Why Most Australian Homes Are Built Wrong: Expert Tips for Building Healthier Homes

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So we know traities and builders love our trucks. If you want to take your truck to the next level then you need to go and check out my mates at off-road creative. Not only does off-road creative build the best touring rigs in Australia. They also have a wide variety of options to suit your youth. From ball bars, roof racks, trays and canopies they can customise a build to suit your needs. If you want to take your rig to the next level then go and check out off-road creative today and see how they can help you out. All right guys welcome back to another episode of Level Up. We are back online today for another cracking episode. I haven't really spent a lot of time with the guests we've got coming on today but I've definitely seen a lot of these stuff online and heard a lot of really good things about him and one thing one of the reasons I wanted to get him on is I'm really passionate about people that are passionate about what they do and also I really like it when people start other businesses or follow their passion so they can get better results and the guests I've got for you today has done exactly that so I'm massive warm welcome to Jackson Digny. How are you mate? Good thanks for having me. All good mate so to give people a little bit of an idea you are a builder you have enduro builders. Yep but you also have climbershaw. That's right. We started enduro 10 years ago. We actually last month to do up 10 years and climbershaw started five years ago. I started climbershaw because the journey with enduro started in enduro always wanting to do sustainable energy efficient homes and it quickly started to learn that there's a big difference between those two things they do overlap with each other but they are two very different kind of two different approaches and the energy efficient side of that approach led to air tightness which very quickly led to dealing with moisture and that introduced me to proclamal and then we became what we became proclamers biggest south Australian client because we were the only south Australian client and the yeah the guys of proclam are going to touch and say if you want to stop lying from Justin in Victoria and you know become a become a distributor which also means selling it to other people and I was like oh that for me that is perfectly in alignment with the reason the reason that enduro exists which is to improve the quality health and comfort of the housing stockings out the stride so I'm also aware that some some builders are really open and happy to like I am so everything that they know and some of it will be helpful and some of it won't other builders are a bit funny about that so we started climbershaw so that those just a little bit of I suppose branding separation and employed Jess who you know to run that business which also just gave a little bit of personal separation and yeah Jess has done a fantastic job really growing growing that business to where it is and doing a lot of learning on the practical side and spending a lot of time in site meetings with builders with me sort of soaking up the sort of hands-on building part that goes comes after all of the building science part so yeah yeah this um I think this podcast we're going for hours mate I've definitely got a lot of questions I'm trying to stop myself rather than just going yeah I've got a bit list here left there going all I got was two hours of Jackson talking and mate that's fine because I'm sure it would be quality information but the um I've put together some notes because there's a few things I wanted to make sure we we definitely cover today because I do feel like in a like I'm not sure if it's just because I'm aware of it now but like a lot of people in the building industry like just they they get into it because they like being hands-on they do an apprenticeship they they might move on become a builder but they tend to just stay in that lane they follow very old fashioned practices and ways that they were taught and they don't necessarily keep up with our uh well I don't know if I'd want to keep up with our industries progressing but they don't really put themselves out there to better their knowledge so that they can deliver better products to their client um I guess that's why I'm a big fan of yours and what you've done and like I said because you've you've actually created another business um alongside your building business to to help more builders understand um which I think it's fantastic but I think we'll if we can dive into enjoy our builders a little bit first because I guess that'll give us a bit more of an insight and and background into what you do what you do with climate show but um yeah tell us I guess how you got into building like is building something you've always wanted to do or um gets a really dark green first yeah so when I was uh some of my old man um right up into just before I was born was uh in hardware so he he owned a couple of my attend scores and he at 1.105 um and that this was back in the gold board in 83 so this was like late 70s into the early 80s um and at one point he was the managing director of my attend Australia and he um he kind of kept a lot of contacts with the hardware side of things even though he he sort of finished up with my attendement I was born because he uh that role involved a lot of traveling and a lot of um a lot of time away which didn't wasn't wasn't congruent with his goals for being around for his kids um I it meant that I grew up in a household where I was really exposed to small business and small business problems because my old man became a business consultant and um and very much ran a quite new business there was that people would come for meetings at our house and often be sitting around the dining table as we're all purling around after school and things like that yeah um and uh I kind of as I grew up I wanted to be lots of different things one of which was a property developer um and that kind of um never never happened because when I finished school by I did really well in accounting at school and when I finished school I applied for university positions in construction management at one uni and um converse specialising in accounting finance and marketing uh at another university and the the university that both both spots got offered to me but to do construction management meant going to a university that was an hours drive away from home and um and not near the your club which at that point in my life was central to knowing my income but also um to where I thought I wanted to go at that point in my life which was sailing for a living and basically sailing for a living can can go down a couple of different routes but the one that I was focused on was the America's Cup and um I did that for a couple of years while also kind of applying myself at uni um and in the end we we worked out that sailing was not going to be the honey pot that we thought it was going to be good good experience but great experience and you know I got to see a lot of the world um on other people's checkbooks which is great because we were we were professional sailors so you know we were being being paid for on the times where we weren't being paid, we were at least, you know, flowing to where we had to be and clothed and how I was doing the bed. So I then moved back to Perth and was really serious about being in business for myself and I worked for a company in Perth that made your sales and New York Mass and did shades and oils and structural steel and a whole bunch of other bits and pieces and I bought that business and ran it for a few years and had a lot of learnt a lot of hard lessons because I was 21 when I bought that business and I learnt a lot about not sticking with bad people and the old slow and higher quick to fire was something that I did in reverse to my detriment. Basically I got to a point where we we exposed ourselves to some really big mining projects in WA doing SHSRs and I had worked out the cash flow of these two huge projects which for where the business was out doing a million dollars shades of projects was you know, it