Building a new Gehan home - Radiant Barrier question (Houston: sale, appliances)

[confused33]

Howdy ya'll!

I am in the very early stages of building a Gehan Home in the Austin area and I'm considering the radiant barrier product that they offer. It's "only" $990 to add it, but I'm paying out of pocket for the upgrades on the home, which makes me price conscious.

I'm curious if these new homes have enough insulation to offset the radiant barrier or if I'm a fool for even contemplating it. Anyone care to shed some light on the subject?

We are building a Laurel with the gameroom which adds a half story upstairs.

Here's another scenario that I'd like some input on!

We have a few free options that we can choose from. One of them is built in appliances vs a slide in cooktop/oven combo. We chose to have the built in oven (electric) and a gas cooktop at a $1500 value. I could swap that for the Radiant Barrier...would you?

The slide in stove/cooktop combo would be all gas which is attractive.

Thanks for your input!

Marcus

[Bo]

Radiant barrier is an easy thing to add later for about the same price. If Austin is anything like San Antonio, there are dozens of companies offering it. If you'd rather save the cash, leave it out.

[RooCeleste]

We built a Gehan in Walsh Trails in 2009 and it has radiant barrier - and I wouldn't live a day without it! Even in the horrid summer of 2009 and then again 2011, we never have had an electric bill over $200 - and we're in the 2600 sf Harvard with the whole back of the house facing west without any tree cover.

And we have the built-ins (don't mind the electric oven - would actually rather that than a gas oven) and I like them. They just look classier than the slide-in. I say keep them, and fork over the money for the radiant barrier with the build. It will only increase your payment about $5 per month and you'll probably recoup that with every month's electric bill!

What community are you building in?

[marthait]

we are also in the process of buying a gehan home, we own a house in Houston which also has radian barrier but we would never buy a house without it. we live in texas and it gets pretty hot here.

[confused33]

Thanks for the responses!

We were going to build in Elm Grove but ended up in Meadows at Buda where my brother in law lives. (This could be dangerous...LOL!)

I'm still not decided completely on what to do on the radiant barrier, but I think it is a good idea.

I know it's only "$5.00 a month" but add interest to that over the course of 10 years and weigh the benefit of a 5 - 10% savings on a $150 electric bill and you'll start seeing where I'm coming from. (Yes - I over analyze EVERYTHING!)

Keep the thoughts coming!

Marcus

[loves2read]

The radiant barrier that comes on the bottom side of roof decking is far superior product to what is sprayed on after the fact--
that does not offer the same R value, is more expensive, more difficult to apply, and can be MISapplied eventhough it seems pretty easy--
Better to go with the decking radiant barrier and just pay the difference--it is totally worth it

one of the major regrets of the current house we live in is that the owners for all the positive features they included when they designed/built this house is that they did not do radiant barrier decking--

and with the house we owned before this one--we reroofed from wood shingles to composite shingles and failed to take advantage of using radiant barrier decking when we made that switch--
even though our remodeler suggested we pay a little more money and do it
we through price of oil/gas would not be going up--and just used regular decking--
costs us every summer...

get the radiant barrier--and go with a gas cooktop and wall oven--those offer resale cache...

[Bo]

IMO, another reason not to add an easy aftermarket add-on like a radiant barrier during the build process is that it adds to the final cost of the home and increases the taxable valuation if you surrender your sale documents. (And before someone points out that we're not required to disclose sale price, I had to surrender my sale documents to get my assessed value down when the local assessment district guessed about 10 percent too high.) Adding it later won't affect the assessed value.

[loves2read]

Bo--appreciate the fair way you act as moderator but
people who deal with/sell/install the different energy barrier products--like the original decking barrier, the spray-on barrier, and the foil barrier that is stapled to rafters post-construction will all tell you that the decking is the way to go---if you have the choice

the other two products are after-market and just less efficient--

and it was the TOTAL construction value/land that was over appraised--NOT the radiant barrier decking--the value of which is no way 10% of the cost of a home's construction

depending on the size of a roof--the amount of increased cost in upgrading from plain decking to radiant barrier is probably less than $1K--
telling someone to "save" money on a lower appraisal by going with standard decking is just not taking a long view of the value of the product--
you can always replace one slide-in stove/cooktop with another w/o significant modifications to the kitchen--
but you CAN'T reroof a house to change regular decking to radiant barrier decking without a significant increase in cost ...
and the two other options are cost inefficient for the energy savings...

[bluescreen73]

I'm with loves2read on this one. We built our first house and had Centex install the radiant barrier on the roof decking and it was a godsend. Our second house was pre-owned and it didn't have a radiant barrier and it was hot as the blazes upstairs during the summer.

If you don't feel like financing the radiant barrier and you have the cash to do so, see if Gehan will let you pay out of pocket for it. You'll recoup the costs on your heating bill fairly quickly.

[CptnRn]

If your attic insulation is not already at R-38 or better, I'd put the extra money into more insulation before considering the radiant barrier. I'd probably go for an R-49 on a new home. And make sure an inspector checks it to verify you are getting your money's worth. Some insulators tend to skimp.