that character homes. It’s, you know, it’s not impossible. It’s very hard. And there’s also personal choices that we want to make. We really like cooking with gas. So, we’ve been able to have a gas-powered range in our house. That’s important to us. We wanted a hot tub on the deck. That’s not really passive house friendly, but there’s lots of other things you don’t have to go full passive house to think about how are your windows performing? How are your doors sealed? How are, you know, the orientation of your windows? Are they going to let in nice warm sun during the winter months? Are they going to be shaded during the summer months? All those things you can think about without having to make compromises in terms of your lifestyle.

Jennifer-Lee:

And I love the fact that you guys are thinking about this, because a lot of the times when we think about high performance homes, we think of brand-new builds, and there’s a lot of heritage homes here in Vancouver, as well as new Westminster where I grew up. And it’s nice to kind of take that little bit of heritage and be able to move it into the future. So, can you paint the picture for our audience of the home that you purchased? It’s from 1912, tell us a little bit about it. What drew you to it?

Janet:

So, I mean, what drew us to it is really that it was the right size and shape, which is really the only things that we’re keeping about the house, but specifically, you know, it had really nice curb appeal where I could see the potential for the curb appeal in terms of the overall shape of the house and the roof massing and this like the basic architectural style that was there. We liked the space and the layout, especially, you know, we wanted three bedrooms upstairs with room for a master bathroom and a secondary bathroom. And so that was something that was important to us. The other thing that was surprisingly difficult to find when we were shopping for houses was that the second floor was not under the eaves. So specifically like your bedrooms do not have slanty ceilings, and that was something that was important to us. So, all of second floor bedrooms are like full height ceilings. And so, it’s just those sorts of personal things that we’re looking for when we were thinking about what do we want the layout on the footprint of our house to look like.

Jennifer-Lee:

And you said your home is designated character. Can you tell the audience a little bit, and maybe this is question for Henri, what’s the difference between character and heritage is? Because I think a lot of times when we look at these properties, we’re not sure exactly what we can and cannot do to them.

Henri:

We kind of entered the project, the house wasn’t designated character yet. That’s something actually we did ourselves. Heritage designations are very tight in terms of what you can do with the building and what actually fits within it. Like a heritage home needs to be essentially in its original state. So, when it was built, does it have similar hardware, similar layout, like not really renovated. It’s like, it’s, it’s something like you would put in a museum if you wanted, like it’s a capture of, of the, the time that it was built in. Where a character home is more about the size and shape, like the front of the building. When you think of like the character of a neighborhood is what the, the intention of the designation is. Like the idea is to preserve like the feel of neighborhoods. So, the city has created an incentive for people who like Janet, who buy, buy a home, are planning a project.

Henri:

And when you’re dealing with something like, like Janet is taking on for, for this renovation, it becomes a real conversation of whether or not you should build a new house. And if you’re going to build a new house, then it’s really common to use, like, you know, you engage like a great architect or home designer, and then you end up with a, like an awesome design, but it may not match and look like it’s supposed to be there. It might look like it’s kind of sticking out like a sore thumb on the street. And so, what the city has done is basically created a program where if you keep the original size and shape and use similar materials to finish the like the curb-facing part of the home, your front entry, there’s an allowance for extra square footage to build on. And so, one of the cool parts about this project is that if Janet had decided to tear the home down and build a new one, then we would’ve ended up with a smaller house then we’re going to end up at the end of this project, probably by to the tune of around 600 or 800 square feet. Like it’s a noticeable difference. The funny part about this project though, is that the square footage listed when you bought it was about the same as we’re going to finish with, because there was so much non-permitted addition work done to the building. So, they actually recaptured the attic space and then turned that into an office, added some stairs and deleted a bathroom. There’s an addition off the rear that it’s really hard to tell if it was fully permitted or not. It’s very poorly done. There’s some strange things about this house, but to your question, working with it meant that we had to kind of use for example, cedar siding on the front, as opposed to what we commonly use as like a Hardy or stucco or something like that on the sides is what, we are doing. And that’s because Hardy didn’t exist pre-1960. So, the designation for a character home is, it has to have been built before 1960 and have the original primary roof form that it had when it was built. So, if the roof lines and the front face of the building are slightly different, you’re at risk of not being able to achieve that designation.

Mike:

So, Janet, when you were looking at this house and looking at all these different subtle nuances, how’d you sort it out, was it scary for you? How’d you figure out it was the right house for you when you were trying to make an offer?

Janet:

Everyone knows the Vancouver housing market. It’s kind of insane. And even this house, which definitely had lots of issues, it was staged. It looked nice. Like you could definitely have been actually I showed people the listing photos and they’re like, oh, you’re going to, you’re going to renovate that. Like, that looks really nice.

