Panelized Prefab Kit Home Building Show

Learn how to transform preliminary lifestyle concepts, napkin sketches, or online floor plans into permit-ready construction blueprints engineered for your specific building site. We discuss why taking a generalized floor plan and building across distinct geographic regions demands site-specific foundation adaptations—such as elevated pilings in hurricane storm-surge zones, walkout daylight basements on sloped alpine hillsides, or concrete slabs on flat Midwestern parcels. Discover how building departments enforce strict compliance checks, ranging from 200-pound staircase handrail load tests to residential acoustic decibel limits and native soil landscape nutrition standards. We examine how resolving custom room layouts, Jack-and-Jill bathrooms, and window schedules during the preliminary drawing phase prevents costly change orders during framing. Finally, see how owner-builders can browse 2,000+ kit home plans or order complete home building kits to keep projects on schedule and strictly on budget.

You don’t have to be an Architect to design your own home.  Listening to your ideas and placing them in our design processes creates the first set of plans so you can see and understand your home project.  Quick permit approval through properly designed and detailed plan sets specific to your building departments requests.

On this episode, Landmark Home and Land Company president Steve Tuma discusses the process of designing your new panelized kit home.

A: An identical floor plan footprint requires completely different foundation engineering depending on regional environmental forces. A flat Midwestern lot can utilize a standard slab or shallow basement, while a coastal parcel in Hurricane Alley requires reinforced pilings or concrete stilts engineered to withstand storm surges and wave action. On steep mountain terrain, the foundation must step down the grade using engineered retaining walls or a walkout basement to prevent lateral soil displacement.

A: Building codes require interior stair handrails and guardrails to withstand a concentrated structural load of at least 200 pounds applied in any downward or outward direction. This ensures that if an adult trips or falls, the handrail brackets, wall anchors, and framing studs will not pull free from the wall or collapse under sudden human impact.

A: Cost overruns rarely stem from unavoidable construction issues; they almost always result from poor preliminary planning or making layout changes during active framing. Omitting desired luxury features—such as covered porches, specialized kitchen islands, or deck hot tubs—during the blueprint stage forces contractors to issue expensive change orders and halt work in the field, driving up labor expenses and construction loan interest.

A: Densely populated suburban jurisdictions increasingly enforce exterior acoustic decibel limits (often capping sound transmission at 50 decibels at the property boundary). Complying with these standards requires incorporating sound-attenuation measures into the design, such as acoustic decoupling clips, dense mineral wool insulation, and multi-pane laminated windows to prevent mechanical systems, home workshops, or media rooms from disturbing adjacent neighbors.

A: A preliminary plan set includes dimensioned interior floor plans, exterior front, rear, and side elevations, roof geometry outlines, and a preliminary foundation layout. This working draft allows owner-builders to visualize traffic flow, verify window sightlines, check code clearances for hallways and stair rise-and-run, and gather competitive bids from trade subcontractors before finalizing stamped engineering calculations.

Stephen Interviewer: Hey everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Panelized Prefab Kit Home Building Show. With me as always is the President and Founder of Landmark Home and Land Company, a company which has been helping people build their new homes where they want exactly as they want across the nation and worldwide since 1993, Steve Tuma. How are you doing buddy?

Steve Landmark: Excellent. How are you doing today?

Stephen Interviewer: Life is good. I’m excited to get into this episode. I’ve been talking through with some friends of mine about building new homes and perhaps getting into the process of a panelized home. Since you know so much about it, I thought I would ask you a few things like – well, let’s say I were a new Landmark customer. How would Landmark – sort of layout how Landmark would work with me to start off with to design my new home?

Steve Landmark: Well, that’s an interesting process because a lot of this depends on kind of where you’re going to build and different lifestyles that people have. If you’re living in the city, maybe where you’ve got a 50 by 100 lot or 75 by 100 lot, that’s one situation. Maybe you’re a family that has got an active lifestyle and you live in the mountains Colorado. Maybe you’re someone that likes to ski. So again, it’s a mountain property. Maybe it’s a city situation. Maybe it’s raw acreage. You know, you’ve got 20 acres somewhere that you want to build or even waterfront or ocean or lakefront. They’re slightly different processes. But fundamentally, we’re believers in making sure that the house fits your lifestyle, but also that it fits the land properly.

