What Actually Makes A Home Healthy — And It's Not What Instagram Is Telling You

A new build can look spotless and still be a chemical soup. We get real about building biology, indoor air quality, mould risk, and the uncomfortable truth that “low odour” does not mean low toxicity. If you’ve ever walked into a freshly finished home and felt headachy, wired, or just off, this chat explains what might be happening and what builders and owners can do about it.

Brett Fowler joins me to unpack what we’re learning as we chase homes that are genuinely healthy and durable, not just shiny. We talk fit-for-purpose building in Australian climates, why Instagram details need context, and why energy efficiency star ratings can’t be the only yardstick. Then we go deeper into practical building science: sensors and as-built data, moisture testing before lining, timber quality and sap content, and design moves that handle bulk water properly through roof pitch, smart drainage and better wet area thinking.

We also cover how tighter homes change HVAC design, especially in Queensland humidity, where sizing, run time and dehumidification can make or break comfort. Finally, we zoom out to the bigger picture: smaller homes, less waste, fewer glues and coatings where possible, and building in ways that get better with age instead of falling apart behind perfect finishes.

If you’re a builder, designer, or homeowner who wants better outcomes, hit subscribe, share this with someone in the industry, and leave a review so more people can find the conversations that push building forward. What part of your home worries you most: moisture, air quality, or materials?

Transcript

New Homes Can Hide Toxins

SPEAKER_01 0:00

As I've been m learning more about building biology, that a lot of people assume that their brand new home is really healthy for them, and that's just a uh assumption. And we know lots of people now that have have really bad environmental illnesses.

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Research and stuff that I'm doing is all these chemical companies, they're still the same bad chemicals, but they've taken the smell out of it. So we're if they're fooling us because we all think now, because there's no smell, it's not harmful.

SPEAKER_01 0:22

You could live fully self-sufficient and all organic food and live in a house that's you know you sleep overnight and you're breathing in, you know, particle matters and and chemicals, and you know, it's worth it's worse. Like it it really needs it's something that we don't put enough emphasis on, is our own where we spend so much time and steel does not absorb any moisture at all.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

Whereas like even a stud timber frame will absorb a certain amount of moisture and maintain and then ever release it again. Yeah, being open-minded enough to understand that it's there's no one size fits all, none of us know everything. And if you see something on Instagram, understand that there's more context behind it. Like go and do your homework, make sure that it's suitable for your area, or reach out to the person that's done the post and ask more questions because education's a key. As

Sponsor Messages

SPEAKER_00 1:09

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Why Brett Is Back

SPEAKER_00 3:25

guys, welcome back to another episode of Level Up. We're back in the studio this afternoon for another cracking episode. Um look, if I look tired, I am. I didn't sleep after that disgusting game of football last night, but um Queensland literally threw that game three away. But anyway, a few refereeing decisions there, could have gone a different way. But um look, today's gonna be an absolutely cracking podcast. Um, the guest I've got on for you today has been on the podcast before, uh, but previously he was with us as Psalter Ash Holmes, but he's now a member of our DPS Constructions building business, and he's actually helping me out with some stuff with Live Life Build as well. So a big warm welcome to Brett Fowler. Hello, buddy. Cheers, mate, good. Been uh been on the on the site today, getting things sorted out. It is, we've started a new job, it's exciting. Yeah, getting to put some of these things we've been working on into practice. The reason I wanted to get Brett on today, so Brett and I'm working on something. So part of Brett's role is I guess helping me do a lot of research and I guess just collaboration, bouncing ideas backwards and forwards, and really trying to develop the way like our best practices, how we build homes, and a big part of that is more durable, more healthy homes. That's really why we're having this chat today, because we've um we've both been learning a lot, and I my thing is that I don't know everything. I'm quite happy to put my hand up and be proven wrong, or um, in fact, I think that's how we'll the best way to learn. Like, we need to challenge each other and share ideas and pull people up on things that might could possibly be done differently. Or but yeah, Brett and I have been putting a lot of time and effort into learning more about building materials, about timber, healthy homes.

SPEAKER_01 4:57

Like it's been a lot of deep diving into every aspect of it to be honest. Yeah, the more we the more we learn, the more questions you have, and the more ways you sort of think about how we can apply it in the scenarios that we're that we're trying to provide solutions for, I suppose. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

I think like for me, I feel like in this like in the industry at the moment, like obviously social media's got a massive influence on um on things, and obviously there's a lot of a huge amount of younger people in the industry out there now that are very that are all over socials, which is fine. I I think it's great. Like the more people sharing the the better. We're all going to learn from that. But when it comes to actually specialist in like I guess better building practices, healthy homes, all these things, I feel like people get like there's people that are just they're really focused on one, two, or three elements of it. And I can't I'm really struggling to find too many people that are looking at it as a holistic type of approach. Like when especially when you come like talking

Healthy Homes Need Context

SPEAKER_00 6:00

healthy home, like basically right from how the materials are sourced, where they come from, transport, um, how they get to site, how they're managed on site, like how they how they get put together, how they affect the the final outcome, the off-gassing, how they I guess protect or create like um environments for the environments for the for the people that live in the building, and then on top of that, like the act like the team, like making sure it's a healthy environment for the actual whole team, the consultants, the homeowner, the builder.

SPEAKER_03 6:30

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 6:30

That's a massive picture. Like, and then and then once it's handed over, like all the the maintenance and the ongoing, I guess, just condition of the building.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

Yeah, how to operate a building, I think, is is a big um thing that we need to look into more and educate people on.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

Yeah, like I'm not even sure where to where to start the conversation because there's just so many parts of it to um talk about.

SPEAKER_01 6:50

I think the way I keep everything we we learn, everything we come across and be sort of put try to take that bigger picture approach, it keeps coming back to understand if something's fit for purpose in that scenario. I think everything has to be has to be given context. No decision in building, no matter how small or big. I don't think it's never going to work across our whole Australia our country in Australia or the world. It needs to be really definitely client-specific, but just even just fit for purpose, I think that's the best way to do it.

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Even on the same even in the same business. Yeah. Even like we build well like we've just finished two jobs right near the ocean, and then we've got other jobs out in the country. Exactly. Yeah, that's a completely different, it needs a different approach. Yeah. And so you've really got to um I think for me that's why I'm so passionate about just expanding my knowledge, because what we do on one job today could be completely different next week on another project in a different location.

SPEAKER_01 7:47

Or completely detrimental to that project too, if we don't understand the the fundamentals behind why we're building a certain way.

SPEAKER_00 7:55

Yeah. So you've really got to have a good overview of everything and and and and basically assess every single project in that preliminary process to what's going to work, what's not, what do we need to find out more about?

SPEAKER_01 8:08

Like um, it's such a a benefit for builders who are involved in the PAC process or a preliminary process, because if you're not if you're not, I think the builders are the ones that we need to get the knowledge into. Um they're the ones that bridge across so many different areas of our industry. But if a builder doesn't understand what they're building and why they're building things a certain way, but they're given a design, like someone at some stage is making really important decisions about how that house is going to be built and how it's going to perform.

SPEAKER_03 8:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:35

But the builder's going to be the one responsible for it. So the builder needs to be the one that understands it and can say, look, this isn't applicable in this situation, or there's a better way of doing this. And if we're not involved really early in design, it you you miss that opportunity and it's it's quite risky.

SPEAKER_00 8:52

And it's like the the builder, like I feel it's really dangerous for builders that don't have a preliminary process and that just sit back and get everything given to them once the client and the architect or design has just finalised everything. All the decisions are made then.

SPEAKER_01 9:09

Yeah, largely the important ones, the fundamental ones of how the that building is going to be constructed, they're locked in.

SPEAKER_00 9:15

Yeah, like it's it has to be collaboration. And um like I know myself, like even in the last couple of jobs, like the you mentioned before, we've just started a new job, like literally the job we've just broken ground in the last few days. Like that project's been um I think just over three years in planning. But a really great client, like a the client was probably more involved than normal because he he wanted to understand all the energy efficiencies and how different windows affected the ratings and different materials changed the stars, star rating, and all those types of things. Like in they had a goal that they wanted to get to, that they they really wanted to um have that seven star as a as a minimum, and like as it's turned out, we've on paper we've got a 7.9. Yeah. But he was so like him and I worked so closely, and and Camille in the office, like um like testing things, like Roto. Well, what if we'd use a Louver window or a double hung window? How does how does it affect? And yes, it cost him more money, like there was a lot more backwards and forwards with consultants, yeah. But like it was down to the nitty-gritty where like, Roto, well, this change affects like point one of a star rating, and this is another point one.

SPEAKER_01 10:29

And that's something we spoke about a lot, isn't it? Um, understanding the value levers, like yeah, energy efficiency has all somehow become a real proxy for a well-built home. And and I'm not on I do understand the importance of it, but it it it certainly shouldn't be the main factor, the driving factor around a lot of decisions. But they do come hand it does come hand in hand with a lot of other good practices. But and look, it is something that's immeasurable. Some things are really hard to measure, and by having that a metric around it, we can it gives us some capacity to say like you know, to know what levers we're pulling to give what value. But it's something that our industry really lacks, I think, is a is an understanding or a framework around that.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

I think it's per like personally, I think it's horrible, like it's really bad how it works. Like, because you sort of you rob Peter to pay Paul. Like you want to you you put a one kilowatt solar system on, or if you put a f uh fan on your outdoor alfresco, or you you put under like there's just all these things that are like there's no sort of set standard, and it sort of almost comes down to like aesthetics, what's what looks good. I know on this job I'm talking about at the moment, like we we did several energy tests um with different claddings to see how that affected things, and then even um different colour on those materials and how that affected things, but and and that was fine, like that that was all good, and it was very interesting to see what happened, but then yeah, like then we've put some under slab insulation in it, like under the concrete, to substitute because we couldn't get the rating on the exposed timber subfloor. Whereas personally, I would have preferred to do the normal conventional footings and slab that we normally do and put a safet lining under the subfloor and and completely enclosed it. Like so I don't yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 12:25

Without going through that process, and it's a slow process, no wonder it took three years because if you're going through and you're you're going through a design and you're testing and modelling that, you're pricing that because we need that, they need that's the input, like we need to know what that's gonna cost, and then you're tweaking it and you're just going through rounds and rounds of that until we find something that's what the clients are happy with, what means their budget. Yeah, it's it's a real it's a hard process, and but I I I don't really know that yet. It's I know we've been working on a few things that uh around this, but I haven't really got a a better solution for it at the moment because it is so climate-specific, pro um property specific, location specific. Yeah, then it's a and it's got to suit a certain aesthetic of the client likes. There's a lot of parameters around it that we've got to make work, and it's a very it is complicated, and I think um it's a it's a it's a massive bonus that that the owner of this home is on the same page in that sense, because if it's someone that didn't value this this side this way of building at all, that pack process would have fitted out and it wouldn't have gone ahead.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

I

Data Beats Instagram Advice

SPEAKER_00 13:24

guess just just something to get out, I guess, before we get too deep into this podcast as well, and this applies to everything I put on my socials. Like I'm I'm very aware that what I put on my socials and what I talk about on this podcast is not suitable for every single building. Like I we only posted a post um the last day or two about um vented saffit sheets, and I know it's had 20 odd thousand views in 12 hours or 24 hours or something, but a lot of comments and a lot of people saying, Oh, you can't do that like near the ocean, and like that doesn't work, and you shouldn't be doing that. But with what we've just been talking about, like it's I'm I'm more putting the stuff I put out there to show people how we do things and and why we've done them on that job. I'm not necessarily saying that's how you should do it on every single job. Um, and I think that's something that we all need to be very aware of. Like it's and and I feel like that's something that is a little bit maybe uh misinterpreted with social media because people are putting all this stuff out there without context. Without context. Um and I don't know if that means we all need to have disclaimers on every post we do, but I don't think it would hurt just to start it with a comment.