represented like a 25% growth in our revenue in a six month period and the problem was that like cash flow doing those projects based on one happening at the beginning of the year and one at the end and what happened was one got delayed and one got brought forward and they both kind of went ahead at the same time and that was in 2008 as the GFC was starting to buy and so we had a big a big problem with cash flow combined with a kind of a dying marine market because everyone everyone in the you know in a marine market generally the bid I was in was all discretionary spending and there was no much to that going on and the solution for me at the time was to sell the business which luckily someone came along and bought it and that was all doing me moving to South Australia because at the time I sold the business my now life finished her Chiropractic degree in per and she's from South Australia and her mum had teeter up with a job over here straight out of uni I sold the business so I was kind of foolish and fancy free and probably needed a bit of a break from the pressure cooker of Perth and I moved over here not really sure what I was going to do but I had from all of the years of traveling around the world and working in various different things but I had a whole bunch of trade skills from carpentry skills related to building boats so you work in composites welding a whole bunch of different materials together um a rigging of like dealing with loads and weights and all of all I had all these skills and I like where I wanted to direct them and I kind of managed to flood my feet because my wife's father my father-in-law is a builder who is retired now but he was a hands-on builder who did everything and he of course said well you know what are you going to do I said oh my boy business I don't know I'm going to hang around he said why don't you come work work for me while you work it out and I started working for him and very quickly it was like I'm going to retrain in the building industry and become a builder and that kind of set in motion the process of getting getting the training and skills doing the courses and then getting my builders license and I did initially do much other than go and work for a commercial builder as a project manager which was a job that I only got because of my prior business experience and obviously I'm like condensed a lot of the business experience into a short explanation but they basically said like you don't you don't yes you've been working on the tools doing additions and renos and one new house but where so you're you're building experience for this role is probably not as good as the other candidates but your business experience is clear and and and this role involves as they would have catching on killing your own so finding your own work learning it and so I then went on a really vertical learning curve on lots of areas getting getting things right first time because in commercial it's very cutthroat and the type of work that that company did is very little room for making errors and letting people down and the consequences of doing some really unpleasant so I also worked out that the construction industry can be a solace, lifeless wasteful space the end by a metter carpenter during during that who his business had kind of morphed from having a bunch of carpenters and doing decks and pergolas to additions and renos new homes and he did everything as cost plus and he was in a world of pain um he was fine with the ATO handpaste super for ages was fine with his suppliers and it was just sort of just shoestringing things along and I really had my own my wife for accepting that I was unhappy at the commercial good up and wanted to go and save somebody else's business because I knew that I could do it but there was a risk that you know we couldn't end up we didn't know no no income and even worse have a you know a black mark against my reputation for having not done what I thought I could do yeah um the good news is that I did I took over that business my deal with him was that I said look you got a hand over the ranks entirely financial control the whole life you got to give it up if you want me to come in um um supremely confident I can save it and I just did the basics so to do the kind of you know did you become business partners or you worked for him go on my no I just went in as an employee so part of my exit strategy is was always that like anyone can get a job anywhere so um I didn't want to be um it definitely did not want to be in partnership with with it but I was happy to take on the personal challenge of fixing this business yep um and I just did the basics the first thing was he was doing all cost plus and had no system for collating the wages for the other hours for the week on and on which jobs and collecting like who had bought what materials or hired equipment for which job so back then was a system called Workflow Max so I just implemented that so straight away we had a very tight connection between money being spent on jobs and it being allocated to the job and same same deal for hours and um and then also went and met all the clients and gave them a contracts design which was interesting because you know partway through for some of them now partway through a job and they've been doing this ad hoc where they sometimes get fuels and sometimes they're doing and I kind of rocked in wearing a pattern up shirt and looking official um and said oh by the way like I'm the general manager and like we need to like formalize this arrangement and he is a cost plus contract and he is how they work and we're going to do your every Friday payments have to be in by the close of business of Monday otherwise we're going to be back on Tuesday and they were like a few of them are like oh it's good to see someone's like pulling stuff together and a few and a few of the other ones were very put out about it um but the turnaround was really rapid and it took about two about eight months to get on top of everything and get back up today the ATO get super up today um and so you know all of the profit that was generated went into catching back up and then some of the behind me is that got the guy into trouble in the first place came back, which was seeing a big bill come in and because I also introduced fixed price contracts, seeing a big bill come in and think that that was all his money. And so we wound up parting ways, probably not all that amicably, because I take integrity really seriously, so if you say you're gonna do something, do it. And if you don't do it, that's really for me that is a very, very serious thing. And that's what had happened. And so we parted ways and sat down with Carly and was like, Carly's my wife and I said, I think I'm gonna start booting Carly. (laughs) And sometimes I wonder how, how she does it, how she saves. Carly's a car manufacturer, she runs two clinics, who are very successful business on her own, but she's certainly probably taken some leaps of faith with me. This one's worked out really well. (laughs) And yeah, we argued for about three weeks over business names while I started reaching out to architects. And at that point in time, I decided that I was gonna set up a business that specialized in building energy efficient homes and sustainable homes. And bear in mind, at that point in time, I knew that that was what I wanted to do and it didn't fully understand what that actually meant, yet. - What was a driver for that? What was a driver for going into that space? - A few different things. So, my old man has always been big on self-sufficiency. And that's across the board. Financial self-sufficiency, finding ways to be fluid, self-sufficiency where you can or having a good network of people that you can work together. He's always been really strong on that and skills. And that's the thing that I always find really interesting, just as comfortable pulling an engine apart as I am roofing a house or like a pick your thing. And that's all because of that, just going, having gone and doing everything and going and hang out with people that are specializing in the things and learn about it so that there's heaps of here's to those things where nowadays I'm really grateful