So generally what happens is families will come through and they will have an idea to some point of – at the preliminary thought stage, saying, “Hey, I need 2000 square feet, three bedrooms, two baths and a two-car garage and we’re an active family. So we’ve got bikes and motorcycles and trucks and minivans and whatever we need.”

So there’s generally an idea. So some people may be active. Some people might be centered more around the work. They need something set up at their house. A lot of home offices are coming in, retirees that have businesses, younger couples that have businesses. So they want to have a separate office or work space. There’s also many people that have like really interesting hobbies. Some people are into woodworking. Some people make large scale model planes. Some people are into railroad. Some people are into music.

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: So you kind of tie the whole concept together of where they want to live and sometimes people say, “Hey, I want to build in a certain town in Colorado and this is what we want.” So they will go through and generally the customers will have a general idea of what they believe they want. So they will go through and say, “I want a two-story. I want a big wrap-around porch. I like wrap-around porches. When the families come over, we could spend time together and we got to have a two-car garage or a three-car garage,” for whatever reason.

So we will work at that general idea. We will review the plans, look at it. Customers will generally say, “Hey, I need to make that better and bigger. Make the garage larger, you know, or move the garage to the side,” or whatever it is. So then we would work with them and also figuring out where it’s going because if you took a house, say just a – for the purpose of a simple picture in everyone’s mind, a 1000-square-foot ranch, just a typical all-American ranch and you put it on flat land in Iowa, the foundation and design will likely be very different than if you stuck it on the hill in Colorado with a higher snow load.

Then yet if you said, “No, I want to go build this in Key West in Florida where the hurricanes are at,” suddenly the structure will look a little bit different. You know, so we have to be able to be flexible. The concept being that if you’re building in Iowa on a flat piece of land, you could do a slab, crawl space or basement.

If you’re on the side of the hill in Colorado, you’re probably going to have a crawl space or maybe a walkout basement to work with the slope of the land. If you’re building on the Florida Keys, it’s probably going to be up on stilts, so that the home is above the storm surge. So that’s what we have to look at is how does the concept of the customer saying, “Hey, I want a certain size home with so many bedrooms and such a garage.” How do we actually fit it to the land and make sure that it works? That’s one of the very important things because there’s regulations that come into it, but there’s also just kind of common sense things.

I want to be able to get my house. Obviously, if you’ve got a house on stilts in Key West, you got to have a staircase to go up to the door and you’re not going to have a basement. In Iowa, you could do whatever you want. So that’s one of the things. We kind of take the concept, the light bulb. Hey, I want to build a ranch home and then we can take it down to the point where we could develop a permittible and buildable set of plans. That’s where we come in is taking the concept, putting it on paper, so that it works, makes sense, works in the budget that they’re shooting for. You can obtain permits and then also build it.

So that’s how we work. We take their idea and formulate it down into something on paper, so that they can see the house, obtain permits and then also go through to build it.

Stephen Interviewer: Well, I’m your average customer and let’s say this is the first time I built a house. Now I’m not an architect. So is there some way, like is there a variety of templates or plans that I can work with that I – to start with say and design my own sort of ideas based around something that Landmark already has or do we have to start from scratch?

Steve Landmark: We can start from any point. We’ve actually got a couple of thousand plans on our website. So –

Stephen Interviewer: A couple of thousand?

Steve Landmark: Yeah, a couple of thousand and so people can go through and search through to say, “I want a two-story from 2000 to 2200 square feet with a three-car garage.” It will come up with a selection. They can use those as a starting point or they can actually develop their own ideas. We’ve actually had some people that have sketched it on a napkin.

Stephen Interviewer: That would be me.

Steve Landmark: Yeah. Well, it works. You sketch it out on a napkin. You text it to us or fax or email it to us and then we can grow the idea from there. So you don’t have to be an architect. You don’t have to go back to your high school drafting class ideas and figure this out. Just get us your concept. We’ve worked with people that are deaf. We’ve worked with people that are blind. So they don’t always have an ability to get the details to us. But we are able to understand the concepts and then get it to paper. So whether you can put it on paper or not, we can work with you. But most people have a general concept. They will say, “Hey, I want 1500 square feet with a basement and a two-car garage.”