SPEAKER_01 14:33

You know, so this is something that I worry about a lot, and I speak to a lot of young builders here in Brisbane about it because around this sort of high performance and passive house has gathered a lot of uh momentum, it it's it's all being done in a colder climate down south, Tazie, Victoria, norther uh southern New South Wales. But but these young guys are seeing it and just thinking that's applicable wherever. And it really worries me that they're gonna get in trouble with the other. Well, not even young guys. Well, I shouldn't say young, yeah, any builder. And it's just people at a different stage of their journey of level of understanding. Like and we all started out somewhere at the same place, to be honest. So until we um I think it's really important to understand why what the problems we're trying to solve in each climate, or the problems we're trying to mitigate and and design for, it just has to be relevant to the site. Yeah. And and that can change from the ocean to say Mount Tambourine. Like that's completely different.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

It can literally change within like you look at the sunshine case, like from the from the water's edge to like say Millennium, Montville, like the hills, like you're talking literally 20 or 30 in it as a crow flies, like a straight line, or maybe 30 or 40 kilometres, yeah. And you've got two completely different environments.

SPEAKER_01 15:42

Yeah, massive different different amount of rainfall, like that's a that's a big one that that the the higher elevated um places deal with, which which in our in our climate brings with it humidity. And yeah, it is, it's it's without understanding the what we're what we're designing and why we're trying to design a certain way. Yeah, I think we're uh builders are open themselves up to a lot of a lot of issues now that uh we happen to insulate to the levels we are and we're naturally building tighter.

SPEAKER_00 16:08

It's very different. Um like obviously when it comes to building, and so let's I guess say talk about all the trades. Like there's certain things with plumbing, electrical, concreting, carpentry, like metal roofing, like there's certain things that don't change. Like if you're a good tradesman or a craftsman, there's a minimum sort of standard that you can apply to any anywhere, it doesn't really matter.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 16:30

But when it comes to like airtightness and thermal bridging the envelope, really, and ventilation and yeah, the envelope, it is so job and location specific. Like it's yeah, you can't apply it. It's there's there's absolutely no one size fits all.

SPEAKER_01 16:49

No, no, and look, and there is a lot of modelling around, but I'm really liking we speak to a few people who have a lot of sensors in their the homes that they're building, I think that's really the way to the the way forward with technologies that come so far now, and it's it's quite cheap to do to get as built like that that's just kind of confirming the modelling. Yeah, or it might not confirm it, yeah. That that's the stuff we need to know. Yeah, because it is a model, and it um that model is going to have a certain set of parameters that it's working off. And if that's not accurate or not, accurate's the right word, but if that's not um the right set of metrics for that site, um yeah, how much can you trust it? Yeah, and we really need as built con as built data.

SPEAKER_00 17:27

I think that's the most important thing. Um, you and I both um spent some time talking to Anthony from Outload, like his knowledge is is fantastic, but with what he's done on those few jobs, and I'm I won't give too much away, that's that he's gonna do something with the information he's gathered, but like that is the only way we will actually know if what we're doing is correct. Yeah. By putting sensors in the wall cavities, the roof cavities, outside a wall, inside of walls, like it like we have to be measuring air movement, condensation, moisture, um like just everything. Like, because if we don't know what it's actually doing and we're just making assumptions, um, and that might lead us on to the something else I want to talk to you about. Like, I feel like the whole building industry, um, you and I had a brief conversation about this earlier today. Like, I um uh Paula Baker Laporte is um getting more involved with some of the stuff we're doing, um, and I was having some conversations with her, and she sort of highlighted that there is no one size fits all, like it's all like we're talking about, it's all gonna um change depending on where it's built and how it's built and all those types of things. But we've really got to understand everything across the board because otherwise like I guess to go back a little bit, so what what's happened over time is like in the last I don't know, probably a hundred years, I said well since industrial revolution, I guess, building has changed so quickly. Like almost like on a daily basis, we have new materials coming on the market, um, and then within those new materials are new glues, solvents, synthetics, like there's chemicals, like there's so much involved, and we're supposed to know how they perform and how they work and what they're gonna do for us. But like prior to that, building methods were the same for hundreds of years, and they were proven. Tried and tested, yeah. Tried and tested. Like you like people kept, it was repetitive, people kept doing it because it worked. And now we are constantly, I feel like we're chasing our tail, and then I'm not sure about other um areas of the world, but like Australia, I feel like so many changes they continually well that these days, like it feels like every year or two they're bringing changes into the building code. They're just basically putting a band aid on something that hasn't really been.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

They're always a response to a poor decision somewhere earlier, I find like everything we're doing at some stage. When we once once we went to lightweight framing, that I reckon that was the real uh start of start of all this. Because up until then we built with natural products, you know, stone, and and all these natural products were sourced in the areas where that home was built. So they were they grew it, they were either in the ground in that climate, the trees grew in that climate, the materials were fit for that climate. And now we get timber from all around the world, we get very quickly grown timber, but for somehow for some reason we've decided to build like like with like toothpicks.

SPEAKER_00 20:33

And well, everything's driven by dollars. Like at the end of the day, it's all everything's driven by dollars.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

Supply chain and dollars, yeah. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 20:40

Everyone's trying to use minimal material, build as quickly as they possibly can, and at the end of the day, that's just created a whole unhealthy environment.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

It's such a short-sighted way of thinking, isn't it? It's it's we're building so that we have a house tomorrow and it's gonna last 20 years, opposed to building a house that lasts a couple hundred years. It might take a bit longer, but it's gonna go through that family in generations. Yeah, it it it's sped up really quick. We want it's just it's it's um society these days, we want everything instantly. And we can, and and that that's the problem. We can get so many things instantly, like you order something today, it'll be at your door tomorrow. Like you don't have to it's just something that's it's a lot of in um generations that have that to to go sort of through it a lot of change to get to where we are today, and that's a that's over my above my pay grade. But yeah, from a building point of view, we've really gone away from things that our ancestors knew worked.

SPEAKER_00 21:33

Yeah, and you're 100% correct, like it's it is a lifestyle.

Smaller Homes Better Lives

SPEAKER_00 21:37

Like, um I guess to give some more context about why I'm I'm so passionate about this, and it's good to hear why you're um passionate about it, Brett. But like I just I I there was definitely things on this podcast that I sound like a broken record, but look, I was definitely on a journey where I just thought bigger was better, like trying to build a a big business and a big team and have a big house, and like it number One, it it burns you out. Um, it creates a lot of stress, a lot of anxiety. Well, it did back in the day. But like I've obviously worked through that, I've I've built multiple successful businesses, but I just I really like it it actually really upsets me that we're living in a world now where everyone lives beyond their means. It's such a a fast-paced world, like there's no family time anymore. Like people like both parents are working, or both like if it's a couple, both people are working. Like you spend so much time working to pay for what you want that you don't actually get to enjoy it. You um we've ended up with houses that are far, far bigger than what we need, like just so we can all have a fucking separate space to sit in. We're we're eating unhealthy food, we're not sitting down for a family dinner anymore, there's we're we're losing connection with each other. Um and then on top of that, you've just got all the costs of everything. Like, obviously, to have bigger everything and to live the lives we're living, it's it's just costing more and more, which is obviously leaving leading to why everyone's got to keep working and there's no time. And it's just it's just this vicious cycle that um personally I believe we we we all need to sort of slow down a bit and take a step back. And I guess part of my what probably one of the biggest things that pisses me off with this is I feel like so much of it is driven by real estate and then and the banks. Yep. Like real estate, what real estate sees value in is not is completely opposite to what we should be doing. Like they see value in a a big house, five bedrooms, three bathrooms, three garages, like multiple multiple living rooms.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

We've just gone through this with selling our own house. Yeah. But so much of the comments were it's it doesn't have a second living space, doesn't have five bedrooms, um, yeah, that that doesn't have multiple bathrooms. What does it has has an on-speed? So our house is 132 square metres inside, four bedrooms, or it's three and a and we use a study, and it's got a big thing. It's got a huge decks all around it, like it's a balcony on three sides. It's plenty of house. We're the only the two of us, we don't have kids, but um we only we don't use two bedrooms and one bathroom unless someone comes to stay. So we we shut them off so we don't have to heat and cool them and clean them, and that's like yeah, we've we've got to a stage where we're we're building for everyone else. And like we've all built massive houses. I remember the biggest one, well, a house we built in Manley years ago, with that every that was five bedrooms in every one of our non-suite. And the reason for it was because they have a family from England that come out once a year.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

Yeah, so you're spending all that money, all that energy, all that time to cater for three or four weeks a year.

SPEAKER_01 24:42

Yeah, and then I think that's this um cycle thing, it's this once we build decide to build or decide we want something that size, we're committed to it. It's that it's an easy easy to make a decision, it's easy, probably easy to get financed for certain things quite quick. But that's a long-term commitment, and then get tired up. And I think that's there's not enough thought given to that these days. What we're doing at the moment by selling out is it's exactly the opposite, we're we're downsizing, we're gonna build exactly what we just what we need, and we're gonna use it as an opportunity to build the best way that everything that we've learned to date, try and put that into practice and and show people that you can build a really good home for it's it's not gonna be a no-expensive spared home, it's gonna be the whole point of building it is for us to live a less a lifestyle where we're not tied to earning a certain amount of money, or when that our our principal place of residence isn't.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

So, and then we can when we want to wind down, we can, or yeah, when we're gonna be able to do it Well you still earn you can still if you want to still earn the money, earn the money, but you use it for holidays or or experiences, like I think just not having to take all the pressure off.

SPEAKER_01 25:42

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:43

Yeah. Yeah, I I really feel for people like we've worked through, we've done the hard yards, we've worked through it now. Like we we get the time with the kids and like we we a lot of people say we're busy, but we're productive, like we're living a life we want to live. But I really feel for people that are are in that situation where they're just following what the world's doing. Status quo. The status quo, and they're they're in a position where they've they've got the big house, they've got the two new cars, they've got the boat, they've got the caravan, they've got and so they're they're working full-time just to pay for that lifestyle.

SPEAKER_01 26:17

Yeah, I have a real gripe with um people talking about this cost of living um issue. And because you I I just feel you can't if if you've got a car, uh like I know no matter what that um what you have, but and and you can earn and and good on you to have whatever you want. But uh certain people you'll you'll know that'll have they'll be in a lot of debt and but they'll buy a new car and still in the second breath whinge about the cost of living. And I just my eye glaze over and that's it on the next conversation after that because I really think it's it's it's not a cost of living, it's a cost of want. It's what we want, not what we need, and if we pair it right back to what we need as close as we can, um the flexibility in your lifestyle is completely it opens everything up.

