Building a new home can be an exciting and rewarding venture. Support and protection to homeowners is offered through the government agency – BC Housing and its Licensing and Consumer Services branch. In addition, public for-profit companies provide 2/5/10 warranty for homes in BC.

The Licensing and Consumer Services (LCS) branch administers the Homeowner Protection Act and helps protect the consumer. When unethical builders and homeowners try to circumvent the law and get caught, they are subject to stiff penalties. See this link for disciplinary actions against disreputable builders and homeowners.

If a homeowner chooses to act as the contractor and build their own home, they are considered Owner Builders. As of July 4, 2016, anyone who wishes to build a new home in British Columbia as an owner builder must apply for an Owner Builder Authorization and pass an exam. The exam is designed to test an applicant’s knowledge and understanding of home building basics as well as the statutory obligations and requirements that owner builders must meet under the Homeowner Protection Act. This will help owner builders expand their knowledge, improve the quality of construction, and protect subsequent buyers of owner-built homes.

It is critical to note that it is illegal for an Owner Builder to hire another contractor to build their home using the Owner Builder exemption.

BC Housing – Licensing and Consumer Services

Formerly known as the Homeowner Protection Office (HPO), the Licensing and Consumer Services (LCS) branch of BC Housing, is the government agency responsible for licensing residential builders and administering Owner Builder Authorizations. They have the power to cancel the license of the builder and levy financial penalties. Ultimately, they protect the consumer by ensuring that new homes are covered by home warranty insurance. Wendy Acheson is Vice-President & Registrar of Licensing and Consumer Services, and also the person you will often see in the news. She is responsible for administering the Homeowner Protection Act, overseeing licensing compliance and consumer-service operations. Wendy has led important initiatives to increase the quality of residential construction and strengthen consumer protection. LCS also monitors the provision of third-party home warranty insurance.

Warranty Providers

Builders are responsible for arranging home warranty insurance through a warranty provider.
The warranty provider issues a 2/5/10 home warranty insurance policy when the home is completed or occupied and provides the following protection:
• One year on defects in materials and labour or violation of the Building Code.
• Two years on defects in materials and labour supplied for the mechanical systems, as well as for the exterior cladding, caulking, windows and doors, that may lead to detachment or material damage to the new home and violation of the Building Code.
• Five years on the building envelope includes the components that separate the indoors from the outdoors.
• Ten years for defects in materials and labour that result in the failure of a load-bearing part of the new home, and for any defect that causes structural damage.

There are four warranty providers in BC: Travelers, National, WBI and Pacific. It is illegal to build a house without registering the home with a warranty provider. Unscrupulous builders continue to ignore the laws and put at risk not only themselves but homeowners as well.

When looking for a builder, make sure they are licensed with BC Housing and one of the four warranty providers. It is illegal to build a home and not provide 2/5/10 warranty insurance.  Non-compliance with the Homeowner Protection Act and its Regulations can lead to a monetary penalty of up to $25,000 or imprisonment for a term of not more than one year, or both.

The English idiom, “A pound wise, a penny foolish” provides timely wisdom when choosing a builder. Ultimately, you get what you pay for. Happy Building.

Larry Clay
President of Clay Construction
Vice-President of GVHBA

Materials, craftsmanship and design might just make the new home of today, the character home of the future. More importantly, it is the engineering, building science and application of a minimum building standard that will result in our future homes being more durable, healthy and efficient.

Like most people, I hate to see these opulent character heritage homes removed from our streetscape forever. These homes have history and were built for influential people like judges, doctors and wealthy business merchants. They have a level of craftsmanship and quality of materials seen from only in the finest homes of that generation.

Truthfully, these magnificent homes are rare but do the vast majority of homes that are demolished have the same level of workmanship and quality of material? Are all older homes from previous generations quality, well-built homes? There is an adage, “They don’t make them like they used to.” Does this apply to homes as well?

The remainder of the article will be comparing average older homes with today’s average new homes. Let’s look at some facts and compare in several critical areas.

Remember the basement of your grandparent’s home that smelled musty and felt damp? These basements were never intended as living spaces. Damp proofing was minimal or nonexistent resulting in a basement that often-had moisture issues. Lack of insulation and vapour barrier under the concrete basement slab worsened the issue. The older clay draintile was inferior and prone to failure and floods.

Current newly built homes have a damp proofing spray applied to the exterior of the foundation wall with a plastic dimpled drainage mat secured over the surface of the damp proofing coating. This provides a drainage cavity for water to drain down to the superior PVC drainage piping protecting the basement from water infiltration. In addition, a poly vapour barrier is installed and rigid insulation is often installed under the concrete basement slab. This keeps the basement dry, warm and comfortable making basements more livable than their predecessors.

Older homes were not built to our current engineering standards. Foundations did not have steel and many had no footings which provide support to the foundation. This would cause uneven settling with one corner of the house or porch dropping several inches. Floor joists were undersized resulting in a floor that was bouncy and squeaky. Roofs were hand framed with no engineering and eventually the ridge of the roof would sag.

All new homes must be built to engineering specifications and inspected. Footings and foundations are larger with steel installed. Floors assemblies are engineered to carry the load from above and beams are correctly sized. Trusses are also engineered to withstand snow loads and not fail. New homes are much less likely to experience large amounts of settling, failure of structural members or squeaks in floors.

Climate change has necessitated more stringent standards for protection of homes from hurricanes, snow loads, and driving rain. We need to build the home to withstand the potential weather patterns in 50 years. The same applies to earthquake protection. More attention has been given to building homes that can withstand an earthquake which could level homes from decades ago.

In the past, fuel was either free or inexpensive; older homes did not need to be airtight or efficient. With the escalating price of fuel, it is not prudent to operate a leaky inefficient home. Current energy building codes are vastly superior over the homes build generations ago that applied few standards.

Asbestos, lead paint, formaldehyde, and mercury were prevalent in older homes. In addition, precautions were not taken to mitigate the deadly radon gas. New homes are healthier with products that have undergone extensive testing to be verified as safe. Albeit, time will tell which harmful products we continue to unknowingly place in our homes.

When an older home undergoes a renovation, we try to replace the old and dangerous knob and tube wiring or the aluminum wiring with the current code approved copper wiring. Circuit breakers are safer and less fixtures are installed per circuit. The same upgrades would apply to the plumbing, heating and ventilation as well as many other areas of the home.

In conclusion, the fabulous handcrafted character homes need to be protected but the same does not apply to the average older home. Builders are providing a service replacing dilapidated, unhealthy, unsafe and inefficient houses with durable, healthy, safe and efficient homes. Future generations will benefit from our advances in engineering, building science and application of a minimum building standard. Love your new home.