But we do have the ideas on the website. They can send us their ideas. We will take it from there, put it on paper and in our preliminary plan stage, we can go through and actually review their needs. So we could draw it up. They could see the rooms with all the dimensions, the elevations, the roof plan and a preliminary foundation plan. So then you could look at it and say, “Hey, that’s what I want. But I still want to add a two-car garage. I need to redo the kitchen. Let’s add a window in the dining room overlooking the big backyard.”

We can work all those details out in the preliminary plan stage. The idea is they can then get – design and build and get the house that they want. That’s the key element. They’re not stuck with having to choose from 10 plans and then hope that they work.

Stephen Interviewer: So if I’m working with Landmark and I’m designing a plan, either on my own or based on something that you guys have on our website, let me ask you one thing. Obviously, you’re not going to make me feel like an idiot when I call. But is there some way that I can count on Landmark sort of talking me through things or even let’s say I’ve got a good idea, but it may not work with that design. Are you guys able to tell me why and maybe tell me what the alternatives would be?

So maybe I’ve got an idea for a certain stairwell or something. But – and you say, “Well, that won’t work for that design. But here’s what we can do.” Are you guys that involved in the process.

Steve Landmark: Oh, yeah, we can help. We have full architectural services, full structural engineering. So let’s just say someone is asking for something that they saw in a picture someplace and sometimes this happens. They see a picture of a $10 million home and it has got some dual spiral staircase that’s suspended and all these things. The staircase could have been $200,000 itself. They say, “Hey, this is what I want. But I want to put this in my $300,000 house.”

We could take the concepts and put it into the house so that we can work through to make sure that the rise and run of steps, make sure the steps fit, make sure it puts together and go through to a – make sure the end result is there.

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: Now obviously, if it costs $200,000 to build a custom staircase in some mega mansion, it’s probably not going to fit in a regular $200,000 home. But the concept being – is we can give them a nice staircase. We can give them the entry they want. We can work with them on the kitchen layout and that’s the key element that we could do is go through to put some reasonableness to the design, so it makes sense on what they’re building and also work towards the target budget.

That’s one of the key elements that I see because a lot of times, people’s ideas are pretty good. It doesn’t match the budget or sometimes they just don’t understand like you were suggesting, saying, how do I go through and take this general concept of – hey, how do I get my bedrooms here? How do I get a Jack and Jill bathroom? How do I get a big family eat-in kitchen? Or hey, we don’t really need a dining room but we need a gaming room or a theater room.

How do we tie it together? That’s exactly what we do in the plan process because a lot of people understand, hey, I want a bedroom 12 by 12, the extra bedroom 12 by 12, the master bedroom 14 by 14. But the actual putting it together is the key element I think of how we can help and that’s where we come into it because there’s a lot of code details. Hallways have to be a minimum width. Staircases have to have a certain rise and run on the steps and those are things that we calculate so that it’s all put together. Make sure there’s enough space in the kitchens. Make sure the windows are the right size for egress so that if there’s an emergency and someone had to jump out the window, the window is the right size.

So we can work in a lot of those details. So you’re right. You don’t have to be an architect. You can just be someone with an idea and then we formulate it into a set of plans that’s usable.

Stephen Interviewer: You had mentioned Colorado for instance. I imagine your experience since 1993, it’s a long time to be in business, you guys have pretty much built houses in every state. I would imagine in every kind of terrain possible. So are there some terrains like mountainous areas or beach areas or desert areas? Are there some environments that are maybe a little more difficult or can you pretty much solve everybody’s problem no matter where they’re building?

Steve Landmark: Well, we’ve been able to work in all those areas. I mean we built in areas that are below sea level. We built in the highest populated city in the 48 states, Leadville, Colorado. We built houses in the Florida Keys, right in Hurricane Alley. We built them in California right on the earthquake zones.

So all of those, we can help customers. But they have different applications.

Stephen Interviewer: Right, right.

Steve Landmark: And in certain places, there’s more regulations. Like if you go into certain states, there’s parts of Texas and Missouri and other states, where in some areas you don’t need a building permit. You could just go out and start building your house and then there are other places where it gets to be very complex. There’s a lot of regulations. But the reality of it is we’ve done it. So we understand the codes. We understand working through the processes. We understand what the building department requests. So it’s pretty rare that we get stumped.