SPEAKER_00 27:02

It's shocking, mate. And look, I I don't want to get off track talking about costs and things, I want to focus on healthy homes and better building and stuff, but um I uh at at a do recently I got told I was tight because I I don't spend money, like I don't buy coffees and shit. And like this young fella was like, What's wrong with you? Like just I was like, mate, I don't I don't need that shit. Like, but how that conversation started was I was telling in the in the group that we were in, I was saying, like, it's it's ridiculous now. Like I got fuel the other morning and like I was in line to get fuel, and like the five people in front of me, like one's got two icebreaks and three hot dolls, the other one's got three cans of V, and like 30 bucks worth just walking out the door. Yeah, but and look, not trying to like I'm I don't want to offend anybody, but like you could tell just by like looking at them, like they weren't healthy, they were just filling their like eating shit, probably not sleeping well. Definitely, I would guarantee, concerned about the cost of living, but yeah, they stand in line to fill their car with fuel and adding 20, 30, 40 dollars onto that bill just by eating shit. Yeah, and um I said to these people, I was like, Oh, I don't need any of that shit, like I'm carrying my water bottle everywhere. And that's when this young fella said to me, Look, you're too tight, like it's not that I'm tight, like I I I enjoy my water, like I don't need to drink any of that other shit. But um, to bring it back to building, um if you're one of those people, you need to stop buying all that shit. But um the like and so I guess that that conversation probably does tie in with what we're talking about because it's it's a holistic thing, isn't it? Like having a healthy building isn't just about the building, it is completely about your your entire lifestyle. But I've definitely learned, and look, this house that we live in at the moment, it's definitely not our our ideal home, but it's not going to be our forever home. We know that now, like it was six years ago and we bought it, but man, like we've we've learned a lot in the last six years, and now we're putting all that on paper, and like we will our next home will be one that is I I would suspect it'll be under 120, 130 square meters. It'll take minimal maintenance, it'll take it'll use minimal energy, it'll feel fantastic. Um, and if we want to lock it up and go traveling for three months, we'll we'll we'll do that. And so yeah, I I feel I definitely feel there's a shift coming. Um, like we're seeing it out around Tennerfield where we um bought that property. There's just like people as soon as land comes on the market, it's gone. Like there is such a shift for people to get out of the rat race and just take an easier approach on life.

SPEAKER_01 29:49

Yeah, we're trying to find we we are on some acreage now, but we want to sell that and buy a blank a block where we can build, and actually all that's just gone unconditional yesterday, too. So we're it's all happening. Party time, but um, yeah, yeah, once we finish building. But um that's um that finding that property was so hard, so hard. And we've gone out a bit further, which doesn't bother me. I'd I'd live further away from the city the better, but it's for practicalities and for today's work and things like that. We it's it's a good distance, it's far enough out where we feel like we're away from everything. But that yeah, that took months to find. And it we it only that through you know circles that we've been sort of through the real estate agent and a few other people that this house block wasn't on the market, um, and to secure it was just through hard work and just asking questions, and and we feel we really feel really privileged to have bought it and to be able to build now in a way that is just gonna be to suit us. And and look, it's the same thing with the current sort of concept we're working on at the moment, it's 115 square metres and with an attic space and like a loft space up the top. But um, same thing, it'll be designed specifically for its environment, specifically for what how we live, and that will be it.

SPEAKER_00 30:58

Yeah. Look, I've been I've been banging on about this for years. Like, I think size the whole size thing, like Australia's currently building the biggest house in the world. Um I don't know why we've got to that. Like it's just like a key-up with a giant thing. Like I said before, the real estate, and then once the real estate says something, that's what the bank values, and so I heard that the other day that we're averaging about I think it's over 80 square metres per person.

SPEAKER_01 31:22

So you put that into a five person, five-person household, and that's a massive house. And a lot of the countries around the world are sort of under 40, yeah. Yeah, I think America, New Zealand, Australia, we Canada, we're sort of leading, which is that's so much space. Well, it's it's just it's ludicrous, mate.

SPEAKER_00 31:38

And then you just brought up a good point then, like um you're happy to travel a little bit. Like

Space Sunlight And Subdivision Risks

SPEAKER_00 31:43

we're I we're the Camille and I are the same, like we're more than happy to travel a little bit further. Um, and we've even got boys at work with us that trap like a lot of half, I would say half our team travel at least an hour every each way to work every day. And look, I I I get it, sitting in traffic every day is it does wear you out and things, but I think it only wears you out if you're a I don't know the word for it, I'm gonna offend some people, but like I guess if you're a person that just sits in their car and listens to the radio, that's a shit time. Yeah, but especially all the news, that's even worse. Yeah, but the way I look at it is you're using that time to listen to podcasts, audible books, like um you're using that for growth. But what I was getting at with that conversation is it's convenience. Like convenience is killing us. Like, people don't want to have that drive. So for convenience, they're living in these housing estates where you can put your hand out the window and touch the house next door and you can hear your neighbour's TV. And like that's a whole other part of the conversation.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

Like a healthy home is is one thing, but having it on a block of land where you've got enough space to have trees and grass and makes them really hard to design an optimally for their for their site too when they're really tight together. And you get shading issues and and things like that. And a lot of these subdivisions, they'll just be a lot of houses stacked up in the same direction, you know, one over the back fence and the other one facing the complete opposite direction and built exactly the same. So that house can form is a white for complete 180 from how it could perform. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:12

And but then generally like you look at those homes, and generally they're well, if not every wall, but at least three elevations of the home, they're they're all dirty and dark and go and mouldy because there's no air movement and there's no natural sunlight and ghosting, yeah. It's just terrible.

SPEAKER_01 33:28

Yeah, it's um it is a it's a hard thing because it it's obviously um Temp look for TM planning-wise and and making most efficient use of our infrastructure, it does make sense to live a little bit more condensed, but uh natural, I just don't think we are natural natural beans, we're not meant to be cooped up like that, and um it has a massive flow-on effect.

SPEAKER_00 33:47

My my dream I I would love to see in my lifetime that like I I'm not a fan of the small sites, like I grew up on um like 800,000, 1200 square metre blocks, and that was like and I think the average houses back when I was growing up were only 140, 180 square metres, so you you had a big yard. Like you could you could have the family over for a barbecue, you could play cricket in your backyard, you could kick a ball around. We grew up outside too.

SPEAKER_01 34:15

We weren't allowed inside until it was dark. Yeah, you get outside. If you were inside through the day, you hey mum of you get out there and do something constructive.

SPEAKER_00 34:23

And the whole house was open, like everything was open. But um my goal before I pass away would be to try and get people to understand like it's it's okay to have a smaller building, and even though our block size are reducing to 400, now now we're seeing some like 280, 300, but why not have a 300 square metre or a 400 square meter block with an 80 or 100 square metre house on it? Yep. Like you can actually, if it's well designed and and thoughtful and multi-purpose, there's absolutely no reason that you can't have everything you want in a house that's only 100 square metres.

SPEAKER_01 34:58

Yeah, yeah, 100%. I was only just talking, uh I went and got aircut the other day, I was talking to the bar about he said he's just looking at buying a new house, and he they their first house was in a unit, a unit block, and then he looked at they were looking at a block that was 850 square metres, and he was literally saying, like, what am I gonna do with all that space? Like they've just enjoyed Well, he he he thinks it's too much, he thought it's too much for him. Yeah, so he was literally gonna try and find a smaller block because that's just they felt all they felt they needed, and I haven't I didn't tell them we would have spent back on the seven acres, but like I was like, you got nothing, we're maintaining six acres now, and that's a full-time job. But um, yeah, it's it's funny, it's just and it is, it's just what people grow up with and what you be what what feels like the norm or what you what's perceived to be the norm.

SPEAKER_00 35:40

Well, people have started to like people think these days that yard work is hard work. Like I I I I love it. Like it's actually like you throw the it's well these days you put their earphones in and you again you listen to audible books or you're cranking the tunes and like you just that's my chill out time. Yeah. The uh or you would like and well while you're out there, like the the kids are throwing a ball around, you're throwing the ball to the dog, like you Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 36:07

I I I look at um our property where we are now in the next one. I think I take I feel I feel a lot of responsibility that that's a patch of Australia that I get to look after. I've I've thought about that um a bit as we've been going through our priorities and and really honing in on what is important to us. I think it's it's not a hindrance, that's that's a um a privilege to be able to be responsible for that much of Australia. And I that's just how I'm gonna treat it. Like we're gonna treat it like that's you know, that's just that's we're gonna do um we're gonna use that property to do exactly what we want to do, live a lifestyle we want to use, and really look after it. And and that it sheds a whole nother light on it, then it's not a hindrance, it's a privilege, and and we we feel we're really privileged to be able to live in a in a property like that.

SPEAKER_00 36:55

That's a really, really awesome way to think of it.

SPEAKER_01 36:58

Yeah, it's it's it's come to be as it's a good exercise holding in on um you know writing down your priorities and really being honest with yourself about what you need and not what you want or what you think you need. Um if you pair it right back, we really need very little. Like we need shelter, water, and food. And anything after that's a bonus.

SPEAKER_03 37:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:15

But we feel these days, I think uh we all feel so entitled or that we we uh deserve to have all this stuff. It's that's a bonus.

SPEAKER_03 37:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:24

And and if you've got it, you've worked hard for it because it doesn't come easy.

SPEAKER_03 37:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:28

And um, I think if we yeah, change it's the same thing, it's changing that perspective on things.

SPEAKER_00 37:32

Yeah, yeah. And that yeah, there's just there is so many parts to it. And like you have a smaller home, there's less materials, less labour, there's less maintenance, less commitment. Less commitment.

SPEAKER_01 37:46

It's gonna be a big barn, though. It's gonna be a big shed. But um, that's a luxury too.

SPEAKER_00 37:51

Yeah, but like the that's again, that's where you can create experiences and memories, and and and actually to me that's more important. Like, whether it's yourself or your partner or your kids, like you can have hobbies in that shed. Yeah, like so you can actually instead of sitting around a television or on a screen, like you can do anything you want.

SPEAKER_01 38:12

Yeah, go and build something. Yeah, well, yeah, I I we cannot wait, like, yeah, we cannot wait for this um to have an opportunity to build exactly what we want. I think it's it's really lucky. We've renovated a lot of homes and you're always dealing with someone else's um aftermath of what they've they've built in the past, and yeah, and you're sort of um hindered or you're sort of curtailed by certain parameters, but yeah, no, it's gonna be exciting to you. I'm looking forward to it. And and really I'm looking forward to putting into practice what we have been talking about a lot. Uh and and not have have just m mine today's uh decisions going into it, not not have not be anything, um no decisions by a client or parameters set by a client to really build how we want to build, and I think it's gonna be really exciting.

SPEAKER_00 38:53

And you've got so much opportunity on your own stuff to learn because you can experiment.

SPEAKER_01 38:58

Yeah, some of this stuff's gonna go back to some older school ways of building, like I definitely will be, like all these proprietary fixings and and things that that our homes have in these days. I really don't feel that we need them. I think we can definitely build in ways where it's not required. Um, but it it is really hard, that is really hard to change the mindset of the industry. That's a big thing, but this is this is where I want to start with it.

SPEAKER_00 39:22

Yeah, no, I think it's awesome, mate. I um so you're uh not sure if you want to you're gonna document your build.

SPEAKER_01 39:28

Yeah, we're gonna document as much of it as we can and I'm gonna try and keep get other young builds, especially young guys. I think we need to get the young guys on the right path as soon as we can and not have them pick up any bad habits or get too caught in the industry. So the sooner we can get them, but I want to get guys out there, we'll open the site up. Like we've we've done a lot of open sites with your business, and I used to do it with Salt Ash, and I used to love it and been able to that's just such such valuable learning for we used to do it, I used to do it back then for clients more so, but my focus has really turned to if builders can learn this now different ways of doing things, better ways of doing things, understand why we're doing certain things, then they can go and they can share that with their clients and their trades, and that flow-on effect's going to be a lot quicker than me building three or four houses a year.

SPEAKER_00 40:12

It is amazing. Like it's really, really inspiring me to see um how many people turn up to the open sites that we do and um trade as builders, but probably the the biggest ones, architects, designers. Like there is a real passion there for people to get on-site experience.

SPEAKER_01 40:26

That is another really important bit. We need the designers to be educated in it too. And I and look, I feel that's changing. I feel I definitely feel they are taking more interest in and understanding it. And if we can have that, it's sort of coming from both angles then. If we can have it, the information uh the architects and the builders singing the same song, the clients are only going to benefit. And then the reach that an architect has, they're gonna they're gonna they're gonna interact with so many more clients than than one builder, and vice versa, the builders will build houses for you know their career, yeah, and um the impact will be a lot greater. Yeah, I really think that's but yeah, my my real passion for as being a builder is that educ is helping young builders understand why we're building, why we're doing what we're doing, not just we do it because this is how we've done it. Yeah, it that that's gonna get us in trouble.