Henri:

I actually had the same thought when you sent it to me, when you first called, it was like, you really want to get this place looks pretty. Okay. But then got it. And I visited and it’s a different story.

Janet:

It was, you know, potentially quite a big project and we knew that, but we did want to be sure that we had a good sense of what we were getting ourselves into. And so even though, you know, everything is crazy and there was going to be offers on one day in the span of 36 hours I was able to get a contractor in, a home inspector in, and after the home inspection, the home inspector said, oh, you know, there’s all these things. but also like, I don’t know about the foundation. I don’t know about the structure. So, I actually got a structural engineer in to like reassure me that it was not going to fall down if we started touching it. So <laugh>, I managed to do that all in 36 hours and I, you know, I got a good sense from the contractor that yes, the things I wanted to do were possible. It wasn’t going to be impossible to take down this wall or put that nano door in, that was within the scope of, you know, reality. And I had a good sense of the ballpark price of what that would look like. And I had the reassurance from the home inspector. Um, well actually there was no reassurance from the home inspector. The home inspector was like everything is a mess! But actually, that was helpful too, because then when you’re talking about price, there were three home inspectors in the house at the same time. Because this is how Vancouver is these days. And the home inspection itself scared off one of the other potential buyers and made one of the other buyers offer quite significantly below asking. So, when I came in, I had a really good sense of what was needed and what I was willing to pay for it. And it helped me feel good in my offer. And it ultimately, I think the inspection helped us get the house and and be confident in what we were buying.

Jennifer-Lee:

Yeah. And I think you just mentioned something great, because we’ve talked about it a few times on this podcast, but the fact that you sent Henri the listing, and I always think it’s a good idea if you can, and maybe Henri can jump on in this, but if you are looking for a piece of property, it is probably a good thing to contact a contractor that you’re thinking of using just to kind of be like, Hey, is this worth it or not?

Henri:

Definitely. And that’s something that I seem to do at least three, four times a year for, for clients or potential clients, whether it’s someone like Janet coming to me like, hey, here’s a project I’m kind of thinking about, or I’m looking at buying this house and doing some renovation. Is it a good candidate. Any builder or renovator should be able, should be able to do fairly comfortably? Just kind of like a quick look through to see if there’s anything really jumps out. Cause there’s real differences between a house that makes sense to do like an addition or to do like an energy retrofit or anything like that. And a home inspector is like really important part of the buying process. And I think we kind of play different roles in this. A home inspector. Like what I do like is different than what a home inspector’s going to bring to that conversation.

Henri:

They’re going to point out like, hey, your roof has X number of years left on it. You have copper pipes in the home, you know, you might want to look at getting the home re-piped. If you do a renovation, they’ll give you those kind of, that kind of insight, like surface level, like the cracks in the walls, et cetera, but where someone like myself or another renovator or builder can come in and say is like, oh, this house would make sense to do a top story addition on, or because like we can look at the, a layout or take a look at Google street view and just give a, get a quick sense on if it’s going to be really challenging to do something like that. And fortunately, like for what Janet had in mind is that this house is actually an excellent candidate for it is because we’re not actually having to mess too much with the structure to get what we need done. It’s a lot about opening the place up and like cleaning it up a

Janet:

Yeah. I mean, I think it started with, we want to consider energy efficiency and um, you know, just environmental impact when we’re doing this house. But we also had very specific, like we want this square footage, I want this layout, I want this nano door and you know, thinking about how do we get the insulation that we need it really, you know, I think it all kind of goes to onto the basement, right?

Henri:

Mm-hmm <affirmative>.

Janet:

really thinking about how we are going to make this home as efficient and possible. We need to redo the basement and that, that becomes a big part of the project. Yeah. So that’s kind of where we focus getting those insulation values and thinking about what we needed to, to achieve like the energy efficiency of the home while still like, I mean, and I guess the plus, or really what, what the, the, what we wanted was a fully finished, dry, clean, warm basement. And so that, uh, became a big part of the project.

Henri:

And that was something that we weren’t actually considering at the outset. Like it became really clear once we got into the planning that it only really made sense to redo the basement. Like when we say redo, we’re not talking about refinishing it, we are lifting the house, removing the existing basement, and then building a brand new one and that’s became important. Because one, it was a musty damp basement. Like many, many of them are because concrete is kind of intuitive, but concrete works like a sponge. It’s kind of just pulls water in through it just big, heavy, and slow. And so, what we’re going to do is essentially build a water and airtight basement that’s now going to be sunk a little bit deeper. So, the old one had about seven-foot ceilings, ish David Janet’s husband’s a fairly tall guy, so we wanted to feel comfortable. And then, so I said, we’re know we’re the base basement floor. We’re sinking deeper by about feet. So, we’re going to have it just under a nine-foot ceiling.