Some of these details can be pretty in-depth. We’ve got different projects going on right now where some building departments are asking some questions that are pretty extreme. They sound weird. But when you think about it, it kind of makes sense.

Let me bring one up. This is the first time ever. It’s in Newport Beach, California. They’re asking us to do structural engineering for the handrail, to know that it will support a 200-pound weight if – you know, so the idea being that if someone fell, they grab the handrail. It would be supported. It wouldn’t come out of the wall.

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: Now someone could say, “Hey, that’s picky.” But hey, if you were falling on your staircase, wouldn’t you want that?

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: So it sounds interesting. We got another one where they need to do a landscape plan. We’ve done them before. So I kind of thought, “Hey, they probably just want to make sure you don’t plan the big old oak tree between you and your neighbor’s house so that the fire department couldn’t get through.”

I’m thinking, “Well, that kind of makes sense.” But they’re asking about where their geraniums are, where all the different posies and the tulips are going and they actually want to know if the nutrition – there’s enough nutrition in the soils to support that plant. Now someone could say, “Hey, that’s crazy,” and it kind of is a little extreme. But on the other side, isn’t it nice to know that people are going to be spending money to plant plants that will grow instead of spending money on landscaping and it doesn’t?

So those are extreme situations. But most situations, the building department wants to know that it’s clear what you’re building. So that they can go through and make sure like egress for windows are good, hallways are the proper width. Make sure light and ventilation codes are proper. They want to know structurally it’s sound, so it stands up and it doesn’t sag.

All of us have gone through neighborhoods and you see a sag in a roof or a deck or a front porch that’s kind of leaning. That devalues the neighborhood, so the building departments want to know that structurally it’s sound. More and more want to know that the house is energy-efficient. You know, a lot of people say, “Why do I have to do energy codes?” I’m like, “Well, it’s going to save you money.” Your house is going to be more comfortable. It’s going to be more affordable to heat or cool it.

Then in some places, they have green codes just to make sure that you’re building a house with the most sustainable materials that are there. So we can go through and do all these things. We can also develop the site plans, make sure the house fits on the lot, building setbacks, make sure the driveway is put together properly. Those are the details that we can work with to supply a set of plans so that it’s clear to the building department, the customer and the contractor what’s to be built or the subcontractor.

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: A lot of our customers actually build their own homes. Some people, their whole family is involved. Other people kind of manage it and they hire people. So we look at the set of plans not as a hassle. We look at them as a method of communication to make sure it’s clear between the customer, the building department, and then the subcontractors. That gives you control of the project. It helps you control your schedule because you’re not doing a bunch of changes and getting delays and people say, “Well, I thought you wanted that. There it is right on the plans.”

Then it also helps you control your budget because you could preplan what you’re going to build and then go through. Sometimes people say, “Oh, Steve, why do I have to engineer the house? Why do I have to do this? Why do I have to do that?” and I said, “Well, it’s kind of simple. When was the last time you drove from Los Angeles to New York and said, hey, let’s just drive west from Los Angeles? Never.” You kind of get an idea. You look at a map and you get a general idea.

Stephen Interviewer: Yeah, of course.

Steve Landmark: So building the home is – should be the same thing. It gives you control and understanding of the project. That’s how we can help people. I think that’s an extremely valuable process and I kind of call it doing your homework upfront. Know what you’re doing and then start building instead of start building and then doing changes because – an interesting thing that I hear is, “Oh, home projects always go over budget.” I say, “Well, are they going over budget or were they improperly planned?”

Interviewer: Ah-ha. Right.

Steve Landmark: Or are people doing changes? So when they’re working on the budgets – say Stephen you were doing something and you’re working on a budget. Say you have a $350,000 budget to build a house and you said, “Oh, OK. To make 350, I’m not going to put the Jacuzzi in the back deck.”

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: Well, the house is built. You fall in love with it. You say, “Oh, I got to do the Jacuzzi.” Well, is that a change or is that an over-budget? Because you just weren’t straight with yourself upfront on the budgeting. So that’s what we suggest people do.