when something goes wrong and we're a long way from hell. I'm like, thank God, I'm really self-sufficient because I'll fix this and make that work. And we can, yeah. So, and as a Messiah, that travels around the world now building earth ships which is the hardcore sustainable end. - That's awesome. - You're gonna have to catch up with your old boy. I watch so many YouTube and earth ships and that I think they're amazing. - Yeah. - So, he's just always drilled that into me and then the carbon that morphed into a builder who's business around for a bit. He was really interested in sustainability and so there was a bit more of an introduction there as well and it just, to me, made a lot of sense because I'd also done, being in the time that I spent doing commercial projects a lot of time in just the slap it up, get it done, cheap as you can and it just didn't feel right and it's difficult to describe. Like I enjoyed the relationship part of commercial but I just never felt like I was leaving a positive impact behind with some of the building practices. So that's probably the best summation I can give you as to why I wanted to go down that road. - I think it's awesome. - Yeah, I saw it in the business. - I think it says a lot, like that, knowing that background and where you've come from and all the stuff you've been through and then you're reasoning why. I think that says a lot and that's, I know, so there's a lot of marketing in that for your building company. - And the other thing too is that I, coming up with the why for Enduro scooters of where you're to improve the quality, health and comfort of houses in South Australia, that was really easy for me to come up with as like our mission statement. And it's stark, it doesn't change. The only, the only tweet to it is that we included comfort and health in it about two years ago because I was like, well, we're doing, yeah, we are doing more than just quality. And it was important to recognize that for new staff coming in so that they, they, they grasped it straight away. So I, like I was saying, I started off with this focus on, I'm gonna focus on working with architects and building architectes of our own houses. That for me anyway, didn't gel very well with expanding my business. The way I played it up for me was that I started off with a few architect design projects and then started getting, I was driving a lot of marketing which meant that a lot of leads were coming directly to me. And then I was, I had a really good system for taking them to one of the three architects that I was working with and kind of team them up and then leaving them to do the design and the de-was to, you know, do a concept, show it to me so I can check it for pricing then we'll show it to the client and then we, you know, from there we'll work backwards and forwards to close up the gap. So not that too similar to what I understand your process to be, just slightly different, slightly differently. But we got a way into that where there were a few misses where the architects showed the plans to the client before they'd spoken to me and they were a way over budget and then the architects blamed me for being over budget which makes no sense at all. But that's how, and I'm sure lots of readers just heard that sentence and I'm like, yeah, that's up in a minute before two. So, and then then it started to become clear that the volume of work I had going through just the architects just couldn't keep, they think, I'm gonna rephrase that, they didn't want to keep up with it because I was really strict about, I need to see the plans before you show them to the client. We need to have this level of communication about cost and I understand from that point of view, I was probably throwing sand and gravel into the well-oiled machine. And so then I started, then I had a project where I was like, you know, I'll design it because all of the work that Kylie and I do on the side, I was designing anyway. So, we did one job with me designing and I was like, this was a well-oiled machine, everything works really well. And so then I hired a building designer and we just tapered out our architectural projects and we do still work with architects but we have a really clearly defined set of guard routes that we work with in. And we've learnt to make it work, but our primary thing is design and build. And every time we do an architect designed project where they come to us with the concept already done, we haven't had any that we've cost it up and they just landed on the budget and it's all being sweet. That there's always been a lot of work to close the gap either by the client raising their budget or by changing the plans. And we found that that's unpleasant for everyone. It's unpleasant having to ring the client and say, hey, I know you had a QS say this and you've had an architect say this and you've had someone else say this and maybe even other bearders give lower prices. But I think that's it. We really think this is going to cost this much money. And then of course we follow through and actually prove that. It's a shame our projects. It's really shame that that whole process is so broken because a lot of great projects don't go ahead because of that process. And there's a lot of great architects. And there's a lot of great architects like I don't want to be misconstrued as bashing the architects because there are a couple that we do work with who ones that we used to send work to and we've just worked out that it works better if they come to us and say hey we've got this job that's a perfect fit for you guys. And they are like one of them we go and resolve booting details because we use Revit and they use Revit which is that design software. I go and sit in their office and sometimes I drive sometimes they drive and we develop. We've worked out the quickest way to get all of the things like one of us drops and rest of us talk. And so for me that is real collaboration because we're literally there doing some of the drawing work. So they work really well but that my experience has been that they're few and far between. And we alongside of that I've really focused on like I want to build more homes so that there are more high quality comfortable healthy homes in South Australia. And to do that I need to grow and part of that is making it more economical to build homes that actually perform and are actually safe to live in which means that you know they're not that thermal bridge free so they're not going to have more growth that the air quality has been considered in the design and the specification. And we have really worked hard to systemise how we build to bring the cost down by doing it. Yes, they cost more to build and ask us then go to a volume builder but quite often we will be the same or a lower price than a custom quote comparison. You know, we've had a couple of instances. Well on that subject because that was one of my questions because I noticed like in a lot of your stuff on Instagram stuff that you talk about like you're always selling your standard and that's sort of what you're talking about now but a lot of builders and even tradies always use the cost barrier. I can't do that because I won't get another job or people won't pay for it but my building business is very much the same as yours like we set our standards and if people don't want to build to our standards then they don't build with us. So can you just look just a little bit inside into I guess your brain feels works when it comes to that because I think if every builder set their own standard and just concentrate on selling that to their clients straight away we're going to get better homes in Australia. Hey guys, if you're missing going fishing on your weekend, spending time with your family and friends or just feel like you can't get the time to do your quoting and estimating you need to check out Quotees. You see my wife and I created Quotees because we know how important it is to provide detailed proposals to your clients but we also know how time consuming, frustrating and nine times out of ten it can be the last thing that you want to be doing in your business. Quotees makes it absolutely simple, easy for anybody to be able to provide very detailed