Jennifer-Lee:

And I know in a lot of those older homes, I’ve talked to other people about that before, too. It’s really trying to make sure you have that height because sometimes in the bathroom areas, especially on the top floor, people are like trying to crouch into their shower because obviously these homes were done a long time ago and people were different shapes and sizes back then

Henri:

And basements weren’t used. Like that was a really, that’s a really common thing that we see in older homes is that basements weren’t really designed previously for living in, they were designed for like storage, like it’s called the cellar where you just like put all your junk and then live upstairs. And then over time as you know, families changed and people needed to get a little more out of their house, then you start seeing basements being redone. But they weren’t meant like when they originally designed, like they’re not meant to perform the same way as like a main floor of the top story of a house does. And so, they’re uncomfortable and that’s why no one likes living in basement suites is because they feel weird to be in cuz there’s like a little moisture. Musty. And like the air quality is not as good kind of going back to where we started about why high-performance building is good and good for people, not just for the energy reasons because you get, you know, better air quality, you know, it feels nicer. It’s quieter.

Jennifer-Lee:

Yeah. I live in a basement suite currently. <laugh>, it’s a nice basement suite, but I definitely feel like sometimes the air quality down there is probably not as great as on the main floor. For your basement suite though Janet, are you going to like, is it just a place you guys are going to hang out or are you guys actually making it into a rentable suite?

Janet:

It’s not going to be a rentable suite. There were a couple challenges, one of which was the legal access to the basement. We were going to have to – currently there’s a side door, which was not up to code, and we were going have to sink a whole sunken patio in the front of the house, which would destroy the character thing. So, it wasn’t really possible, but that’s fine. And we’re happy with it as like basically it’s a guest, suite connected to the main house, and space for like a recreation room and a dog shower and all that good stuff.

Jennifer-Lee:

Yeah. So, you got different things that you wanted because I think that’s something that a lot of young people like ourselves are looking at now is trying to find other ways to have more added income. Uh, just because obviously living in Vancouver is very expensive, but it sounds like you were okay with the tradeoff that you get to have what a dog shower did you say?

Speaker 6:

<laugh> among other things.

Henri:

It’s actually a really cool space.

Janet:

So, I mean, we went from not really thinking we’re going to do so much to the basement. So, the basement being like a big chunk of the budget and the project, and you know, making other decisions in other places of the house, but that’s fine. I think we’re going to be really happy with the finished project and it’s going to just like, there’s so much heat loss in a house and Henri, we can talk to more about this, but like there’s so much heat loss in a house to the basement. And so, we doing that goes so far to improving the efficiency of the home.

Mike:

Janet, I just want to ask you specifically, we’ve talked a lot about, you know, the type of house that you want to create in terms of your goals for energy and energy efficiency. Can you talk a little bit more about how that type of house is going to support your goals for comfort? Like can we talked about like the bedroom at night, the temperature you like to sleep at and stuff, what specific comfort aspects of building this type of house really appeal to you?

Janet:

Sleep is very important to me. So, I’m going to start there having good windows. Good insulation is sound insulation just as much as it is heat insulation. So having quiet in your house, not having to open your window to get a breeze, because you have a good and well-constructed ventilation system, that’s going to bring in fresh cold air, keeping the bedroom, you know, the temperature that you want without having to spend a lot of energy on air conditioner heating because you’re well insulated. So, knowing basically that you’re going to have like a nice clean, cool, dark heated sleeping space and, and actual quality of the air. So, you know, when there’s allergens, when there is particulate matter in the air, you actually don’t sleep as well. And you actually don’t wake up as refreshed. So that cleanliness of the air. And I think somewhere in like passive house literature, I was reading, like someone was saying like they actually in their passive house, they have no drafts. They have really clean air, and they sleep so well. And actually, when they go anywhere else, they have a really hard time sleeping now, like in hotels or anywhere else, because they’re just so used to like the high-quality air and the consistent temperature of their home. So, I think that’s really important to us.

Mike:

That’s awesome because now you’ve talked about comfort, but you’ve also tied in the other big one, which is the health benefits of living one of these types of houses as well. And the long-term benefits go well, well beyond cost as well. So really appreciate you talking about that.

Jennifer-Lee:

Yeah. And I’m, uh, always cold. So, I always love the idea of these homes that are going to keep you warm because I wear like 12 sweaters in my basement suite.