Stephen Interviewer: It sounds to me like there’s an extensive consultation that comes with being a Landmark customer, which I think is pretty amazing. I’m not so sure that – even if the average customer might think that they have a – that they have a solid idea of what the house is that they want to build. It sounds to me like Landmark is willing to work through the process of design, to get me as close as possible to my let’s say dream home and yet bring me into reality in a nice way.

Steve Landmark: Right.

Stephen Interviewer: So that I know that I’m getting good advice that’s going to help me in the building process.

Steve Landmark: That’s kind of the point. Sometimes it’s not just getting into reality. It’s understanding the process.

Interviewer: Right, yeah.

Steve Landmark: All of us have lived in a home or apartment before. We know what a window is. We know what a kitchen is. We know what a toilet is. We know what a door is. We know what a floor is. But how do you put that together so that it works for you? So people will understand that that’s where we come in.

So if someone has got an idea, step A, and they want to get to step Z, Z is the finished house, move in, invite your family over, we can help in the processes that are there to make it easier for them, make the project more successful and then minimize the learning curve. That’s kind of the key element.

So someone could call up and say, “Hey, Steve. My building department just asked me about green codes. What is that?” Bam! We have the answer. We can go through, figure out exactly what needs to be done, put it together. Other things that are coming up, building departments might come up with sound-deadening situations. Some of them are saying, “Your house can’t emit more than 50 decibels of sound, so you don’t annoy your neighbor.” You know, different situations like that.

We can help with it. So instead of someone having to research or go ask other friends, we’re an email, a text or a call away and then we could provide that answer so that they can go through. The key to it, a lot of these things we’re dealing with upfront and the customers don’t even realize it. It’s just part of our process.

Stephen Interviewer: Right.

Steve Landmark: It’s part of our process of doing it right and helping the customer. We’re providing value. We’re not just drawing plans saying, “Hey, here’s a cute house.” We’re making sure that the design makes sense for what they intend to do.

Stephen Interviewer: Well, we’re about out of time now. But Steve, once again, thanks for all the information. Can you give us the website and the phone number, so the listeners out there can get a hold of you?

Steve Landmark: Yeah. The best thing to do is you can give a call, 800-830-9788 and then also the website, it’s four letters, kind of the initials of Landmark Home and Land Company,  www.lhlc.com. So L as in landmark, H as in home, L as in land, C as in company dot com.

Stephen Interviewer: Awesome. That’s about it for today, folks. Thanks for joining us again on the Panelized Home Show for Steve Tuma. I’m Stephen Savage and we will catch you next time.

Learn how off-site panelized manufacturing, integrated architectural drafting, and site-specific structural engineering allow owner-builders to bypass the design limits of modular construction while dramatically outperforming slow on-site stick framing. We examine how computerized linear optimization saws and precision flat assembly tables deliver square, plumb wall panels and trusses directly to your jobsite on 53-foot flatbed trailers. Discover how numbered assembly blueprints enable framing crews to stand and dry-in a 2,000-square-foot structural framing shell in just two to five days, minimizing lumber exposure to rain and jobsite weather damage. Explore how regional climate adaptations—such as elevated 8-to-12-foot storm-surge stilts in coastal Florida, sloped walkout basements in alpine Colorado, or seismic slab ties in California—are coordinated with thermal energy calculations to ensure seamless plan check reviews. Finally, see how panelized prefab home packages combine with a comprehensive panelized kit home delivery model to keep your custom build strictly on schedule and on budget.

Panelized home plans and kit homes and their benefits.  Standardized home plans compared to plans customized to our own home design and building site.  Benefits of proper planning.

A: Traditional on-site stick framing requires carpenters to manually measure, cut, assemble, and stand individual studs on an open subfloor, often taking weeks to complete the framing shell. A precision panelized package arrives with pre-sheeted 8-foot wall sections and engineered trusses that allow a small crew to stand the walls, set the roof structure, and achieve a dried-in, weather-tight shell in as little as two to five days.

A: Fiberglass batt insulation functions by trapping tiny air pockets within its spun fibers, creating a thermal barrier that slows heat transfer. When installers compress high-density batts into undersized wall cavities, electric junction boxes, or tight plumbing bays, those air pockets are crushed, significantly reducing the insulation’s installed R-value and causing the home to fail prescriptive energy inspections.

