Episode 3 - Tedd Benson, Bensonwood and Unity Homes

The Prefab Pod

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- Prefab Review

Hello my name is Michael Frank and this is the prefab review pod presented by prefab review where we interview leading people and companies in the prefab housing industry to learn more about them and make it easier for you, buyers to make decisions about your prefab or modular project. Today we're very lucky to be interviewing Ted Benson the founder at Bensonwood and Unity Homes and potentially some other organizations involved with prefab and panelized building who is based out of New Hampshire. So welcome Ted. Thanks for being with us.

- Bensonwood

It's good to be here and I look forward to this conversation. It's always fun to talk about what we do.

- Prefab Review

So I wanted to start out by asking how do you get into this business.

- Bensonwood

I began in 1973 and as a young idealistic naive young man had a vision to really try to improve the building industry. And so my initial interest was to try to find a better way to build. And my initial go to solution was to revive the old form of timber frame construction and bring it into the twentieth century with better tools and better technology and better building systems. So that's how we started kind of really focused on one aspect of the construction. But the interesting thing that evolved from that is from the very beginning from the early 70s we were prefabricating because the efficient and effective way to create a 20th century version of the old world timber frame was to make parts offsite and to fabricate them in controlled facilities with better tools and better technology. And so through the years you know we've added more of the building systems but we've always had the technology and the rhythm and the logistics of pre fabrication kind of as our underlying skill set.

- Prefab Review

So you said in the 1970s had you been a an engineer or a contractor or anything like that before?

- Bensonwood

I had been a carpenter working my way through high school and college. So initially it was a way to make a living a way to pay tuition and room and board and I became very interested in building I liked it you know I like a lot of things about it especially the immediate gratification or feedback of the work you accomplish. So I became kind of enamored of building in general but really disenchanted with the traditional methods of buildings because the outcome was so often compromised often because of site conditions but often because of lack of training or lack of right attitude or right approach and you know I knew from my own experience growing up how what a huge difference a good quality home can make in a person's life. And it was disconcerting as a young carpenter a builder to see poor quality construction come into the marketplace and affect people who deserve better. So so some of it was you know being inspired by building and some of it came from thinking you know as a young idealistic carpenter that there must be a better way.

- Prefab Review

So you started out you said you're mostly building the frames off site. How how did how did the business evolve since then.

- Bensonwood

Well again initially we were focused on one aspect but it became pretty clear that as a company we needed to come up with a total solution that we had to find ways to control also the building envelope - the enclosure the walls floors and the roof. And while we might have been mostly interested in reviving this old way of building our clients were very interested in having a home. And so that took us in eventually to a panelization of all sorts. And and so as a company we evolved our pre fabrication to include you know an entire building envelope with all the exterior finishes we added millwork and woodworking so that we were able to provide doors and stairs and trim and all those important aspects of the home as well. And so just over the decades you know we added value to our pre-fabricated product for our benefit and for the benefit of our clients who really needed and deserve better homes not just better structures.

- Prefab Review

Okay. That makes total sense. So fast forward to today. Can you tell me sort of again I know you have Bensonwood which you should explain it not me but I think it's sort of a high end custom product and you have Unity homes which is sort of more of a you know value product that is not necessarily custom designs but it'd be great to care about those products as well as anything else.

- Bensonwood

Yeah sure. Well you know in the history of Benson we've we've always focused on a more custom product. And part of it part of the reason for that is is for us to learn is as craftspeople and as builders and to be able to experience a whole wide range of products and building types and architectural types and make sure that we were developing construction methods that were viable for everything and not just kind of narrow exemption the market. And so working in that way and trying to elevate our craft and elevate our skills and to demonstrate that this is truly a better way to build we've been able to bring our product as Bensonwood across the entire country we've been in every state to the union. We've built in Japan and England. So clearly you know we've found a way to attract more of an important niche in the market but also everywhere which brings us solutions to the types of buildings that they build out West as well as down south and in the cold climates and the warmer climates and many different architectural types. And so that's given us a broad experience but it's also allowed us to execute a wide range of of solutions and systems and you know once we had all those solutions and systems manufacturing process then the next goal for us as a dedicated group of craftsman builders was to find a way to make this very high quality product more affordable in the marketplace. And so in 2012 that led to launching a new company not just a division of business with a company called Unity homes. And the idea of unity is is to standardize the components of the building so that we could customize the configuration of the building because we had learned through Bensonwood that every client is different every site is different every budget is different every lead is different. And so we needed a standardized solution to lower the cost of entry keep the quality high but still allow a very wide range of client personalization and customization which we've come to think is critical to better building not just the building quality itself but the ability of the building system to meet the particular needs of clients.

- Prefab Review

And what sort of scale are you guys at right no? I mean I know you obviously do kind of multifamily and commercial property as well. But at least on kind of the residential single family home size like how many. Yeah how many homes a year does Bensonwood and Unity homes do a year?