Mike:

On the exact opposite of you. I need it to be like exact like 16 degrees in my bedroom.

Jennifer-Lee:

My brother laughs at me cause he he’s like you, he loves cold. And I said, oh, I got a heating pad because I needed one. And he’s like, how would you sleep with that in your bed? <laugh>

Henri:

I couldn’t imagine that

Jennifer-Lee:

It’s toasty and lovely anyways. When you’re working with such great people like Henry of course there’s a massive team. Can you tell us a little bit about how you got the team that was right for you to reach your budget and your potential design goals for your home? You,

Mike:

Yeah, so I mean, my husband and I definitely have the philosophy of like fine, good people and then let them do their thing. <laugh>

Jennifer-Lee:

You feel like there’s a story there

Janet:

<laugh>

Janet:

The, the whole team’s been really great, you know, I had, you know, coming in, I had very specific kind of goals and priorities and so they listened to that, and they heard what I was saying and, and like, okay, we’re going to, get the right, the right people, the right assessments, the right sort of look at this place. I think, you know, choosing a contractor of course is a really important thing. And it definitely was a little bit daunting for me as someone who’s relatively new to Vancouver and doesn’t really have like connections and, you know, I was calling around. And basically, what I ended up doing was I just talked to a bunch of people on the phone. I kind of honestly just like got a vibe off of people. And I actually set up like three different like zoom interviews and like my husband and I like formally interviewed three contractors on Zoom.

Janet:

And then we made a decision based off that. So, we knew that we wanted, sort of like that all-in-one design build kind of thing. We didn’t want to have to be coordinating between services. So that was a factor. And then, just so, getting a sense, like, does the contractor have experience doing the kind of project that you’re talking about? Like, especially if you’re talking about a character or heritage restoration, you need to make sure that someone has done that kind of work before and is prepared for what that, you know, entails as opposed to someone who’s just building new homes is probably not the right choice for someone for doing a character renovation for instance.

Jennifer-Lee:

Let’s talk about my favorite subject and I think everybody’s favorite subject – and that’s of course the permit process.

Henri:

It’s complicated to put it mildly. It’s the City of Vancouver’s permit process is challenging, and it took a long time to get this permit probably about,

Mike:

Seven months and four days. If anyone was, I was counting.

Henri:

The homeowner knows <laugh>

Henri:

Believe it or not though, this was one of those smoother permits that we’ve had actually gone through. We had minimal revisions back and forth. We did a lot of upfront planning work consulting because it’s a character project had to be really clear on how much of the original home were retaining, cuz it’s like, you have to keep 50% of the original structure, otherwise you don’t get the designation. And so, we had to do a lot of back and forth and workshopping with the City of Vancouver, like, like building and planning department. And there’s so many little hoops to jump through and which makes Vancouver a challenging place to work to work. But it’s also the only municipality where we could do this project. Like this project wouldn’t make sense anywhere else. There’s no other municipality that gives you a little extra square footage because you’re keeping an older house. So, when this would’ve been a new building in another municipality though, which is, I think like personally, I, I like that Vancouver does that because I’m a believer in keeping and retaining as much of a building as we can because I’d rather not throw it away. There’s a lot of good products in there’s good material. And as much as we can avoid like kind of divert into a landfill, the better

Jennifer-Lee:

I was actually going to say, Janet, that seven months and four days it’s actually wait quick. Yeah. <laugh> because you can be waiting a lot longer than that. And that’s why, again, why you hire the right team, and you hire somebody like Henry that can take the burden of the permit process for you.

Janet:

Totally. Like, I mean, it was annoying to wait, and you know, because especially when you’re anticipating you, like it’s a fun project. You want to like get a, it all done. But at the same time, you know, all I had to do was wait, I didn’t have to like go back and forth the city <laugh> or like, you know, hit my head against the wall or like do all these revisions. So, it was great to have the team behind me. And all we had to do was sit here and patiently wait.

Mike:

And you really illustrated that you didn’t have to do a bunch of revisions back and forth. And I think that illustrates the value of working with one of our members is that the people you work with who understand this process, understand how to apply properly the first time, because there can be just as many delays waiting for permit revisions as there can be for the permit. So, it’s an efficiency point. It’s really important to work with great members. Now, Henri, I have a question for you. This is something that for our audience, I think will probably make more sense and from the builder community, but here, here we go. So, when that house was built in 1912, there was one set of building codes in every few years, there was another set and another set and another set right up to current. How do you balance the stuff that’s in there that was built in 1912 code with stuff that’s built to 2022 code and how do you juggle that, so it doesn’t get too, too costly for the homeowner or, or, or whoever you’re managing the project for?

