National momentum on green building valuation grows...

Team work. This graphic of the players needed in the green build and sales process (courtesy of NAR and the MLS Green Toolkit) expresses the team of professionals needed to establish the proper value for high performance buildings.

The great news for us in the green home building and sales market is that there is significant national momentum towards building the professional teams in the graphic above.

On July 15th the Appraisal Practices Board released a first exposure draft of Valuation of Green Buildings: Background and Core Competency. In the draft the APB says that this will be the first of three advisories on national best practices for appraisers hired to establish value for a green building. One quote from the draft, "The transistion towards green buildings, green building codes and technologies, and the growing awareness of the relevance of sustainability to the marketplace...can be viewed as part of the natural evolution of the real estate industry as it adapts to environmental, societal, and economic changes."

The NAR Green REsource Council is close to releasing the Green MLS Implementation Guide v1.0 in tended to help the 860 or so privately owned Multiple Listing Service organizations in the US have guidance on adding green data fields for listings. Important to note is that in 2009 only a handful of MLS vendors offered fields for green or high performance homes.

To the team of people and organizations within the real estate industry that are working to make our home or businesses energy consumption part of a solution to reduce stress not only on our own utility bills, but also the environment and the energy grid: Keep up the great work!