quotes and proposals to color coded takeoffs provide your clients with quality information so that you can win more projects. If you're a builder or you run a trades based business you cannot afford to take advantage of Quotees's free trial. So head over to Quotees.com now and check out our website or go to our socials and sign up to our free trial so you can get back to doing the things that you enjoy doing. Yeah and and and an easier way for clients to compare so the where I start I mean it's an awful lot of work and it has taken I would say this year is the first year that we really had everything like pooled together nicely with all our like standard details, standard drawings and and a lot of our written like systems and processes for how the houses actually go together and part of that's been because those details get shared with climate sure clients as well and like with our detailed pages include a little methodology of like do this bit then this bit then this bit and this bit and this bit and this bit and we've had to do that to support the growth of the business because as I bring in a new site manager they you know they come from the regular paradigm and and they come the you know we find nowadays that when we put out a job at the people that are applying by and large are they're applying because they're like we've been usually in that couple letter it's like I've been watching you guys for years we're going waiting for the opportunity to come up so if that and that's really flattering otherwise I'm always like a couple of people like you know I mean it's what it's hard because it's always been one of my goals to not only do the housing bit but to be an employer of choice and it means that they come in wanting to be here the we then we then have the obligation to train them correctly and put them through a very much like vertical learning curve on this is how the houses go together which meant documenting it and I think I would say that it's really clear to me now why lots of builders don't do that because their amount of work is colossal and and we've really only done it because I've got an awesome team who are all invested in what we do and and have been invested in the you know me saying blocked part of your weekly diary needs to have time blocked in it or these development work that that we're doing building out the documentation assets of the business and and people have been really holding that time as sacred as we hold planning time in everyone's stories but it's a bit it's been yeah and it's one that I'll admit I chose not to keep track of what it's costing because I'm like this is setting us up for the next 30 years or beyond yeah it definitely has to be done we've got the detail yeah it's got to be done yeah yeah yeah like and and look you know we share that stuff with climate short clients so you know there's this value the value that we've put into it we're going we're sharing anyone that is interested yeah but it's I think it's important for builders to realize that and like you don't they don't have to go as far as like you and I have with developing documents and specifications and things but you can you can make it as simple as I want to like proclimate resist and on all my jobs or we do cavity button systems all our jobs or we like whatever it is like every every builder can build better but I just hear it's too often it's all based on price like so many builders think I can't do that because I can't charge more because I won't get more work that's yeah I think it's a education yeah that's what I see yeah it's really not really answering your question about that but I I put it down to education and and I've I have always found that when when we've taken the time to explain why something is costing more and what goes into it to to cause the cost increase and then what the benefit is you you get a much more positive response from the client and and the thing I'd say to builders is how I think about all the times you've talked to them into an idea that you had about a finish or how something was going to look that cost more that they did and the client agreed to it you just got to apply the exact same logic to have you thought about like why don't we do understand insulation because you're building a house in the bottom of a valley in the hills you know like it's going to be cold so let's do under slab yeah it's going to cost you 15 grand the benefit is that you're in winter your feet will be warm your house will stay warm etc etc and I find I've just never found a situation where clients haven't found a way to make it work for them. And under pinning that, those that we have some minimums, we won't do single rising, for instance. We won't do aluminium frames unless they have a high quality thermal break. So things like that too, I find you get them out of the way early on in the conversation with the client and they choose to either go with you or not. And it's the scariest thing, like I'm sure you've done it, where you turn a client away, because they might tip 25 of the 30 boxes or 29 of the 30 boxes and then that last box you like to will know, that's how minimum. And you always go, "Ah, what have I done?" You know, "Oh, we broke next week." That's kind of the pit that I go in every time, in spite of 10 years of it never going wrong. I think every time there's always someone else. Exactly mate, exactly. The one door shut, three door zipons, I'm going to get it to start asking you a few of my questions because otherwise we're going to be here or not. Sorry. Just cut me off. No, no, it's good. Cut me off. You're sharing good quality information, so I really appreciate it. But one of the videos you've got on your Instagram, which I wish a lot, is you talk about full mess that builders are stuck. If you're choosing a build, it's got these full mess that don't build with them. That's the way I sort of target. And you talk about builders being stuck in, like still building homes the way they were in the 80s. Can you just talk a story of that a little bit? Yep. I'm trying to remember what the four myths were, because when I, some of those articles are right, they take a year or so to come out into the thing, but which time we've completely up like, yes, I remember that. Just remind me of the detail again. The four myths, so airtight construction creates mold. So that's, that's a myth, because if you just make a house airtight, and you still put aluminium frames and single glazing, and you don't think about thermal bridge in your wall frames, particularly junctions on corners, and where internal walls make external walls. Then all that happens in an airtight house is obviously that the moisture load inside the house goes up, because it's not, it's not finding its way out through all of the gaps and holes. And it can increase the likelihood of mold occurring. But that doesn't mean that an airtight home creates mold. It's an airtight home with lots of thermal bridges, increases as you chance of having mold. And so there's like a, there's a step to understanding that you, that to go through, which, which if you're, if you haven't taken the time to learn about it, then it's very quick and easy to go. No, no, airtight homes are horrible, I call them, you know, mold problems. And you don't want to have an airtight home, you want to let the house breathe. And that I could go on for hours without a tight wall over there. Timmerism is durable, it's concrete or brick. So Timmer, if it is allowed to get wet all the time, is not a very durable product. Because it can, although it'll grow in my wood, but it'll also rot. And, and also, you know, wet Timmer for things like lentils, or dorses, it'll sag. So, a lot of people, a lot of climators go, I want, you know, brick and concrete, because that, that, that, that solid materials that aren't going anywhere. And, while that, while that has some truth to it, you can have situations, you know, brick gets wet. Plenty of, plenty of, a pony, plenty of examples of brick that has been wet without being able to dry. And eventually it's like brick starts to break down and threats away. And, and a similar thing can happen with concrete. You can also have concrete in corrosion zones, where