Henri:

With great care. That’s, that’s how. It’s you have to be really delicate in your planning around that, cuz there’s like you say, like you say, like there’s homes like built in 19 12, 1920, 1930, 1940, you pick the decade and almost everything up until 1990 something there’s if you touch certain parts of that home, then now you’re the expectation is you’re going to bring it up to the current code. And so, for certain parts of this project, we were very deliberate about not altering certain parts of the building because it would’ve meant that certain rooms got smaller or like the stairs have to be longer, for example. And so, we’re very, very, very careful though. We’re, we’re basically removing all the finishes in, in this building. We’re not touching, for example, the existing stairs. We’re about short, about two inches on clearance of headroom above the stair. And so, but if we lose that, then we, we shrink the bedroom above and it becomes basically a den. And that’s not really, like Janet mentioned earlier, like we’re looking to have three solid bedrooms upstairs when you’re planning a project and there’s something that you really want to avoid having upgrade, it’s important that you communicate that with your builder and you’re aware of it, you’re strategic about where exactly where the project starts and stops. Because if you’re, if, for example, going back to the, um, idea of Janet’s stairs is that if we decided, we wanted to say extend the landing out a little bit, to make it a little more comfortable, that would’ve meant we, that would’ve created like basically like pulling a thread on an old sweater. Like we just would’ve created this like cascade of decisions we have to make in the project. And uh, because we identified that early as something we like wanted to work around, we basically designed around that point.

Mike:

Did you find it’s more challenging to get permit approval for a more technologically advanced house? I mean, obviously we’ve been building to a certain standard and specification for years when we start going into that passive net zero space and talking about emerging technology like heat pumps, does that alter the permitting process, slow it down, speed it up. Anything like that?

Henri:

It can, it really can. And I think the biggest thing is you need to have everything well thought out like a lot of what I’m, what I am like very firm on is having done a bit of the city’s work for them. And so, you need to give like anybody, like you’re making an argument or you’re asking somebody for something you need to give, you need to give the other party a reason why they should approve it. And so, I think where a lot of builders and planners fall short is by just saying like, here’s my project. And then just like letting the city or the city staff basically just navigate their way through your permit set. Whereas for a higher performance home, there’s going to be a lot more questions. So, you have to kind of provide them the answers before they even ask them. So, whether you’re getting sign offs from other professionals who are basically saying like, whether you have an envelope engineer, who’s saying willing to say, like I’ve approved this design of the exterior of the exterior envelope of this building, then the city’s not going to worry about what, what, what materials you’re using because they know what professionals already signed off on it. Same thing goes with your structure or your architecture or, or your mechanical system. There’s going to be things that the city’s going to be any city is going to be concerned about in an application like that. And frankly, most, most planner, most building inspectors are not as educated .as builders who are doing this high-performance work and same thing, same thing goes for the designers. Like we’re often, far ahead. And it’s actually creating a bit of a challenge for, for some of us where the people who are inspecting our work aren’t don’t understand what we’re doing.

Jennifer-Lee:

I want to get actual high performance of your renovation, but first we’re going to take a quick break to thank our sponsors, Henry Janet. This is such a great conversation. Hearing about your process of including professionals from the very beginning and how the project has been carefully planned looking at different pathways to get the home you want. It is so inspiring to hear and share this with our listeners

Mike:

Measure Twice, Cut Once is grateful for the support of our podcast partners FortisBC. Their support helps us share expert knowledge and resources like you’re hearing today from Henri and his client, Janet, to help design and renovate the right home for you.

Jennifer-Lee:

Speaking of resources, the BC Energy Step Code program is a provincial standard that is moving the entire home building industry forward to build homes to better energy efficiency standards, which means better comfort, health, and safety. Be sure to check out www.betterhomesbc.ca, where you’ll find a variety of rebates for construction materials, home, energy evaluations, plus mortgage and tax refunds.

Mike:

Now let’s get back to Henry and Janet.

Jennifer-Lee:

Okay. So now we get to get into the real good stuff. I know you’re a fan of this and this is the high-performance home benefits. I know we talked a little bit at the beginning, but really what was the big driver for you and your husband to have some high-performance elements to your home?

Janet:

I mean, I think that at the end of the day, it’s really just thinking about if this is going to be the forever home, then how are you future proofing that we know that codes change every five, 10 years. And so, in 10 years you want a home that doesn’t already feel outdated or already feel drafty or already feel like you need to replace the mechanicals because your energy bills are skyrocketing. So that a lot of it was, this is a big investment for us. And it’s really about making sure that it’s going to be a home that sort of stands a test of time. And we know that things are changing very quickly, especially with energy prices, energy sources. And we want to, you know, at the end of the day though, doesn’t matter how you heat or cool your home, but if it is well sealed and well-constructed, then you know, you meet need minimal additional input to that house to keep it comfortable. And so that was really, the driving thing for us.