SPEAKER_00 41:11

Yeah. Um mate, I want to go right back to something you touched on at the beginning of the conversation. So

Timber Quality Moonwood And Sap

SPEAKER_00 41:16

um about materials being sourced locally. Um I I do feel that that's a huge like obviously we're in Australia, southeast Queensland, like it's not just an issue of um, I guess, suburb by suburb or state by state, but you and I have had a lot of conversations. I mean, talking with quite a few other people in the industry. We've I think we've become very complacent with just going with the flow when it comes to material selection. Um, and I I haven't really touched on this um or actually we might have done a podcast a few weeks ago with another builder, and we we briefly touched on timber, but like this moonwood stuff. Like I sent you a link to this moonwood video that Paula Paula put me on to, but that's really sent me down a rabbit hole. Um, I'm not sure where you've got to with that.

SPEAKER_01 42:01

Yeah, yeah. It's um it's something that growing up in Tassie and and my mum's fellow Joe, he was he was a bushman, he was worked out, he was a tree fellow out in the bush, worked out there for years, and they so I sort of it it wasn't I didn't know it to the extent that um Fahomer, what was his name, the guy? Max uh uh his last name was Holtz, Holtz 100 was a Holtz 100, yeah. Um anyway, he not to the level that they they do understand it, but yeah, essentially, from my understanding is that when as a tree in in the the warmer months, the tree will wick up and and and use the water from the the ground as much as it can. But when it knows a cold climate's coming, it'll stop its uptake and it'll the cells will c will close themselves down and not take on as much water to reduce the mo the moisture content in the timber. Because in them real cold climates, especially, when the tree is full of water and it sh it it freezes, it water expands and it'll crack and it'll it scars the tree. So the the tree naturally knows through the time of the year when to when to close down and protect itself and then and open back up when the time's right. So that's sort of where I got to it and and the understanding of of cutting it in winter and after a full moon. That's that's their their rules. They only they only harvest in those times.

SPEAKER_00 43:18

And it was incredible the um difference in the natural pesticide or like yeah, everything like insects don't attack it, it's its strength, it's um it's it its growth rings are tighter. Like it just it's amazing. But like um to give people a bit more context of what you're talking about there, like that obviously Australia's a bit more mild, so it's not as extreme as other parts of the world, but in colder weather, like when you're walking through a bush, if you're a bushwalker or whatever, and like you hear those cracks and that creaking noise, that's the tree, like that's that water, yeah. Um, either cracking or freezing or moving, expanding different rates, yeah. Um I I think it's amazing. Like I I can't get enough at like just researching and talking to people about it and trying to understand it more. But um something else I've actually had a meeting about this morning um because that through that um I sent you that link to that Holtz 100, so that like it's a different version of cross-laminated timber. But I only found out this morning like that that company you and I talked about a little bit and then were saying, like, well, how can they do it on a mass scale? Um that um Holtz, I think it's the Holtz 100 guy, they do harvest all their timber in winter.

SPEAKER_03 44:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:35

So they selectively forest the trees in in that time. Like they harvest on the the moonwood. Yeah, and stock it. Like and stock it. So it just and I guess what what's really um so I I've I've been sort of interested in this for a little while now, um, probably 18 months, two years, and I've had these conversations with a few people, and there have been a few things that have come up lately that are on like a leaning towards what I've been talking about, because a lot of people I did talk about this once on social media, and um because where I where I went with it was we should be using treated timber in our cavity batten systems, and heaps of people jumped on me and said, No, that's ridiculous, like we've been using untreated for years, and blah blah blah blah. Anyway, it's proven now that like there's been um studies or jobs recently where the cavity batons after three years have been um found to be completely rotten and deteriorated. But what what what I've learnt from looking into that moonwood and all how they harvest it and how the trees naturally suck in the moisture, release the moisture, like because the other side of that is like at different times of year they produce different amounts of sap, and it just and obviously then if you harvest, and we see it with the radiata pine, we get delivered to site. Like sometimes you get loads of timber and it's just it's barked, like it's got sap all through it.

SPEAKER_01 45:54

They yeah, they have another thing another method before they fall, is that they'll in certain parts they'll scar the bark layer of a tree six, twelve months before they uh plan to fall it, and that drains the sap out of the outside of it. So the sap is what is the is what the fungus attacks. It's sugar in the timber. And if it and so they've they've this is and this is hundreds and hundreds of years old, this met these methods, but by by knowing that they're going to fall that tree, it's been planned, they'll selectively harvest too, which is something that hasn't probably another good topic. But um, yeah, by s by scarring in this tree, the the sap is encouraged to run out of it, and there's there's less sap content in it when they harvest it, and it lasts a lot longer.

SPEAKER_00 46:32

Yeah, but I so again I I think it's important for like as builders and carpenters, like we need to know this stuff because knowing that now makes more sense. And and like like I just said, like seeing the quality of timber that we get delivered to our sites, like you can tell that it's been harvested the wrong time and the tree's just fucking full of sap, and it that like that batch of timber is shit and really shouldn't be used. Yep, some are warp, some will walk quicker, don't they? Some will some will walk quicker than others, and um it's um and that all plays a part in the quality of the builds we build and how long they're gonna last, and like natural pest deterrents and all those types of things. So, and again, this actually comes right back. Like, listen, this is a good conversation. Brett and I have these conversations, like it's quite hard to get off the phone sometimes because we're we're passionate about this stuff, but um that comes back to what we were talking about before, where things have to be fit for purpose, but more importantly, people are seeing all this stuff on social media from builders and traders in America, Canada, parts of Europe, and thinking that we can do the same here in Australia with with pine. With our natural our locally grown stuff, yeah, and our our pine is completely different. Like, um we've talked I've talked about this a little bit over the last few months on some of the podcast episodes as well. Like, like pine in parts of Europe, like you can you can lay it out in the snow and it'll last forever. Yep. You throw a piece of pine Australian pine out in the weather and let it get rained on for a couple of months, and like within six months it's covered in mould and rotting and falling apart. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:08

Like it's it's that's where this um cavity button thing really doesn't make much sense. Everything outside of our our weather resistive barrier, our WIB say, that's treated for all intents and purposes as the outside of the house in every other way of looking at a house. And the argument is that if it's if it gets wet, it can dry. If you leave a piece of pine out in the yard, it gets wet and dries. It'll dry quicker than it will in a cavity, it'll still rot. And then if the argument is you don't want it to be treated because of the chemicals in it.

SPEAKER_00 48:42

Well then you use highway.

SPEAKER_01 48:43

Yeah, yeah, that's probably better treatments. But you better not have any chemicals inside that house you're building, that that else otherwise you're just you're completely contradicting you know the reason for it. That's on the outside of the house. If you're going to use something that for some reason have to have to have a chemically treated coating, I would want it outside the building envelope. So it's it really doesn't make much sense for all like ideally we could, you know, in the perfect world you'd do it with hardwood, but it's just um it's just not not feasible, is it?

SPEAKER_00 49:09

Yeah. Well, and again, like this is why I think these convers types of conversations are important. Um and I know you and I are on similar pages with this. Like it, you've got to look at everything. Like you can't just jump on healthy homes or jump on passive house or energy efficient homes and and just I guess go with the stand, the building standard, or go with what the code requires. Because yeah, like everything we've covered in this podcast, like your environment, the location, the type of the building, the size of the building, like the materials you're using. Like there's there's just so many parts of the code.

SPEAKER_01 49:43

It's a holistic system, the whole thing has to work. And that's not just yeah, you could you could look at that as a holistic system in the ideal sense, but you've got all these other parameters to bring in that you've got to make judgments on as well, and that's whether it's aesthetics or it's budget. Yeah, there's all these things. It's um it's all right to know how we should build in the ideal world, but we're constantly every single job is a different set of parameters, and we're gonna have to learn how to get make the best out of what we know. Just the best, you know, put that into place with with inside that set of parameters, and um that's that's how we need to be building.

SPEAKER_00 50:16

I I'm leaning more and more like towards like we just we need to be building buildings that work on their own without relying or relying on wraps or glues or claddings or paints. Yeah.

Durability Without Band Aid Products

SPEAKER_00 50:34

Um I personally see there being a big problem. Um, like these building wraps that are on the market now, like that don't get me wrong, like they're fantastic. I think they're they're going to make a big improvement to the building industry. But it's like everything else in the industry.

SPEAKER_01 50:52

We need that now because we've got a light from lightweight frame, lightweight structure. That's why we need that wrap now.

SPEAKER_00 50:57

Yeah, but we but it's only everything is only ever as good as who's installed it.

SPEAKER_01 51:02

Yeah, very true.

SPEAKER_00 51:03

So like you could have the best building wrap in the in the world. Yep. Like it's been designed to last for a thousand years. It'll pr it'll you can s put it on the bottom of the ocean, like it it's the best thing ever. But if it's not installed correctly, it's it's useless.

SPEAKER_01 51:18

The other side to that is homeowners are if that's getting put into a project project, the homeowners are paying for that no matter what. It could be installed. If it's installed as it's designed to be, they will have a good product and they'll have a great it'll be a great scenario. But if it's not, they think they're getting a good product and a good result, and and then they're actually not. So this is something that um we talk about a lot and we do a lot in your business, is a lot of testing and a lot of especially the things we cover up. We do a lot of monitoring, recording, testing of that stuff and documenting it. And I think I don't think that gets done enough. I I like we know there should be more mandatory inspections, but by doing them ourselves, I think that's the next best thing. Yeah, um that is one uh element I really like about uh things like passive house is that they have a prescribed thing that gets inspected and from a third party there's checks and measures that we need to find a happy medium there with just you know NCC building. I think um even if we did build to the letter of NCCC, we would make sorry the NCC, we would make it be a massive improvement if they actually got built as they're designed. And um, but yeah, the checks and measures are the trick.

SPEAKER_00 52:24

That's a whole other conversation as well. Like I I still believe that it shouldn't just be builders that are held accountable. Like every trade should be accountable for the lifespan of the project.

SPEAKER_01 52:35

Like it's um it would change how everything's approached, isn't it wouldn't it, if that was if you were legit legitimately held responsible for it. And um yeah, it might make things cheaper in the short term or uh uh sorry, more expensive in the short term. But I I I agree it would over time it would bring the prices of things down, business can be built better.

SPEAKER_00 52:54

All right, guys, I want to introduce you to a really exciting new product that I believe is going to play a massive role in Australia building healthier homes. As you all know, I am extremely passionate about healthy homes, and I'm doing a lot of research and putting a lot of time and effort into making sure my construction business is leading the way when it comes to building healthy homes here in Australia. We've teamed up with the guys from Highwood Timber. Highwood Timber are pioneering condensation management with their high flow ventilated LVL batten system. High flow battons give builders a stronger, straighter, and smarter way to create a ventilated cavity behind cladding and underneath roofs without compromising on structural performance. While tackling condensation to improve building health and ease of insulation, highwood battons are built to perform. When it comes to dealing with condensation and ventilation, high flow battons will help you create continuous ventilated cavities behind all your cladding and underneath your roof sheeting. They reduce condensation risk and support healthier, longer lasting buildings. Highwood timber battons are also in alignment with the proposed NCC condensation management requirements as well as passive house ventilation requirements. Being an engineered LVL product, they are stronger, straighter, and more dimensionally stable than a solid material such as pine. This helps resist warping, twisting, and shrinkage, ensuring more consistent installs less prone to splitting than solid timber. Howwood timber batten are precisely manufactured, meaning that your installation will be faster and easier than other products on the market. The part that I like the most about these battens they are H3 treated for long-term protection against decay and turmoiles. They use a waterborne H3 treatment which reduces reactivity with membranes and adhesives when compared to LOSP. These are the exact battens that you want to be using on your homes and your builds if you are considering building healthier homes or passive homes. Check them out. Highwood Timber products. But like just using and building using materials and building buildings so that like I said before, they're they're not reliant on something.

