freegreen

With the current residential housing market crash and global credit crisis the business model for home builders is rapidly changing. This fact was solidified with today's announcement of a 6.3% drop in housing starts. No longer can builders put up "spec homes", or purchase multiple lots, building one show home, and hoping to sell similar houses on vacant land. In this new market, Home Builder's and Renovators must actively seek out and find clients with land or an existing home, as well as hard to come by capital.

To address this issue, FreeGreen.com, provider of free green house plans has launched its FreeGreen Builder Program. This new feature allows green home builders across the country to upload their own "Facebook" like profiles, portfolios of their work, and even "price out" FreeGreen's Free House Plans. FreeGreen users can then search for green home builders by zip code, state, or by the house plans that a builder has priced. This unique service allows builders to obtain targeted leads, and FreeGreen users to research and find reputable green home builders.

David Wax, CEO of FreeGreen Inc., explains, "The housing market is changing and builders need to change with it if they want to survive. The FreeGreen Builder Program gives our builders a new way to use the internet as a true sales channel." Wax continues, "Today, over 50% of FreeGreen's users own land or an existing home in need of renovation, and all of our users have the ability and desire to go green. We have received hundreds of e-mails asking for recommendations of green builders to build our plans, or renovate our user's homes. This program allows us to easily connect these potential clients with our growing network of green home builders and renovators."

FreeGreen has offered its existing builder users a free year subscription to this new service. Many of FreeGreen's builders have already loaded profiles prior to go-live and are ready to accept new leads. New builders will be able to take advantage of a free trial period which lasts until January 1st, 2009. After this date FreeGreen will begin charging $25 per month for this service.

As Wax states, "In the past builders have avoided using the internet as a true sales channel. This aversion is do to lack of understanding, technical hurdles, and a void of sites that could provide real leads. The FreeGreen Builder Program changes everything. We understand our builder users and had them help us create this program. It is built for builders, by builders and allows anyone with basic internet skills to have a great web presence and gain access to new leads."

Through 2009 FreeGreen will continue to add many social networking features commonly found on sites like Facebook and Twitter. Some of the initial enhancements will include allowing users to become "followers" of different builders on the site. Builders will then be able to post updates on their current projects creating a community of interested parties.

Wax concludes, "Our site and new Builder Program is a great way for builders to get new customers and learn about green building in a non-intrusive, certification neutral, free environment. To date we have had over 9,000 free house plans downloaded. Each of these downloads represents an opportunity for our builder community to connect with users and build the home of their dreams."

About FreeGreen Inc.: FreeGreen was co-founded by five principals as a spin-off from their first startup, Zero Energy Design (a leading high-end custom green home architecture firm). FreeGreen launched its site on April 1st, 2008, and is the only company in the world giving away free house plans. FreeGreen continues to grow its offerings which now include house plans, customization services, and a builder community.

FreeGreen.com Launches—Offers Free Green Home Plans to Consumers, a New Advertising Medium to the Home Products Industry and an Open source Platform for Designers

Boston, MA, (PRWeb) June 12, 2008 --Consumers who once believed “green” to be a status reserved for those in the upper echelon of the housing market can now get green home plans for free.

David Wax, Ben Uyeda and the Freegreen team are upending the traditional stock house plan business model. They are bringing their green plans to the masses by charging exactly what most builders and clients are willing to pay for house designs: nothing.

In the home design industry, good design is hard to come by. The majority of the 200 web sites offers the usual colonial and ranch style designs, provide consumers with basic construction documents and charge $750 - $2,000 dollars per plan.

FreeGreen wants to change this. They offer modern green designs, detailed construction documents, 3D computer generated renderings, and a slew of other features.

To generate revenue, FreeGreen will charge green product vendors, retailers, and other home building firms a slotting/performance fee for specifying their products and services in the home plans.

In the building of a green home, the selection of green materials and efficient mechanical systems is of equal importance—not only for the design, but to achieve the desired performance of the home and applicable green certifications.

David Wax, CEO of FreeGreen Inc., explains that, “Selecting these products can be an overwhelming task and an experienced green architect is not an option for most consumers.”

FreeGreen allows builders and homeowners to select and customize home plans in a well organized online experience. Based upon user selections, a large-format PDF of buildable architectural documents, product lists, and local contractors is compiled and provided free for download.

Chief Architectural Officer, Ben Uyeda says, “We encourage users to submit feedback on the FreeGreen Blog and even submit design ideas. Our team is working towards providing an open source platform that will allow the site’s online catalogue to grow exponentially.”

TreeHugger writer Lloyd Alter is excited about the new site.

Architects can't make money doing one-off houses and most people aren't willing to pay for it, or don't even value it. The traditional model is broken, so why not market architecture like software or blogs and give it away, making money from the ads? Finally there is a model where somebody "looks forward to helping you [architects and designers] get the exposure and revenue you deserve."

There are three designs currently available for download in modern and traditional styles. Uyeda is promising at least one new plan month.

FreeGreen’s initial launch produced 1,500 registered users and 2,000 free house plan downloads. Its instant success stemmed from the viral nature in which word of the company and its free and high quality plans spread through the blogosphere on sites such as Inhabitat, Treehugger and SpringWise.

About FreeGreen Inc.

FreeGreen was co-founded by five principals as a spin-off from their first startup, Zero Energy Design (a leading high-end custom green home architecture firm). FreeGreen launched its site on April 1st, 2008. In addition to its free stock plans, FreeGreen also offers design customization and consultation.

At FreeGreen we hope to encourage progressive building practices by making green home designs free for everyone.