Mike:

So, we talked a little about the comfort. We talked a little about the energy. One of the things I’d like to talk about is the health benefits of this house. Now I’m not a doctor. So, in all my years of non-medical training, I’ve been able to sit and listen and watch. And one of the things I’m seeing, and you tell me if I’m right on, this is a huge increase in allergies and seasonal effective disorders, asthma breathing issues and things like that. And it’s mostly environmental. So, let’s talk a little about some of the choices you made, some of the active decisions you made to help mitigate some of those external factors like smoke from forest fires, like you talked about, and specifically, can you talk about the health benefits for someone like myself, because I’m going to be looking at a new home soon as well. Why would I want this home from a specifically health and physiological perspective?

Janet:

I mean, there’s so much that goes into the air that we breathe, right? And you know, there’s allergens and smoke and pet dander and carbon from cooking and everything like that. You want a house that is going to protect you from everything that’s outside and also, you know, remove the things that are being generated from inside. So, you talked about asthma and respiratory diseases, you know, definitely any like that’s, you’re breathing in. That’s not something that you want in your, your lungs. Your body has a system of getting rid of that, but it does can create inflammation talking about well-ventilated spaces, like right now with viruses and COVID, you know, you want your house to be well ventilated that you’re having air exchange so that those things don’t stag in and build up, um, to high levels in your house. So, there is benefits from, you know, the quality of the air. You breathe, having less sort of those inflammatory things in your house, having better virus and bacteria filtration and everything like that. And then there’s also benefits to being comfortable, makes you happy, being happy, makes you healthy. Like it’s all connected. So, I think that we already talked about sleep as well, right? Having a really good sleep environment, builds a good foundation. So, all of these things, if you wake up, you know, well rested, refreshed, and you’re breathing healthy air that has to impact your health and the health of your family. And thinking about, you know, starting a family and having kids and thinking about childhood allergies and all those things, it all comes from being exposed to so many different things in our lives. And if your house can be like a little bit of a safe haven from that, then you know, that’s so great. And it makes gives you real peace of mind in your home.

Jennifer-Lee:

Well, and that’s great because on the news today, and I’ve been told this by my doctor before- it was interesting. They were talking about the link between global warming and seasonal allergies now because a lot more people are getting them and they’re getting far worse.

Janet:

This has been one of the worst allergy seasons this year. People who live in Vancouver, like I don’t get allergies. I started getting allergies. My husband’s suffered from allergies. He’s on like so many steroids right now. <laugh> it’s been, it’s been one of the worst allergy seasons in Vancouver and you’re right. Global warming is I think only going to make it worse and make those seasons last longer. Right. So, there’s more time of the year where you really don’t want to be opening windows to cool down your house.

Jennifer-Lee:

So, it’s really important to have a house that is going to protect you from all the seasonal stuff out there. And so, like you said, once you feel more comfortable and you’re not taking Reactin every day, <laugh> yes. You’ll be a lot happier.

Janet:

Yes, but if you can avoid nasal steroids, that is generally good for your health <laugh>

Mike:

Should have a little conversation about some of the technology in the house specifically because you did not elect to go with a gas furnace. You went with some different technology, Janet, and that leads into two things. One I’d like to talk a little about that technology, but also, I’d like to talk about gas because, you know, there are people like myself and yourself who absolutely love, love, love cooking on our gas range top, but we are still trying to have that delicate balance. So, can you talk a little about how you compromise? So, you still got some of the gas you wanted and were able to come up with a solution that helped offset some of that.

Janet:

Yeah, totally. I mean, I think that, you know, things like cooking with gas that’s, you know, totally agree is like so important to us. And that’s like personal choices that, you know, are really important when you’re building a house. We really were not willing to compromise on having a gas cook top. But we did want to, I mean, the heat pump really came about as we wanted to be able to efficiently heat and cool a home. And that’s one of the major advantages of the heat pump is that you get the cooling as well in these climates. What I have been told is that sometimes the heat pump can’t heat by itself all the time, especially when it gets super, super, super cold for those couple days in the winter. And so, often you need a backup system, and a gas furnace is an option for a backup system. We decided I didn’t want to buy a whole gas furnace that was not my thing. And you know, and the footprint of it as well, right? So, we ended up using the hot water system as our backup for the heat pumps. So, when it gets really, really cold, the heat pump can actually pull hot water and use that as a heat source to then heat the home. And that hot water is coming off of our on-demand heating system, which is gas powered. And so, there’s definitely gas in the house and it makes sense even in an energy efficient, home, personal choices, as well as just the overall design of the house. So, you definitely can, and reasonably should have gas when it makes sense. But we were, you know, using a heat pump and then backing it up with a gas-powered hot water heater

Jennifer-Lee:

And Henri, for our audience because I see it on commercials all the time, can you just give us a quick little rundown of what I heat pump actually is?