Roofs Overhangs And Leak Reality

SPEAKER_00 55:10

Like uh roof roofs are one of my big pet hates. Like I I think every building should have a 1200 overhang. Like might be a bit too much or a bit over over the top, but like depends on the where it's built, doesn't it? Yeah, it depends on where it's built, but like it it shades the building, but it gets moisture away. Like if you can build your roof really well and get all your moisture away from your walls. Like with a 1200 overhang, even unless it's wind-driven rain that's coming in at 70 degrees or 30 degrees, even with a 1200 overhang, it's gonna be hitting halfway down your wall, which nine times out of ten is gonna be lower than where your your tops of your windows and doors are, your wall's gonna be well sealed up, and you're gonna have far less issues with moisture. But like we seem to be building all these buildings with no overhangs, flat roofs, and then trying to come up with these solutions to to fix things.

SPEAKER_01 56:20

Yeah, it that's a big that's a bigger topic all in itself, isn't it? The design and that's that's another where that fit the purpose thing comes back because if it's not designed for its scenario and for it to a roof to protect its home, like um Paula often talks about a house needs a good hat and a good and good boots and it'll last that that it'll last a lot longer. And we've got we really do challenge that, like these zero thresholds that everyone loves and this livable housing standard that's sort of causing a little bit of trouble. But there's ways of design in with common sense in mind for that too. Um yeah, it's it's definitely it as a builder a minimum roof pitch would solve a lot of problems of 15 to 25. 25 even better. But yeah 37. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A builder.

SPEAKER_00 57:06

That's the other thing. Sorry to cut you off there. But the other thing was like in the old days, and like you see this a lot in Europe as well, like like roofs are steep. Yep. So the steeper the roof, the faster the water gets off.

SPEAKER_01 57:16

Yeah, like water doesn't have time to sit around and get underneath or even if it is wind-driven and held on the surface, like the surface tension and wind can hold water in places that it's not designed to be held for a long period of time. Yeah, and yeah, the quicker it can shed water the better. I even really like the idea of no like tin roofs are one thing, but it's screws every you know, screws in tin roofs. I know I've had jobs where I've had leaks from a screw and you know, three or four years old, you'd lift it and you could see a bit of moisture around uh you know on the anticon. That's back then that was something that was out of my that was designed by the like that's just the standard practice, that's how it's designed. That's how we've built it. But knowing what we know now, um yeah, I'll be taking a lot more measures to to safeguard myself there.

SPEAKER_00 58:01

Yeah, but even with uh and look, I I'm only I'm talking from experience, like I I'm not sort of shied away from putting my hand up, like we we've built flat roofs in the past that we've done like I thought it were going over and above, like with everything, and there's still been leaks. And on a few of those um leaks that we've had, it's we've done everything correctly, and and the reason they've leaked is two things. It's either been like a big storm that's had wind driven rain, and like you said, it's pushed so much water that it's just constantly sitting up in under there, which has pushed it over the top of a fold or a flashing or something.

SPEAKER_03 58:37

Calurically, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:39

But the most common ones that we've seen is when you have flat roos, it doesn't matter how good your joints are, or that you've unlike you've siliconed your under joints, and you've siliconed like you've over silicon as well. Like silicon isn't designed to be have water sitting on it, and then have the sun burning on it, then water sitting on it again, then the sun burning it again. Like, because as it's doing that, it's expanding and contracting, and it's only a matter of time, and that silicon fails. Yeah, well the roof exp expands and contracts as well, so it's different materials moving at different rates then.

SPEAKER_03 59:13

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 59:13

So then it's like it is literally, it does not matter how good a job you've done, how much silicon you've used, how good your flashings are, how big your upturns are, at some point in time and in the lifespan of that building, it's gonna leak. Not if but when.

SPEAKER_01 59:27

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, 100%. And yeah, it is, it's a it's a way I think the way that we are going at the moment, uh you see, especially um the I think it's more of a response to air tightness, but it's it's such a great detail for bulk water management, is these is these wraps or these membranes over the roofs, and that is a real big insurance policy against the leak. Like it that really takes the the not all the pressure off. I still think the roof and the outer skin cladding roof still needs to be the main but even with a flat roof, like that that membranes like you yeah, you've got to get rid of the water.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:01

Yeah, it's flat too. Yeah, yeah, don't build flat roofs. That's the trick. Yeah, yeah, minimum minimum pitch would be an awesome thing. But um, and I guess that flows into other areas of the house as well. Like um, like the quicker moisture gets away from anything, the better. Yeah, um, like even in the last three or four jobs, like um, and you and I just had a conversation with one of our lead um chippies about this yesterday, like uh over digging the footing on a retaining wall to make sure that our ag line is actually sitting down at the bottom of the footing, not on the cold joint where the block work's going to be sitting. Yeah, the critical point. The critical point, but so like getting your water away from your foundations quicker as well, getting water away from cold joints, even though they're waterproofed, but yeah, water sitting around affects things, and then like your bathrooms, like making sure um we had a good podcast last week um with Lucas. It'll be awesome when it comes out. Make sure you have a listen to that. Actually, I think it's coming well. This podcast will be out after it, but um he was saying the same thing. Like, you you've with all these changes in the um falls and requirements and the waterproofing for our wet areas, like we've just kept band-aiding things. Like if tilers and waterproofers just did in installed things correctly and builders put fall on their subfloors and structural substrate, so that water can actually drain to a point instead of getting into a bed and just sitting there.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:26

Yep. That's a real problem. That's something remember um one of the first jobs I was done with you. Uh that's just a m it's just such a strange way of building something to build a flat substrate and embed it. And back before, well, depends on a few variables, but to it to that system is designed to have water sit in it until it reaches the puddle flange. So that's just holding moisture within your building. And it's the same as these retaining walls that we build. And the quicker we can take a pressure the the pressure from water off a system, the the longer it's gonna last, it's not under constant pressure. And that I've it's never sat well with me the whole time I've been building in Queensland. Like we never done that in Tasmania. We would always fall our slabs, and like we did do a lot of slab on ground where it was a lot easier. But we'd put we'd fall our slabs uh in the poor, and I've done that wherever we wherever we can, we always do that. But it doesn't always soon if it's a renovation or it's a second floor. Um, we do need I really do think the way we're going, especially with our strip grates, that's a great way of going. You know, getting a straight, keeping everything on the same plane uh makes a lot easier, but um designing so that moisture sits in your building until it finds the lowest. That's just madness. Like it never makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:35

It's like yeah, it but again, like this is it's only stuff we've learned. Like

Moisture Drainage And Wet Areas

SPEAKER_00 1:02:42

I I've improved like so much, like I improved a little bit through my whole last 20 years, but then like 10 years ago it started getting more five years ago, and like even the last 18 months since you've been in, like you and I having these constant conversations, not and not just you and I, like the whole team, like our other supervisor Todd, is older and got a lot of experience. Lots of knowledge, yeah. Like Brad, Tim, Leon, um, like our lead carpenters is young Jaden, like who's been a carpenter now for a few years. Like, I feel that my building business has improved dramatically, probably in the last three years, two years, and twelve months because of that collaborative. Like, we're we're having those group discussions and we're we're allowing well not allowing, but I don't know, like we're encouraging it.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:28

We're encouraging it really.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:29

We talk about and and the buy-in now from the team is is quite good.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:32

Like, but their understanding it improves their learning. Like we we've we've done some we've done some lesson-learned stuff over jobs that have been completed recently, and the just by talking about it, it allows everyone you draw on everyone else's experience and uh everyone else's perspective, and they especially these old guys who've built multiple houses over their career and they've seen so many things that you you can really leapfrog and learn. And I think it is a way of thinking as as your business, like it's the knowledge of the whole business, it's not just me or you or Todd or anyone, it's it's a collective knowledge, and that that is so powerful if we share it. But if we keep our keep our opinions to ourselves and we don't, we miss all this opportunity to come up with these better ways of doing things. And with the DPC standard that um starting to document that stuff where we can then when we onboard people, that's gonna be they're gonna be up to speed a lot quicker, and and we um just keep building on it. It's it's exciting, it's really cool. And the industry is getting much better at sharing knowledge, it's not how it was when I started, where it was really hard to get anything out of anyone. Um everyone seems if you ask, people love to share what they're doing, and and I think just by talking about stuff, it cements what your understanding of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:44

It definitely pays dividends. Like I I even see um the flow-on effect is just the the morale in the team, the communication the team, um buy-in from the team. But I guess for anyone listening that maybe not be doing it, like uh Brett just mentioned it. So we we've probably been a little bit slack on it um in recent times. We've got a well, sort of got a document called the DPC, so DPS construction standard, and it it's continually improving and growing, but it's basically our minimum standard. Like every job, this is what we expect. Um, and that is everything from uh retaining walls, framing, waterproofing, um, even to how we cut the tops of our fence posts, like um, because we want we want water to drain off our fence posts. Like, but like even uh like yesterday, like on that new job you've just started, like um Brett was offered another project. Um, I was on site with a lead carpenter, we were having a talk about the water tank. Um, he made a suggestion about getting rid of the riser so we could get more height under the house, and then a phone conversation with Brett. Um, because I I was thinking about the heights of the stormwater, and then um Brett said, No, we can actually run it in through the rim board into the joist and then run it hard on start as hard to the joist as we could. So, like that. Literally within an hour, those sort of two conversations um, and then you worked on it more during the day, we got a great result. But I guess to give people some context, like we're thinking about the stormwater falls, the heights of stormwater, sewer and drainage, um, waterproofing behind retaining walls, and we're only doing the site cut. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:21

Yep. Um staging of things here. We've got to get a big concrete tank in around other foundations and footings and the timing of how that's gonna work. There's I I love these times of jobs, like especially where now where these decisions are they set you up for success. I love this time of the job, and I really love set out, like um trade rough-ins set out. That's where a job is make make and break, and you can make some decisions there that'll that can either pay dividends or really cause you a lot of headaches. And um I love that, yeah. I really do love that part of the job. That's where all the all your experience and the little things you've learned over the years and you've seen, and then the conversations you have with other people, that's where it all comes to the fore. And yeah, um, yeah, that's really rewarding when you get to a finished job, and you know, and we talked about this with our apprentices at the um Tuong job we just finished, and we've done a bit of a team meeting there yesterday. Is having a look at the finished product, a lot of these young guys they're at start doing, and this is something that because we do the jobs we do, we don't do the repetition like like we touched on yesterday, for it to become second nature a lot of the time. It's a lot longer between framing or a fit out. And but I went around with some of the young guys and just pointed out some details that to achieve that outcome, explain what we need to do at the start at the framing stage, and there's set out and there's offsets and things like this. And I could see in one of them, particularly where it really sort of clicked, and something that he'd been doing recently, he could see that that's what the finished product was going to be. That's something that we we need to take make the most opportunity of, you know, when we can. Um, and that was great. I thought it was great. That's a great project, and I haven't been involved in that one much, but man, it's come up well.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:54

Yeah, it's a it's an incredible home. But um, and again, look, I don't I I don't know. I bring something brings me back to numbers on every single podcast.

