Sun, 22 Nov 2009 08:15:19 PST http://www.allbusiness.com/construction/4057979-1.html AllBusiness.com - The Contractor's Business Digest en-us Copyright 1999-2009 AllBusiness.com All Rights Reserved. http://www.allbusiness.com/asset/image/general_site_image/3472344.gif http://www.allbusiness.com/construction/4057979-1.html 46 144 http://www.allbusiness.com/economy-economic-indicators/economic-indicators/11844554-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/economy-economic-indicators/economic-indicators/11844554-1.html Recently, I spent time with clients discussing the best ways to improve the energy efficiency and comfort of their home. Like many consumers, they had a number of contractors provide them with suggestions for each system. What they had found was that a heating contractor could give them a quote on a heating system, but the contractor had no clue about the other systems of the house. Thu, 26 Mar 2009 12:30:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/real-estate/real-estate-sector-performance-housing-market/11820862-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/real-estate/real-estate-sector-performance-housing-market/11820862-1.html The jump in housing sales of 5.6% in February shows continuing improvement in the overall housing market. This data should come as no surprise as we have had improving sales numbers and a reduction in housing inventories since October 2008. The numerous government actions to inject capital into the credit system and tremendous incentives from government should help increase house sales further. Tue, 24 Mar 2009 10:30:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/company-activities-management/company-structures/11816369-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/company-activities-management/company-structures/11816369-1.html The public backlash against the actions of some banks is palpable. People are outraged at the executive bonuses paid by AIG, Bank of America/Merrill Lynch and Fannie Mae. These companies are bankrupt save for the hundreds of billions of taxpayer money that is being poured into them. How can companies pay performance bonuses to the very people who ran their companies and our economy into the ground? Thu, 19 Mar 2009 01:55:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/real-estate/real-estate-sector-performance-housing-market/11814005-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/real-estate/real-estate-sector-performance-housing-market/11814005-1.html The past few months have seen real estate sales show a noticeable improvement with a stabilizing market and shrinking inventories. Anecdotally, there seems to be quite a few buyers out there, who are qualified and willing to make the investment. Tue, 17 Mar 2009 09:55:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/banking-finance/banking-finance-overview/11808996-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/banking-finance/banking-finance-overview/11808996-1.html We’ve all heard the phrase that companies such as Citigroup, AIG, Bank of America, GE and GM are too big to fail. These companies’ reach extends into many businesses and if they fail the system would come to a screeching halt. Wed, 11 Mar 2009 11:35:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/banking-finance/financial-markets-investing-securities/11802167-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/banking-finance/financial-markets-investing-securities/11802167-1.html As I watch the stock market averages gyrate up and down, I wonder how relevant these markets really are within our daily lives. After all, no matter if the stock market goes up or down, we still go to work, feed the kids and deal with the mundane issues of our lives. Most of us are invested in long term retirement and savings accounts; we need to stop looking at the daily market gyrations, let the money managers do what we’ve hired then to do and get on with our lives. Thu, 05 Mar 2009 12:05:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/economy-economic-indicators/economic-news/11798475-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/economy-economic-indicators/economic-news/11798475-1.html It seems that the drumbeat of bad news will never end, with one poor economic report after another. It is hard to feel optimistic when all we hear are stories about the devastated real estate market, stock market averages at decade lows and unemployment rising. It’s enough to make you wonder if we will ever get out of this hole and back to a healthy economy. Tue, 03 Mar 2009 10:50:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/science-technology/earth-atmospheric-science/11790834-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/science-technology/earth-atmospheric-science/11790834-1.html The past few articles addressed how the use of green building techniques such as renewable sources for energy, energy efficient appliances and energy saving building measures can improve your bottom line as well as help our world to be cleaner and healthier. Tue, 24 Feb 2009 10:45:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/energy-utilities/utilities-industry-electric-power-power/11784494-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/energy-utilities/utilities-industry-electric-power-power/11784494-1.html For much of our industrial history power generation was provided by a mammoth, centrally located, power plant dependent upon a massive grid distribution system. Time and experience has proven that the central office approach to power generation is inefficient, costly and can be terribly unreliable. The grid system has many weak links from the enormous cost to build, operate and maintain these grids to the potential for wide spread loss of power do to a faulty transformer. We all remember the ... Tue, 17 Feb 2009 10:25:00 GMT http://www.allbusiness.com/energy-utilities/oil-gas-industry-oil-processing/11777114-1.html http://www.allbusiness.com/energy-utilities/oil-gas-industry-oil-processing/11777114-1.html In this segment, I thought I would look at the major appliances for the home. I want to address the appliances that consume the most energy such as the refrigerator, heating/cooling system and hot water heater. Although I will only cover the major energy consuming appliances there are many more opportunities to buy energy efficient appliances for use in our homes and buildings. Tue, 10 Feb 2009 12:25:00 GMT