A: In rural jurisdictions with minimal plan review protocols, obtaining building permits can take as little as two to four weeks. However, in sophisticated building departments that require engineer-stamped blueprints, lateral shear calculations, regional energy models, and environmental site reviews, the planning and permit approval process realistically takes between four and six months before foundation work can begin.

A: Panelized home packages arrive secured on a 53-foot flatbed trailer, with wall panels stacked horizontally like pancakes in banded bundles of 8 to 10 sections. Roof trusses are grouped and banded together, while loose materials such as floor joists and subflooring are packaged into separate bunks, allowing an extended-reach forklift to quickly unload and stage bundles around the foundation according to the numbered assembly plan.

A: While municipalities enforce a unified national model building code, structural requirements change radically based on local geographic forces. The identical 1,200-square-foot footprint engineered for a flat lot in the Midwest must be adapted into an elevated structure set on 8-to-12-foot pilings to withstand coastal storm surges in Florida, or redesigned with reinforced shear hold-downs and heavier roof truss plates to bear heavy snow loads and seismic ground motion in the Rocky Mountains.

Stephen Interviewer:
Hello everyone, and welcome to the first ever edition of the panelized home show. I am your host, Stephen Savage and with me is my good friend Steve Tuma, President of Landmark Home and Land Company. A company that has been helping people build and design their dream homes in the US and Worldwide since 1993.
How are you doing Buddy?

Steve Landmark:
Excellent! Pretty good day to talk about a new method of building a home. Getting it designed so that people can build their own home, control the quality, gain equity and know exactly what they are getting for their money.

Stephen interviewer:
That is awesome because I think that is why people are tuning in. To hear this type of information. Let me tell the audience what our hopes are for this show and what we are going to be about as we move forward in other episodes. About the unique world of panelized homes and what it takes, these days to build the perfect dream home for you. He has some great insights in how to make that happen. So Steve, let’s start off, could you explain to the audience, the difference of panelized homes, which is what your company Landmark does and modular homes and of course the traditional home building project.

Steve Landmark:
Yes, there are a variety of different ways to build a house. There is conventional building which is considered to be stick building. You take the sticks, two by fours or sixes cut them and nail them together to make a wall panel, sheath them and lift the wall panel up. You work outside in the weather on the building site. Modular homes are kind of made in modules. You probably know them by seeing them go down the road. The two halves of the home that are being driven down the road that is then brought to a building site set with a crane and then finished on site. So the modules are say, 80% completed, drywalled, wired, details are there, they just need to be tied together. Those modules have limitations and have to be built on a production line. The stick built can do custom, pretty much anything.

Stephen Interviewer:
By stick built you mean…
Steve Landmark:
Conventional framing. Like when you see guys on a foundation taking two by fours, cutting them, nailing them making a wall section that’s the conventional stick framing. What we do is panelized which is closer to stick building.
It’s a more efficient process of stick building. The reason for the efficiency is we can design and engineer all the cuts in our computer systems, know the material counts, reuse any extra materials and then also build them in a production facility on a flat table. So you are able to get square walls and things that are just more efficient.
So it’s made in a production line and then put on a truck and brought out to the building site so instead of the actual framers cutting studs, plates, different materials to make a wall, they just take the wall off the truck, stand it up and then go around.
So, the example is if you had a 40’ wall on your home we might make that into five 8’ sections. So it is very quick to go up and in some cases can put up a couple thousand square foot home in two to four or five days. Where stick building will take much longer.
The efficiencies are there of the production line but it also allows for the customization where you can pretty much do any home design that you want. We have just refined the processes by involving our designing engineering, energy codes, site planning, green codes so that we can develop a complete plan set so a customer thoroughly understands what it is they are building.
They can control the budget, the schedule and then monitor the end result. It also will help with easy planning, building processes as well as the inspection processes so overall its efficiency. Control of your project and cost savings. Those are the advantages.

Stephen Interviewer:
I know that this sounds like, the way you are explaining it, sounds very simple and that’s great. I know there is probably a lot more involved. Let’s say I am a customer that calls you and I am looking to build a house. Give me kind of a quick rundown of the design and process of permitting and all that stuff. What does landmark do for me as a new customer right off the bat?