they, they're poor 20 MPA instead of following the engineers and 4032 during the corrosion zone. Or even 40, in some cases. And, and that does happen. And then the salt gets into the concrete, flies out the Rio, flies out concrete. So, the, the other thing is, with timber, if you keep timber structures dry, then you will not have a problem with timber over the long haul. And, the, the issue is, that's been like these step changes. So hundreds of years ago, all the timber buildings, they were, they were completely breathable. And, they were very little air tightness to anything. Then we started kind of improving building materials and, and clients started asking for, you know, you do a, you know, architects would come up with different building materials. I'm talking about architects are employed by manufacturers that would come up with different building materials and finishes and looks. And, you know, a lot of materials that were tight feeding and led to more, slightly more airtight homes and so on and so forth. Until we got to a point where we are right now where there's a lot of accidental air tightness occurring with thermal bridging, without consideration to how the timber is going to keep drying out. And then the timber gets wet and then you have problems and then timber gets blamed. Yeah. But it's not actually the timber bar is how you use it. I think, like that, I think that covers a lot of problems in our industry, mate, because a lot of problems I see, aren't the product or the material. It's just simply the installation. Like, people haven't taken the time to understand the material and execute it and install it correctly. Which leads to probably raise the manual. Yeah. Yeah. I'm one of those boring guys, you know, when you get something new and you open it up and the manual falls out and lots of people will just keep like trying to cobble it together or make it work or whatever it is. I'm one of those boring guys that puts whatever it is to one side and reads the manual. Which I got from my mother. But I am often amazed just with proclimate stuff when we send the manual when someone orders for the first time and we always offer to go and meet on site and go through it. And sometimes those manuals go to the builder and then we rock up and say and meet the carpenter. And we say, "I've read the manual." And most times they've been sent it, but occasionally they haven't. And that always makes me go, "I wonder what would have happened if we had not offered to come and do the onsite in-person training." And then of course I extrapolate that straight away to, "What happens when you get presented with another new product that's just sold through a hardware store where there isn't as much vested interest necessarily from the supply?" And it's why one of our core things in our process when we're building is if we're using a product that we've not used before. It's like the manual has to be printed and put on site. And two copies, one that lives on site, one that gets given to the trade. And there's like a toolbox talk at the beginning of installing this, like, "What do we need? We've got everything we need. How's it meant to go on?" Or that stuff. And that's preceded at design stage as well to make sure that any design details try to cover as much of the manual as possible. We do the same. We do the same, like, the whole in the market. And then we do the same. And then it's like, "What if the customer's not doing the same thing? What if they don't do the same thing?" I was saying that it goes in our manual about the cheapest time to fix a problem in construction is the moment you discover it. And the bigger time difference between you discovering it and fixing it, the more expensive it gets. Because I've just never found about it to be the case where you need to see it. leave something that you notice too late on. - Yeah, and it not be significantly more expensive. - Well, that's a good segment 'cause it ties into another question I had for you, which was, you talk a lot about building more durable and more sustainably, is actually more financially, is a better financial decision for clients and trying to choose a cheapest build. Like talk to us about that. Talk about from the construction side first, and then we'll talk about longevity and just build experience. Construction-wise, you have to, all of this is underpinned by making sure you work with the builder, who either really knows that stuff about all of the materials, or has a good robust system for going and learning about the materials. If they're using something that's not touched before, but if you get the right choice and mix of materials, installed correctly, and the right amount of time gets put into working out how they'll go together on site and making sure that all of the various things that manufacturers require for their products actually can gel together. 'Cause there's a lot of cases where to comply with one manufacturer's requirements, you almost can't comply with the others. And then what needs to happen there is a discussion between the two suppliers. And all of that takes time, and I get it, and it's why we developed a lot of our standard details, 'cause it makes it a lot easier to go, can we make this work in our standard detail? And then if it almost works, but not quite, we just amend the standard detail, and then send it to the supplier and say, "Would you support this on a warranty case "like, were there any major problems or whatever it is?" And it's also about picking materials that you know have really good track records for last ability. And I know that there are some really new materials that have come out that we've had clients that really wanted to use them. And we've provided alternatives that have a track record as a process on your dozen. So I'm not saying the material might be totally fine. My outlast, what we're using, but my degree of confidence is really high. So we'll talk that through the client and sort of say, you know, if you go with this type of cladding, I can really start my name and I know that in 80 or 90 years time, it should still be there. Look, it just is good. But the product you wanna use, that you know, it's only been around for 10 or so years in Australia. It's not quite long enough to really be confident. These days mate. And there's plenty of products that you get put in front of you that you just put off the press. Like it's hard to believe. - Exactly. So yeah, and like the interesting one for me at the moment is the aluminium cladding with you know, all the wood textures put on some of them. Yeah, and I've made the clients like look, there are some areas where I can actually be at the old school about my approach. And the aluminium has a lot of embodied energy. And those, whatever it is, they're like a vinyl coating, I think that they put on there to give the wood grain look. There's obviously question marks about what happens at end of life and what happens when you essentially melt it down. What happens to the vinyl? Like how do you separate it? So then of course there's the flow on of when you're building really high-performance homes where you have to do ventilated cavities and you are doing a whole bunch of building details properly from the get-go. It requires more time and thought on your methodology before you start building, which then flows through to your schedule because obviously your methodology very quickly lines up which trades come what times and you need to plan all of that out particularly for trades who need to know how many times they're going to be coming to sight so that they can get the quiz right. And for homeowner, what that means is that you are more likely to be dealing with a builder who has a solid plan for starting on a date and finishing on a date. And what we do in Jero is we don't give out clients the building contract until we've finalized all the specs and provided them with the schedule which we share through an online project management system. And we say to them, if you look through the schedule you'll see where we put slack times in and obviously like jobs in winter we'll chuck a big slack time in the center of the winter period that covers us for, right? And we say to