Henri:

So, heat pump essentially is a heating and it’s like the, the power or thermal source of a heating and cooling system. So, what you can expect, what heat pump is it pulls, I guess, the temperature or the thermal energy out of the air. So, what Janet and we’re using is called a like an air source heat pump so that you call there’s water source for, I think you can even get some better geothermal source, but the idea is you take all temperature, all air has thermal energy in it, even if it’s like you’re at close to freezing. So, what a heat pump does is it takes the air, pulls the thermal energy out, and then uses that like through, you know, refrigeration like ammonia or whatnot, to either give you hot, or cold air. And so, we’re doing this through a mix of like forest air, and also what’s called like a mini split. So, where you have small little, like, you know, some of them are the size of like a bread box. Some of them are a little bit larger, but basically heating and cooling points throughout the house. So, you kind of have like a little, little portable AC unit or heating and cooling AC unit, um, in different rooms, but then you can also use a heat pump, deliver heat, like through like a forest air system. Like most people are used to in their homes. Like, like you have like a conventional furnace, but the upside is you don’t need to bolt on, um, like an air-conditioned unit on top of your furnace to get cooling. In the sense you can just, you can either heat who are with one device

Mike:

And how does the cost of investing in a heat pump compare to investing in traditional technology? And it’s a two-parter and how do the savings from that heat pump offset the cost of that investment? Like what’s the length of time for amortization, for lack of a better term?

Henri:

Well, heat pumps are, have a higher upfront cost because one, the equipment’s a little newer and installation is a little more technical. Like it takes a little more expertise. And because you’re dealing with refrigeration chemicals, there’s like a little more, you want to have someone who really knows what they’re doing, where with a, with a furnace system, you’re essentially, you know, you have the unit, you connect the gas, you have the air source and the air distribution. And it’s a little more simple and there are, there are fewer mistakes you can make. The pumps have a higher upfront cost because it’s newer, a little more complicated, but then also, like I said, a little more technical to install, and though they are substantially more efficient in terms of their energy use to almost any other option that you can get, like one of the key it’s you see it, there’s a reason why most high performance homes have a heap pump in them is because it’s really hard to really beat them. Like you put a heat pump into an existing home insulated well, and you’re already a good chunk of the way there because it reduces the overall energy load of the building by a substantial amount.

Janet:

Interestingly, the house when we bought it, didn’t actually not have ducting to the second floor. It was not actually heated or cooled on the second floor at all. The ducts only ran to like, you know, the basement and underneath the first floor. But so, knowing that we just, we ended up, you know, we were considering, should we do all mini, but should we do it centralized system, knowing that we ended up with the centralized system, where are the duct runs going to be? And so, I was really pushing, like, I need to know exactly where these duct runs are going to be, because I know that if you don’t know exactly where the duct runs are going to be, then sometimes we need a 12 by 12 box to go up to the second full and oh, by the way, it’s going through your walk and closet space. And that was not going to be acceptable to me. <laugh>

Janet:

So, it was like, okay, how do we, how do we get it upstairs without running it, you know, through the second floor, because there’s no space up there that I’m willing to give up. And so, we talked about it. And so, we came up with the design where we’re actually going to do a tray ceiling feature on the first floor, and that’s going to run the ductwork all the way around to the second floor. And it’s going to be a design feature in the living room. And so, you can work it into your design, but you have to know and be thinking about it during that design planning about what the mechanicals are going to look like.

Jennifer-Lee:

It’s so smart because people forget about the guts of the home. Like everyone’s like so focused on the design. They’re like, I want this in my bathroom. I want this. And it’s like, what it a second <laugh> you need all the guts that make your house run. And sometimes it just doesn’t work for spacing. And I can’t wait to see your walk-in closets when it’s done, because that would be my favorite feature of the home.

Mike:

But it also illustrates the importance of the relationship between your design team and your building team as well. Because if one is not working with the other effectively, you get those calls, like why are there 12-inch ducts running through my walking closet, which thankfully didn’t have in this case?