Steve Landmark:
Well, you are right in that there is a lot more to it. That is where we come in. Because most people aren’t structural engineers, green code or energy efficiency geniuses, but they know what they want we can help. They say I want a house with an octagon bump out, 12’ ceiling, energy efficient home with some green code details to make sure the home is a sustainable design.
They know what they want but they don’t necessarily know how to execute it. That is where we come into play. We can take them from A to Z. They have the concepts that they want to build a Victorian home in Denver, so they know where they are now, they have a piece of land and the last is the Z, which is moving in the home.
We can fill in the places by making the design so that the home is laid out the way they want it so they can determine where they want rooms, window doors, garages, and kitchen and bathroom layouts. We then do all the behind the scenes work of making work it complies to building department requirements, supply all the documentation, structural calculations, energy codes and then make sure that all the plans match.
Now that sounds a little odd, plans match? You would think they are but not all plan methods are the same. So if your energy code says you need to have a certain insulation in the wall, all of our plans will match that. Makes it easier to obtain permits, make sure your contractors, need to know what needs to be done and gives you, our customer, the ability to retain control of the project which means you can stay on schedule and your budget works better.
We tie all the loose ends together. We are the one-stop shop behind, the scenes, a cross of Architect, Structural Engineer, Energy Efficiency Person and Production Manager all in one. We are able to, through one point of contact, make it much easier for our customer to design and build their own home.
Its ease and convenience, knowledge and responsiveness.

Stephen Interviewer:
So, that’s great and answers a lot of questions. What I am thinking is Landmark is pretty much a one-stop shop for the new owner builder. The guy who has an idea for his dream house. You mentioned a couple of times now about energy efficiency etc. Can you give us a layout of those details? The permits in different areas vary and you probably have to deal with that a lot. Can you give us a breakdown of what Landmark does as far as building energy efficient homes and how you deal with various building departments in different regions across the country?

Steve Landmark:
There are a couple of points there. Energy efficiency can go house by house and building site by building site. A lot of people think that you just put R21 insulation in the wall and the home is energy efficient. Well that may be the case, but what we do is look at the overall structure of the home and where it is placed.
The prime example is, say you were in the desert South West and you were in a house with a big glass wall facing south. Glass doesn’t have a big R value. It is not a good insulator. If your wall is 80% glass, which glass is going to act as a magnifier and heat your home. So in the summer, you will need extra air conditioning. In winter it can be beneficial.
We can work with you on the design of the home to create shade in certain times of the year so that not as much sun gets in. We can also work on the orientation of the home for energy efficiency to keep the sun in or out. We also work in different methods to insulate different ways and recommendations for heating and cooling systems. The key to this isn’t more insulation, it’s knowing that it gets specified properly and then make sure it is installed properly. So there are a lot of situations where the simple example, is people go out and buy the R21 insulation, compress it, and then they have defeated the purpose of the insulation.
It is the proper installation of the insulation materials that is also important. That is why we suggest guidelines are put together, mandatory measures, so people know the contractor is to follow a specific method and follow it to make sure it is installed properly. You then have a good home. What has happened previously is people have done energy calculations with improper installation and then they complain that their home isn’t energy efficient. That is what we do, we point these details out to our customers, the owner-builder so that they understand the process. We shorten their learning curve so it is easier for them to understand and control their project.
You had a second question about building departments.
A lot of people say they have the toughest building department. Well, it’s a national code, it’s the application of that code to your building site that is important. So, if you are going to build a home, let’s say, for example, a simple 1,200 square foot ranch and you were to put it Key West, Florida. You have storm surge situations and high wind speeds from the hurricanes. The house may look the same but the structure, the skeleton, is going to be a lot different due to the high wind speeds and storm surge than if you took the exact same home in Iowa, on a flat piece of land where there are no earthquakes, hurricanes, high snow loads, say you would have in the Rockies. What we are able to do is take the home that you want and design it for your exact site.
So the example of that 1,200 square foot ranch home. If you build it in Key West, Florida, it would likely be on piers 8’ to 12’ tall. In Iowa, it may be in a crawlspace, basement, or slab foundation. If you put it in the Rockies, says Leadville, Colorado on the side of the hill where the land slopes down, you may have a walkout basement. We can work with you to make sure all these details are put together so the home fits the land. So there are efficiencies in building and cost control also energy efficiency.
Also to make sure it is planned properly, you can confirm your budget and then continue on with a plan that makes sense. Eliminates having to do changes throughout the process. Those changes cost money and will hurt your schedule. Better to plan it out up front, make sure it is accepted by the building department and then execute the building. It’s the homework you do up front and the planning that makes the permitting and building much easier. That is the key element.