Standards Numbers And Calm Builds

SPEAKER_00 1:08:04

I don't think we've ever done FSO that I haven't mentioned. You've got to know your numbers. But um again, I I I so back in the day, and I like you've run your own building business as well, so you can I guess give your opinion on this as well. But um when I was running a shit show and didn't know my numbers, wasn't making like thought I was, but I wasn't making money, like every job you started, it was just everything was a race to get the slab down because you needed that draw. Yeah, and so yeah, like ten years ago, I was definitely not putting in the effort I I am now, the time I am now, or or even giving my team the time to do what we do now because we needed money in the bank. So like the sight cut was done as quickly as it possibly could be. And I remember doing jobs where like you you wouldn't even complete the sight cut. Like you would do, I would do the site cut just enough to get the building started, and like we'd if there was an area we could finish later, like we'd finish it later because our priority was getting it cut, getting footings, getting the slab down so we could get money in the bank. Whereas now we because we run a good show, we we structure our contracts, we structure our draws, cash flows good, that takes the pressure. Like, I'm not putting the pressure on you, you're not putting the pressure on the team. And we can have we can spend that time on site, we can spend the time in the office, do the drawings, do the research.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:29

I feel like we we we can plan a job more instead of just doing it a bit um responding to certain things. Like if something comes up where there's a better way to do it and it's gonna take another day, we can. That's something that I've I love in my role now, and I love that not I don't have to have that other um side of it, the the whole business perspective. Like it where is because it can clear it clouds your judgment. It clouds your judgment, and no matter what you say, um if if you know what gas flow is like at the moment and you and you're gonna make a decision on the side, it does cloud your judgment by it gives me like again, and I talk to this about our team a lot, that we're very lucky to be working for a company like this where you ask you uh across that stuff and you and Sharon and and Camille are so across it that we don't have to worry about it and it it and it doesn't put that pressure on us to have to rush a decision or or do something. And it it it really flows on when you can plan things well, you can actually just execute them and and things go really well.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:25

You don't have them responsive sort of problems, and it's a really it's a joy to build on to work on these sort of well the most and the most reporting part is is the clients like every client we've had in the last three years, but like even right at the moment, um like even that job you've just started, um, I guess to give people some context around it. So we we scraped back all the topsoil and grass, we couldn't find a free site, so we sent it away, and like Brett Romy said, Hey, do you know this shit's gonna be 248 bucks a ton? And I'm like, Yeah, it'll be light. It's um uh like $8,000 light, $8,000 for four truckloads. Um anyway, so literally two days into the job, I'm on the phone to the client saying, Oh look, mate, we're um we're gonna go over our um clean filler land, like dump fees because they've um they've hit us for they're gonna charge a C and D waste because it's got a bit of brick and a little bit of concrete and stuff in it, blah blah blah. But um the client's not stressed. And like so, two days into that job, that client is still saying to me, Oh mate, Dwayne, it's fine. Like the we love your process, like it's it's good, everything's organized, it's like thanks for keeping us updated. But like our other Windsor job, like every week the client's like, everyone at work just keeps asking me, like, when's something going wrong? Or has something gone wrong yet? And I just keep telling them it's great, like it's it's a pleasure. Like, what it's um, and then like the big job Tuan we just handed over that's a pretty substantial, like 3.2, 3.3 million dollar job. And the owner just cannot believe that he's like you moved in today, and he cannot believe that um there's been no major issues, like there's been no stress.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:02

That's how building should be. That's that's how it is like when when you that is really how it should be, and it should be an exciting time for someone building their own home, not filled with fear about waiting for something to go wrong. And it's it's it's sad that that's a very real reality in our industry, and um, yeah, it's it's mate.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:22

The most stressful part of that that formed job, 3.3 million dollar job, has been in the last three weeks because he selected these um Wi-Fi automated fans and he wanted them to run for a certain time at a certain speed, and and him and the Sparky can't get the timing right. And I'm like, if this is the worst thing we've got to worry about. How good? How good. But um, but again, look with everything we're talking about, like with the healthy home side of things, like we're just like every job we're getting better and better. Um and like this, this uh this has been an incredible conversation um today, and I I hope it highlights a lot of or sparks a lot of interest from people because I do feel as a builder and and as a trade, um, like now, like today at the point I'm at now, we need to know more about everything. Like I when I was on the tools smashing out frames with the boys and just running a mark cranking the tunes, like I I wasn't thinking about that. I wasn't thinking about how all the shit I had over my hands because I was working with chemically chemic chemically treated timbers all day. I wasn't thinking about all the sh all the fastness and the shit that we were using, like and I guess it's just a we all change as we go through life, but for me it's getting more and more exciting. Like the more I know about this shit, the more it's it's just addictive. I just can't get enough of it.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:42

Yeah, I have plenty of late nights and and early mornings. I'll often wake up um with uh just to have a thought. Something I do a lot lately is just um like I'll just think through the way uh a scenario at work and how I the ultimate way that I'd build it. And just by thinking through it and all the drawings that we've been doing. It's it's just the the little problems that you solve and the little by drawing something, but the you can you can see the flow on effect or the next part of the job, and I really think that's something that we as an industry are start uh at risk of losing is understanding the complete how how a job is built from start to finish. And um our guys are so lucky to be learning that way. I wish they understood how lucky they they are to be learning and on the side of the houses we are. And I think they the older they get, like you just said, the older we get, the more the our knowledge grows and our understanding grows, and I think they will appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:27

But but in saying that, like our boys will be running their own business, some of our guys will be running their own business in 20 years' time and like talking about shit that we've got no idea about.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:38

Yeah, like it's just things are moving so quickly, aren't they? Technology products, there's a lot to there's a lot to know, a lot to keep on top of.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:46

Yeah, they might be sitting back and building a job from their iPhone controlling robots. 3D printing. Um But yeah, I I I think it's I think it's a r the industry's um going in a really good direction. I I do feel like when I started this mission to create a new building industry, um there was a lot of times where I thought, what the fuck am I doing? And a lot of that was because people were telling me, What the fuck are you doing? But um I definitely feel like it's we're over that halfway point now. Like I feel like we're that we're on a trajectory where trades, builders, um, and that's true, there's not just me, like there's a lot of people out there on Instagram now sharing quality information. Um I think if anything, the the biggest message I think I'd like to get across from today's podcast is just yeah, being open-minded enough to to understand that it's there's no one size fits all, none of us know everything. And if you see something on Instagram, um understand that there's more context behind it. Like go and do your homework, make sure that it's suitable for your area, or reach out to the person that's done the post and ask more questions.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:54

Um, because education's a key.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:56

Correct, yeah. I think Eddie, you're right, we're definitely over the hump. There's a lot of a lot more people building and and and um even in a lot of people consultants in the pre-construction space with the really good intentions of how we the industry should go, and that's really exciting. And when when you look for that stuff, you see there is a lot of it out there. And like we do a lot, we do a lot of driving from where we live to work, and I listen to some of the stuff I listen to, like I've probably learnt more in the last 18 months than I have from a technical um developing my the methodology of how I think we should build. I've learned more in the last 18 months than I've learned in the last 18 years.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:31

I reckon I've learned more since you and I have ramped it up in the last six months. I yeah, I reckon I've learned more in the last six months than I have in the last 10 years.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:38

It's infectious, isn't it? Yeah. Once you get going down a uh a route and then you you start sprouting off into the the flow-on effects or the or how other parts are coming into that and the effect that has, like really we it just the smallest changes in our in our homes and the designs of our homes have a much bigger effect than we realise. Colours, uh window spacings, openings, um overhangs, all this stuff. Like it it all has a flow-on effect, and and I think the understanding across the industry of that now is getting really high. Yeah. Because there is a lot of people really, the building science world is really taken off. Like it's been around for a long time, but it's just hasn't it's coming more mainstream. Yeah.

Building Biology And Natural Materials

SPEAKER_01 1:17:17

And that's I I love that people are a very aware of information.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:20

Yeah, like it's it's it sort of feels like it's flowing on. Like people have been on the sort of healthy food sort of thing for a long time, and now they're realizing, oh shit, like my house has actually something to do with my health as well. Like, what's going on here?

SPEAKER_01 1:17:32

Yeah, you could you could live fully um self-sufficient and all organic food and live in a house that's you know you sleep overnight and you're breathing in, you know, particle matters and and chemicals, and you know, you it's wor it's worse. Like it it really needs it's something that we don't put enough emphasis on is our own where we spend so much time and the knowledge around that's becoming so much greater now. And you don't have to look far to find it. Um I think I've got a big interest in building biology. I think that's a really important thing to start to incorporate more into how we build.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:02

Um because it so to me uh you know the the indicators of a really good home is that it it lasts a long time and it provides a good environment for the occupants. And that the rest of it's you know, energy efficiency plays into it a bit, but really if that indoor environment's good and it can be sustained for a long period of time, that's that's the g that's my sort of how I would like to build.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:26

And uh like part of that is that you your house should be able to be like you should be able to go away for three months, lock the door on the way out, and come home, and your house is still fine. Yep. Yeah. There's no stale air, there's no mould, like it's it's looked after itself. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:45

And I don't know how how much longer we want to go, but um, some of these other sort of built-in methods that we've been looking into about how they do handle their own humidity and moisture uh within the house. Do we want to talk about that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:57

We can go for hours. The Irving can cut it in two parts if he has to.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:01

Yeah, that that's something that um I've really enjoyed since we've been delving into that. The uh like the the mass constructions and and how they hygroscopically handle moisture naturally. Um and that is how they built years ago, and that's I think that's something that we need to whether we I don't know whether it's you know, CLT panel actually does it really well, doesn't it? Like from what we're learning now, that mass timber uh does it really well.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:27

Anything like timber, straw, clay, lime, like any natural, like apart from stone, like stone uh or some stones, like sandstone, it's or mud brick, um rammed earth. Yeah, it's again it's just coming back to natural materials sourced in their like doing what they do in their own environment.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:46

Yep. And I think and look we're starting to look into some of these other methods and ways that we can incorporate them properties into a bit more of our standard way of construction because the alternative construction, it's not for everyone, it's never going to be mainstream as much as we'd like we we probably think it could should be. But understanding the properties that they provide a home and being able to incorporate that in different places where it's effective, and it and you can have you can help regulate the moisture and the the air quality inside a home with the materials we use.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:15

And well, not even just the um the air quality but the temperature.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:20

Like we're and this is look, this is a definitely a pet hate of mine. Like I do, I do really much dislike that we're living in a world where everyone is wanting everything to look after them. And I like our homes aren't meant to like they're meant to shelter us, um, but they're not they're not meant to be a building that um runs heaters and coolers all the time to keep us at an ideal temperature. And I know there's lots of different arguments on this, but like around clean air and all those types of things as well. But like as humans, like our like again, this is just me going down the personal development thing. Like, I'm a mouth breather, I'm trying really hard to not. I use my mouth tape for the night, but like our noses are filters, they're made to filter the air. And if we breathe through our nose all the time, they will look after us and they will filter out all the polls, all the dust, everything that we breathe in. And yet we like people are pushing towards doing in houses where they have all these micron filters that take everything out of the air. So you end up living in a a box that has completely filtered air, sterile and all these. It's sterile, so your immune system doesn't develop or maintain itself. So then every time you step out of that house, you get cold. It's a shock to the system. It's a shock to the system. And that's not natural. And so that can play a big role in why people get sick more often and those types of things. And this is a lot of this stuff is now starting to be proven. Like they're proving now that um office workers that go and work inside air conditioning buildings all the time will be sick for prone to illness. Yeah, they're prone to illness. Um so natural materials play a massive, massive part in in our health, and a lot of a big part of that is because a natural material, um like it was unbelievable spending time with Paula on this sort of stuff because she just rattles the numbers out, and I I can't remember them, but like every material has a a different level of moisture absorption and will release it at different stages. Whereas, like you think we're building all these steel frames homes in Australia, like other countries being steel frame, like, and yet we're just pumping them out. Like, steel does not absorb any moisture at all. Um, whereas like even a stud timber frame will absorb a certain amount of moisture and maintain and then it'll release it again. But then like you go to bulk timber, it'll it'll absorb more, then you go to clay or lime, like rammed earth. Like they will literally like a sponge, like they will suck up nearly as much moisture as the size of them.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:58

