Are you tired of feeling chilly drafts in the winter, despite cranking up the heat? Does your air conditioner seem to run constantly in the summer just to keep the house comfortable? The real culprit might be something you can’t see: air leakage. This uncontrolled escape of conditioned air from your home is a major … Read more
The Children’s Home of Cincinnati (formerly the Lakewood Baptist Church) is parceling out the north half of their property on Westwood Northern Blvd. 4.95 acres of wooded hillside and a huge urban lake. This one would be a super fun spot to build an eco home or compound on. Officially it’s in Green Township (Hamilton … Read more
When people hear the term “passive house,” (or passivhaus) they often think of passive solar design, which uses the sun to naturally heat a home. While harnessing the sun’s energy for free heat is a core principle, it’s not as simple as just letting all the sunlight in. In fact, a well-insulated, airtight home can … Read more
Contrary to the listing, locals know this isn’t Clifton. But it’s a super interesting spot in CUF. Behind the bustle of the University of Cincinnati and some student housing lies some neat hillside housing. This street is a good exampe of a bizarre Cincinnati urbanism enigma: it’s a street of nicely maintained, small, dense single … Read more
Cincinnati’s zoning isn’t great. In some aspects, it needs a ton of improvement. We’ve undergone a couple of different incremental upgrades and my biggest complaint when these happened is that it actually added complexity to the code instead of simplification. Both the Form-Based-Code (FBC) of 2013 and the Connected Communities (CC) of 2024 created overlays … Read more
Finding the perfect plot of land to build your new home is a thrilling and sometimes stressful journey. Like buying an existing house, you’re limited to what’s currently available. In today’s fast-paced real estate market, that inventory changes daily. In the Cincinnati area alone, there are hundreds of options, from publicly listed parcels to private … Read more
This one’s in my backyard, so I absolutely love the location. BUT it’s not an easy site to work on. It is over an acre across 4 parcels. But they’re separated by a paper street, and doesn’t directly connect to the existing street. The skinny parcel is near the end of Badgeley (by the trail … Read more
I’m all about the weird spots to build that can contribute (and benefit) from urban density. This big lot in Mt Auburn is tucked away from the traffic, down the hill from Christ Hospital and nestled on a quiet street next to Inwood Park. This spot wouldn’t be about the view (like other Mt Auburn … Read more
I’m genuinely excited about these three parcels. I researched them extensively in the past and even reached out to the owner because this was a spot where I dreamed of building my own Passive House. The location is truly stellar. A treeline owned by the railway separates it from the highway, and you have a … Read more