Stephen Interviewer:
As a customer, if I were in California and I am building a pretty basic home, windows where I want them, and for a slab foundation, etc. Exactly what I am responsible for as the customer and give me an idea of what the home looks like when it’s delivered. When it comes to my building site, what can I expect to see?

Steve Landmark:
What you can expect is that we will give you the support that you need. Some customers are more advanced and some need more help. We can go through and provide help as a “one-stop shop.” Details you may need include energy codes, lot planning, and all details included for the building department. You bring up California. They are strict but even in California there are building departments which are much stricter than others. Some of the details that have been requested and we gladly supply are more extreme in different areas. That is the key element, helping you through the process. We understand it and have gone through it. If a curveball question comes up by a building department, we have likely already taken care of it in other projects. This is the case across the country including New York, Illinois, Colorado, California, Florida, Washington State and Iowa. We have a lot of experience with that.

As far as what we deliver, It is interesting. A lot of people think we deliver a manufactured panelized wood home which is true, but we also deliver the complete plan set in paper or electronic format. Whatever your building department needs. People forget this. They think, hey plans, I’ll just go online, or go by my neighbor and give him $500 for plans. It’s not that simple. Not all plans are created equal. We deliver the plan set and paper copies so you can submit for permits. If there are checklist items from the building department, we then supply the answers on another plan set so you are ready to go. You have all the paper plans you need.

After you install the foundation, we deliver the panelized home package on a flatbed truck. Stephen, it’s just like the flatbed trucks you see on the highway every day. A 53’ foot flatbed with a tractor on the front that is up to 80’ long. Wall panels are stacked like pancakes and banded together in groups of 8 to 10 panels. Roof trusses are stacked and banded together as well. Loose materials, floor framing, I joists floor trusses, etc. are banded together. It’s a clean precision delivery. We deliver on the date that we work out with you. We work along with your schedule and it works well. The key to it is we also supply complete assembly pans, showing where each component is placed. Wall one goes here, wall three there, etc. truss one goes here, etc.

Stephen Interviewer:
Like a big puzzle!

Steve Landmark:
Well, we give you the answer. You aren’t there scratching your head. It’s very easy to follow. Lastly, is customer service. If you need help, you pick up the phone and we will take care of you and get you what you need to move along. People find that to be extremely important. In today’s world, there isn’t much customer service that should be there, but we work extremely hard to make sure that people are taken care of and supported. If they need help we help them.
Stephen Interviewer:
I have dealt with that lately in my life. Customer service is a thing of the past. Landmark is known for their great customer service which is a good thing. Always a plus.
So Steve, anything else before we end today’s episode. Anything you want to run down before we give out the website.

Steve Landmark:
I think it’s important to know that now is the season and give yourself enough time to plan through. If you are in a state that needs engineered stamped plans, it can take 4 to 6 months to develop plans and obtain permits. Simpler areas can just take a week or two. The key is to take the time to understand your project. We will help you with it. Also, help you understand your project and also plan it properly. You want to know what you are doing and we are here and can provide that help at our convenience.

Stephen Interviewer:
On your website, you have informational videos.

Steve Landmark:
Yes, we have videos at LHLC.com. There are plans, details on permitting processes, what’s included in our package, videos, and also ways to contact us. People can call or send a direct email. Call us at 800-830-9788 or email at [email protected]
We will work with you right away.

Stephen Interviewer:
You mentioned that Mike as the email address. This a family owned business which is rare in America and it’s nice to see that you and your brother have started this amazing company.

Steve Landmark:
It all started all with an idea in 1993. Started as a local company to a national and international company. We can help you as well.

Stephen Interviewer:
Yes, that’s LHLC.com. You can find videos, information and all you need to start building your new home.
Steve, Thanks so much, it’s been a great show.

Steve Landmark:
Thanks!