And then when the temperature's right, the humidity's right, all those types of things, it'll just naturally let it out again. Yeah, there's a I think they they call it the flywheel effect.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:06

So it absorbs and and it really it it them them mass products especially, but they're these um hygroscopic products, they will or materials, they dampen the effect of how quick a temperature will change in a house. So it it takes it slows that swing down. So we a house will heat up through the day. So if we're in Queensland context, um it'll heat up through the day, the house can get warmer. But it generally does cool down overnight. Like our average temperature in Queensland is 22 degrees, 23 degrees. So by allowing it to heat up and then cool down and release itself in that and in that cycle, we you know the the the the slower we can make that transition, that the uh the better your homes will perform by themselves without needing mechanical heating and cooling.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:48

And then sorry, just you keep going. But the other um thing with that is the slower that transition is, we don't notice it as much. Like that's a big reason why when you walk into a house that like it's and you think it's cold, you go and get your jumper. Yeah. But if you walk into a house in the afternoon and the house is naturally changing in climate slower, you don't you don't realise that. Like you feel more comfortable more of the time.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:12

I think I don't know if people go for jumpers as much now as they go for a knob that's an airpon on or a or a fan or a heater. I think that's the natural way of doing it. Gee, it's cold, you know, the heater on. And yeah, I I think I really think I really want to be able to build in a way where our house does naturally ventilate as much as it can, but then there is a there's a backup, like uh we have some some small mechanical ventilation where and I think it in in especially in Queensland, it needs to be humidity. And I think humidity, if we could have it set to humidity and um CO2 levels, so when they get to a certain point, it kicks in. I think that's the perfect sort of hybrid. I I really and and and it depends where you're building, like where we're built where we're about to build, we're gonna be you know out amongst nature a bit where the the air is not gonna be as polluted. But if you are in a city, that there's a different priority there that that maybe does need filtering a bit more. So um I think it's it's horses for courses, and and that's what we need to keep coming back to. But ideally, we can build in a way where the house is nearly as self-sufficient as it can be, and it can handle those swings in temperature, humidity, uh as as as handle as much as it can, and then we just top it up where we need to, not um not the other way around, not make the house just suit up.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:25

The other um another part of that is, and I can't remember, um I know one was Matt, but what who's the other guy? Um Brett organized a couple of guys to come to our builder's breakfast room. Owen and Matt, yeah. Um last week, and one of them, Owen, so he was a passive house designer or energy efficient name designer. I forget what he low end low energy designer?

SPEAKER_01 1:25:44

He is a passive house designer, but he his opinion up here in Queensland, especially, um, that the low energy range is a much more suited building method for us here, as opposed to the full-on passive house.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:54

But he he brought up a good point at the breakfast, and it it's something that I've been talking to um a few people about only in the last sort of month or two. Like everything we're talking about today, it's it's really important that builders understand this, but trades as well. So, like air conditioning, like he brought it up last week as well. Like, so without um like even builders that aren't doing passive house or aren't building healthy homes at the moment, you're like I'm telling you now, your houses are getting airtighter. Like it's just the products we're using, the the materials, like the wraps, it's without you knowing it, you're building more airtight homes. And so if your air conditioning contractor isn't aware of this and they're just using the old metric, which is just size your air conditioning unit based on the cubic volume of the house, they're going to be telling you to use a certain size air conditioner. But the more energy or the more airtight your house becomes, the the smaller your air conditioning unit. Like passive houses are using, like some of them are using like 1.6 or 2 kilowatt units to heat a heat and cooler 250 square meter home. So the thing is, if you put a if you haven't taken into account how efficient the house is and you put in a bigger air conditioning unit, that air conditioning unit is going to be running a lot more because like what he gave the example of a 16 kilowatt can only ramp down to nine. Yep. But if your house is efficient enough that it only needs a seven and your aircraft unit will only go down to nine, it's just going to be in out, in out, in out, like just constantly on and off, on and off.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:29

Yeah, and the other side of that was it it it then doesn't have the opportunity to dehumidify at all. Yeah. You know, a smaller unit that runs, yeah, you'd be better off with a smaller unit running more efficiently that can can can run right down to a low usage, but then as it runs more regularly, it will it dehumidifies the air as well. So that was that was really interesting to learn about that, wasn't it? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:48

Yeah, because a pose people have talked to me about that lately and we've been sort of talking about a little bit, but the the he put it into a context that was made sense.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:55

Yeah, so Matt, who you're talking about, he's he's a mechanical engineer. So that's he was all over it, wasn't he? He's um really A really intelligent bloke and puts it in really good layman terms for us builders to um to understand.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:05

And um it is it's something that um and like if so if if you're if you're doing that as a builder or an air conditioning contractor, you're you're actually making that house have to deal with more moisture.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:16

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:17

Because you're you're pumping humidity into it.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:20

That's the other thing, the other side of the coin up here in Queensland and and and and further north is you know the the air outside is humid. We don't necessarily want to draw that in the in certain times of the year, yeah it'll be you know hundred per nearly 100% humid in the high 90s. We definitely we don't want that in our roof spaces at times. So there's there's a there's a real balance of how we need a design for the climate, and it everyone's knowledge around it's getting a lot better, and um I think we're we're definitely trending in the right direction, and the more builders that understand about it the better. So yeah, I'm hoping I'm hoping talking to Matt and um and Owen and a few other people, and we've been talking to about some training and just educating builders. Our builders Brecki Group are so they're on the right foot. Well, they're in the they're open-minded and they're inquisitive enough and they know they need to learn some of this stuff, and they're great conversations. So just just on uh the other Thursday, sitting back and watching some of the questions, you can see how their their minds ticking and it's prompting other questions, and and that person's gonna have their own whole knowledge base and and um area of expertise over the years and put their spin on that as well and their understanding on it. And man, they're they're great, them little builders, Brickie catch-ups.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:25

I I yeah, like I said, I think I think it's exciting times. I think there's enough builders out there that are um that are I guess willing to learn and and change what they've been taught or what they know. And for me for me, the science of it all is what's really made the science and the building biology side of it, is what it's because what once you know you can't go back.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:46

Like you just no, it completely changes the way you look at everything. Yeah, every single thing. I think I when we were talking on the phone the other day, it wasn't about this, but it was just a conversation for something else at work.

Off Gassing Glues And Perfect Finishes

SPEAKER_01 1:29:55

And and I drove past the site and I seen all that mud walked up the beams on the side of the um all these joists, and they obviously have been walking on them on the ground. And what we know now, like that that's their that's the living organisms that are going to be on that in and that's gonna be wrapped inside the the envelope of the home. And just by so that's something we added into the DPC standard, that that stuff will be cleaned, like we'll be making sure that we for first starters you don't walk on it, but before it gets wrapped up, that stuff's cleaned off. And that's that's a good that's something I never would have thought about, you know, even two years ago. Yeah um that's just a part of it. But understanding that you know what yeah, just understanding a little bit more. Every every job you understand a bit more and and you learn something new and you can put that into the well, it's just trapping it, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 1:30:34

Like it that's the same as like, well, it's only been the last 18 months that we've moisture tested our buildings before we put the plaster board.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:41

But sawdust in the cavities, like that we know that incre increases the the possibility of that that's dock food for mould. So um any or any organisms, any um organic matter that's inside our envelope, that's we we we need to not have it.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:54

Yeah, yeah. And like you, man, I think back to some of the jobs we've built over the years and like not even just the mud, like dealing with the materials in mud during the build, but like you said, like it's all over your boots, and you're walking it through the house, like even at locket fit-out stage, like you're doing a fit-out and your boots like you've got mud on your boots. So one of our standards now, like we make sure we've got floor mats on all of our jobs early. Yeah, early. So um we try and keep the floors as clean as possible, but even just the um the moisture in the temp timber, like we moisture test everything now.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:30

Like that's another thing. What you we mentioned before about um being able to build in a controlled way, if that moisture level is high, we we're not we we will stop and dehumidify or we'll we'll give it time to naturally air out. It's not that we're that underpumped, we've got to get it locked up for it to stay like that. That that all flows into that.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:47

Yeah, having a system around educating the client. Um and so yeah, like we're telling the clients that well before plastering stage, and like letting making them aware, hey, look, like until it gets below 12%, we're we're not gonna sheet the walls. So there may be a slight delay.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:03

Like, but yeah, expressing the importance of that, like we only get one chance to wrap and enclose a home, and yeah, it's gonna be there for how's it gonna be there for hundreds of years?

SPEAKER_00 1:32:10

Yeah, I I it it does it it honestly, um it has there's definitely been some nights where I haven't slept because I think back to like I know particular jobs that we did that just it was wet season and they got hammered with moisture, and I just think, holy shit, like what would those walls be like in those houses? And I don't want to ring them up and ask or I don't want to go and check, but again, it's just I didn't know what I did what I didn't know.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:40

Yeah, that's something that um it's a big it's a credit to how you do things, is you you you definitely won't um cut any coins at any cost, and you you're often making guys redo things even on the odd chance that it could be a problem. It probably you know, nine times out of ten it might be right, but um that's something that's really interesting. It's really cool to see that the the level of commitment to the homes that you're building. It's I just don't think um it's not common in the industry, unfortunately. Yeah, I appreciate that. I I look, I don't know what there's much rescheduling and shit I've got to do every time you do it, but it doesn't matter. Like it's it's incredible that we can do that, and then you don't have to have that sleepless night.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:19

Again, I just I've definitely grown over the years and and changed, and um but I I think a lot of it comes back to now like holding myself accountable, like and just having like it's my business. Like I've set standards now, and it doesn't I'll I will I'm prepared to lose some money to make sure those standards are intact. And um I think it's paying dividends because we we get good clients, we get good work, we've got a great team. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:48

But that's our whole that's the other thing. Our team are seeing that happening. So that's what they will learn to that that that should is what should be done. Um when when and that the opposite can happen when they see something being swept under the rug or something covered up quickly, um that's that's what they think that's okay. And um the I think that's one of the uh for any builder out there, if if you're um you think you're worth your salt, you should really be doing those open homes around those uh when things are open to see. If you can put it on display and bring anyone in, especially like our owners are there every week, so they see it, but future clients, other designers, like that's yeah, there's no bigger um I don't know the right word for it, but there's there's no bigger confidence that or um that that is a way of holding yourself accountable, putting it out there where you're not hiding nothing. Yeah come and see it. This is how we do it and we're proud of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:38

Another thing that you've seen, but like my like I just know like when we do renovations and things, I I know how much I bag out. Like if we pull something apart and it's dodgy, I know how much I bag that builder out. Like we have team meetings, but I pointed out to the team how shit it is or what what shouldn't have been done that way. I never ever want someone to pull well, I shouldn't say that because like I said before, in the next 20 years building's gonna change, and the houses we're building now will more than likely get renovation done on them. And although we've done our best job now, they it might not be to the standard in 20 years. It shouldn't be.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:16

I'd really hope it's not.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:17

Like it should be really they should be. Someone's probably gonna pull that shit apart and go, look what these fucking idiots did.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:22

Should have thrown out our name on it all, shouldn't we? Yeah, that's another thing. Like, I think it's something that we've we've spoken about a little bit, but how like a home, whether it's yeah, we it's it's a bit similar to how we have a um our turmoil stickers and things up here, but something where you could put a plaque on a house and you can s and and you you own that you've built that, yeah, that's what we should be all shrive to you. We want everyone to know. We want everyone to know we built this home. And um, and then that's going to probably flow into some other stuff that we want to do later. But the importance about what the way we're building, we definitely want future trades and people that come and work on that house down the track to understand how it's built and not do anything that can to the detriment of it. Yeah. That's um, mate.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:03