Henri:

No, we didn’t. Thankfully it was actually one of the first things we really nailed down about the design. Like a lot has changed about our planning at the house. But once we, we placed our mechanical room, created like a chase from the mechanical room, all the way to the top floor and then figured out our pathways for all of the, the heat ducts. And like Rebecca, our designer came up with a great idea of doing this, like tray ceiling. Like it’s a classic, you see it in a lot of older homes. So, like that Cove ceiling with, um, it’s like fit faux beams and like a big like cool perimeter details. And it’s something that we all kind of like, and it fits the air of the house. And so, when it came, we had realized we had an opportunity, like we needed to get heat from one side of the house, to the other, without having it look ugly. And so, we kind of just really leaned into it instead of like kind, trying to like to eliminate all of the ducting instead, like, okay, well, how can we make the ducting a feature and have it like, look like, like it’s supposed to be here. And so, we’re build, we’re adding, we’re actually building a little bit extra of like a bulkhead or a drop in certain parts of the living room. That’s not going to really be used for anything. It’s just, but it’s, but because like 70% of the ceiling perimeter is all ducted, then that means that we can, like, it’s going to look like it’s supposed to be there and it’s going to look really nice.

Jennifer-Lee:

Most important question. Janet, does your husband at his own walking closet? <laugh>

Janet:

So, we have the walk closet fully designed and there’s like one wall that’s eight, five feet in one wall. That’s seven feet. So, you know, mine’s the longer one, but he gets five feet.

Jennifer-Lee:

Oh, he does get a space.

Henri:

He did get to make some choices along way.

Janet:

He’s actually been very involved in the design. He sort of took some of Rebecca’s things and redesigned them, but it’s fine.

Jennifer-Lee:

I just enjoyed this conversation so much. I’ve learned so much about character homes, heritage homes, uh, just passive homes in general, walk-in closets. It’s been great. <laugh> Thank you so much, Henri and Janet, and thank you for joining us on today’s episode of Measure Twice, Cut Once. Understanding the benefits of involving the professionals from the beginning and proper planning, including all parties required to renovate cannot be overstated. TV can make it seem so easy. And yet from today’s discussion, you can understand the clear benefits of transparent communication and realistic planning. Janet is going to get the home she has been dreaming of. And of course, that walking in closet.

Mike:

Absolutely. And knowing that a home renovation can include high performance building solutions to realize some of the amazing benefits they offer is incredibly valuable. Today we’ve learned so much, like it’s a good idea to have your builder or renovator review the possibilities before you buy your team will include many professionals, including you, the homeowner clear intentions, including your budget equals the ability to, to reach your goals. Permitting is not cut and dry. Talk to your renovator who can help you determine the choices. High performance homes equal better air quality efficiencies, quiet spaces, carefully plan for improved quality of living and wall assemblies and building envelope impact can be improved significantly and improve the livability in the home ICF minimum R28 is easy to achieve. You just have to talk to the professionals.

Janet:

I mean, I guess I would say that if you’re getting into a big project like this, you just need to be very you need to be honest with yourself about where your boundaries are, what you really want and what you’re not willing to compromise on. And you need to be able to communicate that with the professionals that you’re working with. And again, my philosophy has always been to hire the right person and let them do their job, but make sure that they have the information they need to do it, which is what’s important to you.

Jennifer-Lee:

And Henry, not sure how you’re going to top that answer, but what is your <laugh>? Um, one tip.

Henri:

I was just going to say like what she said, uh, no, it’s really one of the biggest tips I can give anybody about, um, about planning a project of any scale is to be, to be clear and serious about what the outcomes you want are. Everyone’s needs about for their home are going to be different. And it’s, there is no one size fit all for projects like these and that if you and your family need. If you and your family are clear on what you want and how you want and where you want to get there and what the, what the boundaries are and you can clearly communicate that to the team you’re working with, you’re going to have a successful project. It’s often times it’s as the builder or the designer, if you don’t know where you’re trying to get to, it can be really challenging to guide someone there and then it can be really frustrating for everyone involved.

Jennifer-Lee:

Thank you so much. Those are great tips. And I think we should get back in the studio with a follow up episode when the project is finished to see how the plan works out. So, I also want a tour, man.

Henri:

<laugh>

Mike:

Yeah. I want to see it as well. To our listeners. If you enjoy this podcast, please follow and like, and share with your friends, families, neighbors, colleagues, coworkers, and anyone else you think might benefit the conversations we’re having today. The more followers we have, the more people will find our podcasts and the excellent resources our guests are sharing.

Jennifer-Lee:

And for notes and links to everything mentioned on today’s episode, including pictures of this amazing project, go to www.havan.ca/measuretwicecutonce. Thank you for joining us.