Southern Comfort in a Straw Bale Home
(Page 6 of 7)
June/July 2004
By Claire Anderson
The home's thick straw bale walls provide an insulative value about twice as good as a typical wood-framed stud wall insulated with fiberglass batts. Large, south-facing glass doors admit an abundance of sunlight during the winter months to help warm the house, and lighting a fire in the woodstove thwarts the chill. Argon gas-filled, double-pane Anderson doors and windows also contribute to the the home's energy efficiency.
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Michael and Elise use propane for their cooking, hot water and backup space heating needs. Their Vestrost Eco-Fridge (also called ConServ) refrigerator requires only 330 kilowatt-hours of electricity per year to operate. (Even Energy Star-rated refrigerators of the same size consume about 10 percent more electricity than this highly efficient model.) An Energy Star Bosch stainless steel dishwasher blends with custom kitchen cabinets.
Natural light washes over almost every room in the house, except for the guest bathroom, which lies within four interior walls. But even there, light seeps in through a small, half-moon sidelight. And all but one room has outdoor access. French doors in the dining room, living room and master bedroom open onto the wraparound deck. The master bath and guest room both access a screened-in porch area on the west side of the house — a haven from gnats and mosquitoes that plague Southern summer evenings.
Setting a Standard
"We set out to build an exemplary straw bale home, one that could set a standard for alternative building in this area," Elise says. Setting an example others could follow meant jumping through some conventional hoops. They received the county's approval and also secured a traditional mortgage on this rather unconventional home. Elise located Aspen Mortgage of Santa Fe, N.M., through a resource article in The Last Straw.
The only stumbling block during the mortgage-approval process was the appraisal — no other local, comparable properties existed for the appraiser to reference in evaluating Elise and Michael's house. Thankfully, Elise says, Stefan Lark, president of Aspen Mortgage, stepped in to save the day. He assisted the local appraiser with the comparables, and after a few consultations, Elise and Michael received their fair market appraisal and mortgage loan.
They then bought homeowners insurance through USAA, a San Antonio-based insurance company that caters to military personnel.
'When I was first interested in straw bale construction," Elise says, "I had contacted USAA about obtaining insurance on a straw bale home, but they had told me "no." Several years later, when Michael and I started building our house, I got this phone call out of the blue. It was USAA, calling to go over my insurance policies. They said, "By the way, we have a note in your file that you inquired about straw bale. We're now insuring it." — Once the plaster work was finished, USAA called to tell Elise and Michael they were getting a discount on their insurance — because their home was now considered "fire-resistant."
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