clients, like, this is showing all the steps and our planned timelines for them and you will notice that the things will move around as we go and what will move is that hand over date. And you'll notice that there are those slack times and you'll probably watch them get reduced if something gets delayed. But it will never, we're never gonna hand over late. And we managed to get through COVID. We only had two projects that handed over late and both of them were caused by weather, not by material stuff. - Yeah, and I think that's the thing, when you go to, I think people really don't understand when they go to a builder that's put a lot of time and effort into their business and their systems, their structure, it isn't cheaper in the long run. Like everything's more efficient, it's a better process, it's a better experience, you get a better product, you're a product in a last longer, rather than a builder. - And you move in on time? - You're not left renting a house but longer than you expected or having to move around. And we had a project that we, sometimes I feel like we didn't even really get a look in, we priced it, but the homeowner's wanted to go with the builder that their real estate agent recommended. And it was a high performance home with the preclambered membranes inside and out. So it's almost like we would be able to certify passable house but it was in the certify passable house. And it was on a really difficult site. And because of the house including here recovery ventilation, that there's only one guy in Adelaide putting here recovery ventilation in. So I've heard about how that project's going and it's still not done. And that was back in 2021. - Holy really? - And yeah, and I'm like, what's that should be like living in those people, you know, that elderly. So that they, things happening fast really matters. And yeah, they're still not done. That's got four years now. So for what should have been about a four-end month build? Yeah, the time it's hard to have the tail people. But maybe we'll cross over into a little few questions that will definitely do with building but also on the climate show party or climate show business as well. But the notes I've written down that I want to ask you questions about, it's probably more to get other builders thinking because I know just from the questions I get on my socials and the stories that I do on from my building sites, these questions come up all the time. So I talk a lot now about all cladding leaks. I know you've got some blog posts on your page about as well. And look, I definitely was, I guess, tore it through my apprenticeship and my early years as a contractor. Like, the, my bosses would always drive into me like get that tight. Like this is what seals are building up and reality is it's not. Like water gets in in all sorts of places. So just run a studio of thoughts on that a little bit because I think it's, I don't know for a lot of builders but they don't understand how important that building rap is. Yeah. Yeah. The where to start. So we start at the end. So putting on a high quality building membrane, we're, and I obviously have a strong bias towards preclamant membranes because I've distributed up. Number one way to protect your booting from getting moisture inside it and most critically protecting the timber and the insulation from getting wet. All, like you said, like all cladding is to wind up leaking somewhere. And even brick is porous and you can, and there's plenty of, plenty of examples and you don't have to agree with too hard to find, you know, pictures of the back of brick walls that are really wet, that have been facing the weather. And that's, you know, brick is regarded as like, certainly to a public that. Hasn't had any education in other options than I grew up in WA where everything is double brick. My boy is, is, is, is the rest. Yeah, while you're on the brick, like it, there is so many hares getting built in Brisbane, also by volume builders that are just smashing out the brick facades and then they're painting it. And like that, that's amazing. And then when the water does get through, it's trapped and then people want to work out again. People want to work in two-year-old houses and you look at it in certain elevations of the house, it's just all black and moldy. And you have the problem in the tropics of the mould forms on the outside, more open than not, because you're, you're, yeah, you're more humid on the outside than on the inside. And I, yeah, building with a high quality, building membrane that's actually waterproof and then putting event-lighted cavity and then you're cladding on is, like for me, it started off about the building performance and air tightness. And then as soon as I started learning about how proclaiming membranes worked and how building science works, I suddenly went putting these membranes on is an insurance policy against claims for leakage and and buildings getting wet on the inside. And it's, and it is a, it's a layer of defense against any filings in your, in your cladding installed, which, you know, they things, things can happen. Years down the track, very unusual, but, like I say, and I also had the opposite argument from a couple of viewers that like, yeah, you're creating this thing with ventilated cavities and you're putting events at the top and events at the top. And events at the bottom and what starts rain hitting the ground and bouncing up into the bottom of your cavity or when it's really rainy having water going on, like with the whole thing drains. I said, even if you high pressure hose the side of the house and all water goes up into that, that vent strip that we put in where the thing about particular case where the text cladding and an ead coming in and then a little bench through in between. Now, I keep on lying pressure, hoizing that the water goes up and I said, yeah, it goes up lands on what is almost a completely waterproof building membrane that is actively pushing moisture to the outside and it's in a ventilated cavity and any excess water is going to run down that membrane and drop out the bottom of the ground. I said, you far better off. I said, what if you high pressure, hoizing that house and there is no bench true and there's a gap in the cladding somewhere and that water is going straight in the middle of the wall. Straight into your insulation. You tell me what's worse. Well, it's more like going on to a shitty old foil back paper and there's no ceiling around windows and it's eventually writing out your your your studs around your windows and those types of things. And that's where I that's where I feel there needs to be more education like I feel like a lot of builders, they're not understanding how the house performs or and that's why they they maybe put so much time into understanding what I need to be doing cladding better and benefit cavities and using better building wraps that's. Yeah, like how that's and that's why I look at it from the insurance perspective. Because if you know if you're using a building membrane and putting events like a cavity in your your your providing yourself as a builder with insurance from potential problems and at the same time giving your owner the homeowner a better outcome and. Insulation that's protected from wind washing. Yeah, which is a you know we talked about water a lot about this also that the making insulation work. Yeah, and I don't know you would know a lot more than I do with the building science stuff but I feel like it's very different up here to down there like your condensation like you're dealing with a lot of time cold outside and warmer inside whereas up here we're dealing with quite warm outside and then everyone running me air conditioning inside so like you need to understand how all that's affecting how your house is. So yeah, yeah, well how's different and and it. Yeah, in in a lot of the tropical areas we use a membrane that has a higher SD value which essentially means that it lets moisture pass through slower because the moisture load in the tropics because it's more humid is is higher so you need to have more resistance to moisture passing through. And you also have to be aware of like thermal bridge causes the same amount