I couldn't think of anything better than um like that was I've I've only been to um Europe once, um, I think I was 24 or something, but that was one of the things that blew me away the most. That I could walk around and whether it was a terrace house or an old church or a cathedral or something, like almost every old building had a some sort of plaque, whether it was on a post on the on in a stone or something, that said this building was built in such and such, it took like 300 years to build, and this like uh some of them had like the architect or some of them had like the person that like they didn't call them builders, but like it had names on there.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:44

Whether they used to call them general contractors or something.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:46

Um and I just think that is excellent, like amazing. Like I would love to um but we uh we used to um do these little signs that we like they're only 300 by 300. We'd ask the client if we could let put them on the front fence, but like that is something that you and I are working towards and like wanting to include is um like when we finish our homes, having a some sort of sticker or plaque that goes on them that basically gives the homeowner all the information about what's gone into the building. But I wouldn't like that would be the proudest moment ever someone to open the door and say this this home was built in 2026 by DPS constructions.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:23

Like just but if if that if we're gonna do that and any build it, that changes the whole attack of how you're building that home then because you you've for generations that house everyone's gonna know who's built it. That's another thing that even making that mantry would be a good thing to sort out a lot of stuff, wouldn't it? Put it on the front. The fancy, everyone's gonna know who built that house.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:41

So um so when it's covered in mold, people know.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:44

Yeah, well, it just changes how you attack it.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:47

Yeah, it's just as a b industry, we've got to like we've really got to stop this race to the bottom. Because again, all all everything we've spoken about today all comes back to dollars. Like if you're if you're under the pump, you're not making money, you're you're not covering overheads, you're just you're just pushing to get to that next draw all the time. Yeah, it's just it's a disaster. And and at the end of the day, the it's not only the builder that's stressed, anxious, like there's depression, all those things are coming into it, like the client and their families are the ones that are getting let down. Yeah. Like they're living in buildings that they just that aren't up to the standard they should be.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:23

Yep. And unknowingly, probably a lot of the time too. That's a that's a big assumption that everyone, as I've been learning more, as I've been more learning more about building biology, that a lot of people assume that their brand new home is really healthy for them, and that's just a uh assumption. Um and we know lots of people now that have really bad um like um environmental illnesses that that they've tried that, they'll go to a brand new home and have sometimes the same, if not even worse, reactions from from off-gassing and things being a lot newer. So yeah, it's um I I've been loving the the learning curve. It's um still feel the more you learn, the more the more questions you come up with, and um, I still feel like we're like well yeah, we've got so long, so far to go with it and in that understanding, but it's mighty exciting the way it's going.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:06

Oh mate, it's the more I learn, the more I realise I don't know. Like it's just it's unbelievable that and again this might go on for hours, this podcast, but um I haven't talked about it on the podcast before. You just um jogged my memory. So something I've been talking to my team about um for a little while now is like obviously there's a lot of talk about off-gassing and chemicals and those types of things, but look, I'm a I'm a bit I wouldn't say I'm a conspiracy theorist, but I definitely think that things have agendas out there. But I don't know, and I it'd be interesting to get some feedback on this and see what people have noticed. But uh I know during my time and when I started contracting, like like when waterproofing was getting done uh in the bathrooms, like man, in the first thing in the morning you opened the door and walked into that house, it would knock your head off. Um, and even when the painters were in the house, like the painters would be in there, no mass spraying out, and like it was strong smell. Um even after the um painters have been done, like when you went back to a house to do all your final fit, put your door stops and catches on, fit your handles, tower rails, those sorts of things, like I I've after those days I would go home with a headache. Um but something I've sort of picked up in all this research and stuff that I'm doing is all these chemical companies, they're still the same bad chemicals, but they've taken the smell out of it. So they're now so we're if they're fooling us because we all think now because there's no smell, it's not harmful, but it's still just as harmful. It's just we can't smell it.

SPEAKER_03 1:40:40

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:41

So um I guess yeah, don't be fooled by all this no-smell stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:46

It is a real hard thing when I because we've been starting to assess a lot of materials, everything we're using, and um it's a really hard thing to actually do. Like a lot of manufacturers don't legally have to they don't have to disclose a chemical in a product until it's on a list that it where it can't be used.

SPEAKER_03 1:41:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:03

And there's they're very quick to substitute out as soon as something goes on a red list or um declar list or anything, one of the the um sort of lists that it where it's no longer recommended, they're very quick to change that out for something that's just as bad, but it's not known about yet. So that's just a real hard thing to get. And Paul talks about this, doesn't she? It's it's a that's a really hard thing to do, and you can you could spend bloody you could spend years trying to track some of this stuff down and we we're we're wanting to build in a uh healthier way a general health, but if there's people that are specifically allergic to a certain thing, like it can become really hard to build a house in a way that doesn't have it in it.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:40

Um the easiest way is just coming back to natural more natural materials.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:44

Look, and I think old school methods are the way I want to build our house is we won't be I I'm gonna be top nailing our timber floor down with no glue. I will not be using glues inside where anywhere where we can, where we where we have to, we'll be using, we'll be researching what it is. But during my apprenticeship, we never used glue. But not even on particle board. All these houses, everything's designed to move, like every material moves, shrinks and spans at a different rate. But what we do in our new construction, and like we sit in a plastered room now, like this whole house is designed to move, but we've got cornice adhered from surface to surface with cornice cement that doesn't move at all. And we wonder why we get hairline cracking and things like that. Things are designed to move, like we need to design in that way. And this is a this is a real benefit of being able to build this for ourselves where we're not. There will be I will be installing some things that don't uh adhere completely to the supply to the manufacturer's um or manufacturer's uh specifications or or warranty to to void that would void warranty. I don't need it to I don't need I think these warranties are very um watered down anyway from what I don't feel like many of them are worth the paper they're written on. But go there's a lot of arse cover in our industry, and that's what that's all these sort of things are in a lot of senses. And look, I'm not by any means saying go and just you know install things really nilly on clients' houses. Like there's a whole chain of sort of responsibility to come along with it. But um I think this is an opportunity for us to build our house in a way and demonstrate that it can be a really good finished product without all this shit in it.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:14

Yeah, I'm really curious now you've said that, because I that's one thing that I'd never even like it's just what we do now.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:22

Yeah, and look, we might yeah, I could go down that.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:26

My whole apprenticeship, and even for years as a contractor, we never glued floors down.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:30

And we'll be finished with natural oils, like these probably like we we always after these perfect finishes, and that's the that's the hard thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:37

Well, that's what's creating a lot of our problems.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:39

Yeah, when we want a perfect finish, there's no room. We have expansion joints and controlled expansion where wherever we can, but yeah, the systems, and that's where it comes back to design and in a holistic way, where the whole house works together. There's room for things to move where they need to move, and and we're not trying to and it's lucky that we mean tonight love that that the old aesthetic that you've been to our house. It's we don't like this new polished perfect stuff. Like that's not how we'll be building our house. But um you wait, it'll feel like a very homely house, it'll feel like a very welcoming place to build it.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:10

Well, it'll feel like it should. Yeah. But that's that's probably a whole other podcast as well. That's one of my biggest pet hates with rubbish. Like you people, and look, I get it, people are paying good money for things, but and they want everything to be absolutely perfect. So like look at tatware. Like you buy most tatware these days is comes in some sort of uh what I'm not gonna like felt type bag packaging, yeah, which is shipped for the environment, and then that bag is inside polystyrene or some sort of um shaped foam so the thing can't move around in the box, and then that's generally into plastic, and then that's in a cardboard box, and then that that cardboard box comes in a bigger cardboard box. Like you you you think about like when we when it comes time for plumbing electrical fit off on a job, oh the only trailer loads of shit that we take away. Well, you'll fill a 12 cubic meter skip with boxes, plastics, polystyrene, yeah, just because people don't want it to have a little tiny or hand prints or an imperfection in it.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:14

Like, yeah, that's it. Like a lot of the yeah, even we've only just touched on finishing and stuff in our place, but look, we we like antique looking brass, like antique brass or copper, like these natural products that they actually look better the more damage they get. Just a bit like they they get worn and they feel like they're they're worldly, they've been used. Yeah, these matte finished products and high gloss products, like it's it it really I'm not I'm not a designer. Definitely not, and this is just our personal preference, and it's a bit that's the luxury of being able to build your own customer. Yeah, but um we'll be building in a way that this house it it gets better with age.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:47

It that goes right back to where we started this conversation about this lifestyle that everyone's living, like where everything's perfect. Yeah, they're living in a big home with the perfect taps and the perfect joinery and the perfect floor coverings, and everything's got a filter on it when they take a photo anyway, so it doesn't really matter, does it?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:01

Touch it up. But yeah, it it it it's a real hard thing for us to combat in our industry. Is the perfection, is everything wanting a perfect finish? Because we're building with handmade materials a lot of the time, and what it's definitely been assembled by hand. Yeah, perfection isn't isn't um realistic, I don't think in a lot of in a lot of scenarios.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:19

Yeah, like a timber floor is meant to be like you walk into an older house or an old pub, and like it it's the character is in the floor. You see the footprints, you see where the tables have been dragged around and things have been scuffed up. Like that that adds to the product.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:32

Yeah, you can buy recycled timber floor now, like people pay more for that.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:35

Yeah, then like we're doing a heap of polished concrete floors, and like don't get me wrong, they they look amazing, but like have a have a think about the labour, or the cost of the labour, but then the cost of all the protection that we put on our jobs. Yeah, like the ramboards, the tapes, the drop sheets, the and that the up and down, like through the job, making sure that that product is perfect when the client meets it. Plus everything that can't the waste from the grinding of it and honing.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:00

Yeah, like that's massive bags of it coming out of the house, aren't they? Yeah, um, and that's comes back to you know that that although all the health measures and and them safety things are in place these days, there's still margin for error. Like that, that stuff's still gonna get disposed of somewhere. Like, yeah, I just really want to go back to some to just to a lot of oh like we had it figured out uh years ago. Yeah. If we fucked it up by we fucked it up in multiple ways.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:26

No, well mate, we'll we'll um we'll wrap it up because we like as people can already see when we start talking we can easily talk for hours.

Key Takeaways And Closing

SPEAKER_00 1:47:33

Um it's a mate, like I love your passion. Um and I yeah, I really appreciate the work you do in the business and definitely the help that you're uh putting into what we're doing at the moment. I think stay tuned. Like we'll we'll have Brent back, but um Brett and I are working on some really cool stuff at the moment, which I believe will make a massive difference to the building industry for people that are interested in it, so um stay tuned for that. Uh I'm not sure when this podcast will come out, but uh part of what we're working on, we will have some stuff going on around sort of February, March 2027. But yeah, I won't give too much away. But before we get out of here, mate, what's level up mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 1:48:08

I think it's keeping an open mind now. Yeah, I think it's keep an open mind and don't shit can anything if you don't understand it.

unknown 1:48:15

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:15

Yeah, that's awesome. Bang, wrap it up there. Well, um, guys, look, thanks for watching, really appreciate it. Make sure you uh Shay keeps telling me not to say this, but I'm gonna say it anyway. Make sure you uh like, share, subscribe, tag, do everything you can to help this podcast keep continuing to grow. Yeah, wherever you're watching it, YouTube, Spotify, Brothers Prout, all those things. But um, look, this podcast is on a mission. I don't know everything. Um, I don't want to know everything, but the whole this podcast, if this podcast does have an agenda, the agenda is to improve the building industry, and that's it. Just by sharing knowledge, sharing stories. Um, I love your feedback. Keep asking us questions. And look, if you're passionate about this sort of stuff, reach out, give us a shout-out. I'd love to have you sitting over there and have a conversation with you. Guys, go to the DwaynePears.com website and make sure you grab your level up merch so you can continue to help us grow this level up movement. Yeah, appreciate you listening or watching, and we'll see you on the next one.