of drama you know cooler climate as it does in a hot climate it's just that the direction is often reversed. Yeah, there's so much there is so much to know like it's that we could go for hours the one more I really like to like building so on so is I think something that people really need to educate themselves more on like I know I've spent hours online I've done a few online courses and stuff and and like you and I will you guys more working on something in the moment next year which I think is pretty exciting if anyone's on the level up email list you've all been sent an email this last week I think with opportunity to register for the event that climate sure is putting on so make sure you check that out. Do you want to give that a plug mate or any. Yeah, yeah, I'd love to that so we it all started with just being really keen about doing it and and getting at one particular building scientist over here and yeah, Joe look I'm going to butcher his surname Lou Spryk I think it is. He is basically regarded as the godfather of booting science in the world and we're setting up to run a two day event where we will have guys like him talking about the booting science and the half of the link to the practical side and then Jess is really twisting my arm to talk about practical side and and how you know how you actually go about delivering this stuff on on site and and how we go about training out trades and bringing new trades up to speed as well as bringing new incoming staff up to speed with with the knowledge they need to to make sure that the standards that we have doing slip. Yeah, no, it's look I'm it would be great event. Yeah, I'm really sorry looking forward to it. Yeah, look, if you're not on the level up mailing list yet, make sure you go the website and register on there and we can always stick that email again otherwise reach out to the closet, climate sure and I'll I'll flick you all the details so you can register it's it's a bit of an invite only so unless you've got an email or you know about it, you won't be able to be there. But just another one I'd really like to touch on quickly if we can before we get out of here is and I know you've got some blog posts on your website about this as well but everyone bags out like any con and roof blanket like so how do you know what's what to use like any con or a variable member. So, so I was like, here we go, Anticon, we've got plenty of examples of Anticon doing exactly the opposite to that. The problem with the Anticon blanket is that it gets squished at every pearl once you use it a roof and it at those points it condensates the only and I did a trial this on on the house that they used to live in when we did a massive run on it. I was like, I want to see just how bad it gets so I didn't put any of the roof ventilation in and we did it with an to come and blank it because at the time we were hours out and what we were doing, changing it all to Mento just wasn't all in the budget. So I thought this is a great opportunity to learn something and carry that knowledge forward. And it took three days for the commensation to start generating some mold at which point I would run around and put all of the we finished the job in the middle of winter. So like that's your worst case as well. So we were heating the house, r6 insulation, truss roof, anti-com blank it, and yeah on the third day I started to notice like the first day at comment side and I was like well that's no surprise. Now let's see how long it takes and yeah on the third day I noticed some some mold getting going. So all of the roof vents were very hastily cut out and installed and the problem the problem went away because we had so much ventilation in there that the commensation that was forming was being picked up by the moving air and fented out. So I mean places like Tasmania, anti-com blank gets outlawed, Tasman Food has been for a while and it's for that reason. So if you put that into like a really flat roof so like sort of once you get below 10 degrees that condensation load is probably the right term increases dramatically because there's less air running along the bottom of the anti-com to try to vent out. So my advice is that anti-com is not not a great thing to do on a roof. You better off to put a membrane on there and have a ventilated cavity above that membrane. One of the there's a really good video that Jesse Clark has done. It's like 25 minutes long video and you have to watch about 5 minutes of it where he steps through the calculations involved in our values and in a nutshell if you think about the rating heat so like you boil the kettle and if you hold your hand and I'm going to go American an inch away from the the kettle you can feel some heat and if you go half an inch you feel a lot of heat and obviously that increases really rapidly as you get your hands closer. So the same thing applies with insulation if you have the roofing iron hard down on your anti-com blanket which is standard installation then the iron temperature is hard against that insulation so the heat there's more heat radiating down into the insulation and if you separate it with a ventilated cavity then the radiant heat from the iron is not getting it's not known near as high when it gets to the membrane and because that's ventilated you're bringing in ambient air temperature so regardless of whether it's a 40 degree day or a 25 degree day the roofing iron is going to be hotter than the air temperature and because it's in the sun and that air running up is going to be cooler so the heat load that's on the membrane is low which means the heat load on anything below that whether it's a the truss roof or a skillion roof where the insulation's harder against the membrane the heat load on it is way less and there's there's a the way that argol is a calculated includes the K value which is Kelvin for the temperature difference and there's some assumptions in the Australian standard for how that's calculated and in that scenario I just describe if you go away outside the assumptions because roofing iron can get up to 80 degrees in the dark and colors obviously color dependent like any any rebuilding science that answer always starts with it depends like what's the climate what's the orientation what's the material what colors the material like it goes on and on and on so that's why I always try to talk in I try to keep it as general as I can because there's like specific answers are not possible without knowing specific details but I think I'm hoping in general principles are the same yeah and I look I'm hoping by having these conversations it's going to spark the interest of more build and they're going to dig deeper on this stuff but I think as a general author like we still use any corner now ruse we're really well ventilating them that's next on our list which is which is the easy thing but if you're a builder listening to this and you're like oh god like far out of all my jobs have got to enter come just just make sure your roof is really well-ventored and you'll you'll minimize your risk yeah we've gone back to old school that we're using ventored suffice sheets we've got ventored bridge caps on like we're putting solar power yeah that's also solar power vents in the roof and that we're really getting that air movement which I think is a very important thing but um make well we'll have to wrap it up because I haven't even got through half my questions we might have to get you back around too but the very last thing sorry just two things before we go um the first one is like just quickly tell us about climate sure like what does climate sure offer builders or clients yeah so climate sure does completely do things we we're obviously the distributor in south australia for preclimum membranes we also make and sell a bunch of standard sized uh cavity closes that are made out of stainless steel mesh that um complies with all the push by requirements and because the stainless steel it also complies with the corrosion zone requirements um and then in addition to the products we provide consulting so the consulting covers a pretty wide variety of things we do pacific house consulting so um obviously all of all of the enduro certified pass-past houses climate sure does those and and we work for a few builders and one architect at the moment um and we provide woofie analysis and thermal bridge calculations as well as doing um plan reviews and just providing early feedback on any sort of major areas of concern primarily from a thermal bridge point of view and also from getting a complete thermal envelope point of view so they're like applying applying the pillars of a pacific house but the consultancy is about casting our eyes over the plans and saying hey like there's a bit of a problem with that detail and things like things like candle lever overhangs are always a tricky one where they're often supported by steel which means you can generate a situation where you've got steel going from inside the thermal envelope to outside and and there's ways to sort all of that out for the best like so we all building problems the best time to fix them is the moment you are down a flame and the early you can identify them the better um so that in a nutshell is what we do which is all on the website I am blow-daw testing obviously we got about that yeah yeah that's what we're testing yeah um and I guess for anyone listening anywhere in Australia like um by my name I'm in New Zealand too but um like we've got a couple of clients at the moment dealing with them Jackson's team at Climaxure like they do they offer reports and things which um I know we're helping a couple of our clients at the moment make some key decisions in the design stage and like we're still working away pricing through the job so it's really good to have that information be able to make adjustments now before we get too far down the track or like we're not even a building contract yet we're just working through our pre-construction pack process so um yeah reach out to Climaxure if you're unsure of any of these things we've spoken about today I guess and see if they can help you out but um mate last one was like for any builders they're listening that want to build better that aren't quite sure what's like one or two to simple things that they can start doing on their projects um this the first one would be adopting ventilated cavities that that will it will protect you from problems down the line and it will really help improve the performance of the houses that you're building um and and the second one is um do at least do the very minimum with the preventing the most obvious thermal bridge in houses which is the windows yeah do double glazing and use either good quality thermally broken out of menu or you PVC frame or if you've got a client that really wants to do timber timber the only reason I Tim is always on the end because it costs so much more um and and has a lot of maintenance hang-ups so yes you sequester a lot of carbon and using the using timber but then you're going to paint it every year or oil it or and then there's you know those flow on yeah those flow ones have to be considered mate correct me if I'm wrong but with the with the cavity or the drain, cavities. system, they're calling it in the NCC. If you're in climate zone 678, that's in by the end of 2025. You have to do that, don't you? That is my understanding. The tricky part for me is I'm in South Australia where, and this is constant, and I was saying a consulting client this morning, that I wish that I had one of those brains where you can let read stuff and just remember it. Because in South Australia we have a very complex delay in the booting code implementation, and there is no say complex is some bits are in, some bits are excluded, some bits are excluded if you're booting a town. There's all these weird things that make it pretty much every time, Jess and I, yes, a question we have to just double check that we're giving the right answer, particularly with interstate clients, it's pretty straightforward, but South Australia wants it's tricky, but yeah, that is my understanding, that's a requirement. Yeah, apart from all the other maybe bits and pieces and rules, and I guess type of property or building or type of dwelling or building or the class of building and stuff, but yes zone 678 pretty much by the end of 2025, you have to be doing this on your projects and then all other zones and underslap. Yeah, underslap insulation. And then all other climate zones like one to five will be in, like I think they've been delayed until late 28 or something, but even, the reality is this stuff is coming into code, and if you're not talking about, you're not becoming more aware of it, you really should be. So I hope today's podcast has sparked some interest and you start reaching out to people like Jackson and his team at climate shore. We're going to try and get this podcast out pretty quickly because climate shore is actually sponsoring a, we call them a fuel session, live life build up fuel sessions, we've got one coming up on the 14th, Friday the 14th of November, it's in Adelaide and it is completely focused on educating builders on drain cavities, ventilated cavities, the proclimate product and the health, the benefits it brings to using it on your homes. And I'm going to be talking how I sell it to my clients because that seems to be a very big hurdle for most builders is getting over those cost conversations with clients because this stuff does cost more. So we're managing to do it with every single one of our building clients and in fact the more we talk, it seems like the more we talk about on socials and more and more people want it. So I think it's a no brainer but Jackson really appreciate your time this afternoon mate for coming on. You're a wealth of knowledge, honestly I didn't even get through half my questions, I'd love to cheer you off for hours. No it's good, it's good. I really appreciate you sharing your knowledge and your experience and I think the industry needs more of it. So mate, look forward to catching up with you soon. Logos that appreciate your time and look before we go out, is there anything else you want to just say or work and listen, just go to your website, Instagram. Yeah, the websites for climate sure and enjoy our builders, they get told that there's lots of useful information and our Instagram, on Instagram you always cop just a writer talking about something to do with this stuff. And the only other thing that I just thought of for builders is, is having a bit of faith in your trades, our trades have all come on the journey. None of my trades started off with any interest in energy efficiency and I really just said that this is what I'm doing, this is the path that we're on and there hasn't been that many that have stuck their nose up at it and walked. And I think you'd be amazed how well they'll support you because everyone wants to do better. Sometimes you just need to have the right push in the right direction at the right time and then you're away. Yeah, definitely. Now I agree, 100% mate. Well, look, like I said, thanks for coming on this afternoon and everybody, thanks for listening. Continue to make this Australia's number one construction podcast. As always, go to the DwayneFear.com website, make sure you get your merch and look, as always, if there's anything you want to know, any questions you have, make sure you reach out, we're happy to help you out. Look forward to seeing you on the next one. Alright, guys, I want to introduce you to a really exciting new product that I believe is going to play a massive role in Australia building healthier homes. As you all know, I am extremely passionate about healthy homes and I'm doing a lot of research and putting a lot of time and effort into making sure my construction business is leading the way when it comes to building healthy homes here in Australia. We've teamed up with a guys from Highwood Timber. Highwood Timber are pioneering condensation management with their Highflow Ventilated LVL Baton System. Highflow Batons give builders a stronger, straighter and smarter way to create a ventilated cavity behind cladding and underneath roofs without compromising on structural performance. While tackling condensation to improve building health and ease of insulation, Highwood Batons are built to perform. 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