- Bensonwood

Well you've run up to multi-family piece and that's important because it's all part of what we're doing we're actually raising and installing a big multifamily project in the Boston area right now. And a month or so ago we completed one another multifamily project in upstate New York. And each of those kinds of projects kind of displace 10-12 or 15 single family homes. And so we count things a little bit differently but I think the important thing to know is that our production capacity with our one hundred thousand square foot factory is about 250 to 300 homes a year. And how those get kind of organized between the Bensonwood-side and the unity side and then the out of offices outside architect multifamily and other kinds of projects is always shifting. So right now for instance unity is very busy. We've got a number of projects in production of Bensonwood it's a little less busy because we just went through a big kind of sine wave of activity and we've got another one coming up in the fall. So you know it's good for a company like ours to have the kind of diversity that we have and be able to serve all of these different kinds of markets out there not just across the northeast which is primarily where unity is focused but throughout the country

- Prefab Review

Let's talk a little bit more specifically about the two companies Bensonwood and he just because you know when buyers come to us they say OK here's my price point here's the location I want to build and here's the style I want to build in whatever here's the size. What are we looking for. And we try to point them in the right direction. Sure. So for four like to achieve unity are you. Are you guys doing the interiors as well or is what you guys are building mostly kind of the shell the house?

- Bensonwood

Especially, well in Bensonwood the interior part that we're doing is the offsite fabrication of the millwork elements. So we make a lot of interior door stairs trim packages and even things like waste cut systems and kind of all of that you know interior millwork that defines the finish but also the style of the building and it helps us to create the craft consistency from all of our building. So for example we do have a building being constructed right now in Colorado just outside of Denver and maybe six weeks or eight weeks ago we installed the shell of the building and now we have the millwork package ready to go. We're ready to be shipped to the site whenever the local contractor who is taking care of the mechanical trades and kind of the rough in and when he's ready then we'll you know we'll deliver that millwork package for the interior finishes. So on the Unity side its similar although we don't always as a company ourselves make all of the interior finishes we provide the interior finishes stair trim cabinets even fixtures through kind of a suite of suppliers and always focused on quality and affordability. And so some of the things we make in unity buildings like we make trenches for windows and doors but we don't make all the cabinets and interior or as we often do for Bensonwood projects but we're still providing that kind of complete interior package after the shell goes.

- Prefab Review

And then stuff like appliances like hvac it's plumbing that will be done by our local contractor.

- Bensonwood

Yeah. And while the appliances are usually purchased locally and that's important not just for the service side but the mechanical systems : plumbing, electrical, HVAC tend to be installed more locally. However I do have a little caveat on that and that is that we also do make that things like bath pods as modular elements. And so that's been a focus of our new Keene factory to bring that capability back to our production. We did it for two years in our smaller facility and and then just kind of outgrew it. And now that we're in the larger facility the intention for both Bensonwood and Unity entities is to provide complete modular elements. That is you know 3D volumetric elements for the intensive mechanical areas allows. You'll still need a local plumber electrician for tie ins and so on. But we are capable of doing more.

- Prefab Review

Right. And once there's a foundation. Are you actually putting the house together. Or is that with a local contractor standing.

- Bensonwood

Usually both. That's the right way to do it. Almost always there's a representative or two from our company here. But the best the best way for us to execute is in partnership with a local contractor especially if it's a little farther away from our factory. So they're also kind of tuned into the product that we've delivered and have been a part of that installation so they know the details and the requirements of how to ensure that the high performance qualities that we've embedded in it are maintained as they continue their process.

- Prefab Review

That makes sense. What's so from a from an architectural standpoint on the Bensonwood stuff. What's the split in terms of you designing the homes versus an outside architect designing it.

- Bensonwood

Well that's that's a good conversation. We we have a team of interior architects. We do good work and we definitely have a lot of pride in the quality of our architectural design. But that said we we like working with outside architects and bringing them into our system because it really helps us to know to stretch and learn from other professional designers. So we do a lot of work with outside architects. And in fact there's a new initiative that we're relaunching this year in partnership with two significant architects. You'll know the answer to that question in early September because we're launching this new initiative of kind of new Bensonwood products that will be a collaborative effort between our team of architects and two outside architects bringing three products kind of platform products into the marketplace. And it's just been really fun and exciting to work in collaboration with other architects and to show them the standards that we have that really help us to fabricate products efficiently and then together with kind of their design ideas and how we can integrate the two and have lots of standardization. But you know all the customization and kind of the quality that we need to represent you know kind of 3 tentacles of design through one system that makes a lot of sense.

- Prefab Review

Yeah. We've had we're seeing I mean I wouldn't say that strategy's currently popular but we've seen a few people do that over the last couple years. It's always cool to have more you know quality designs that are being built competently.

- Bensonwood

Yeah yeah yeah. The key and the key to it we think is that there's consistency in the systems and the components in the elements even in the parts and pieces so that they all fit offsite fabrication can happen well. But there's different differentiation in the architectural outcomes. And and you know that whole thing is kind of fun because you know there are things that we're now going to be doing that we we alone never would have thought of.

- Prefab Review

We've seen this a little bit before and it seems like a bright light you probably save a little bit on design services. If you're a buyer because right it's not 15 or 20 percent necessarily for it.

- Bensonwood

Yeah. Yeah. Well in fact you save a lot. And that's where you know that part of the reason this is happening.

- Prefab Review

And then the second thing is that I think that helps from an inspiration standpoint too.

- Bensonwood

Yeah yeah yeah. That design a custom design is expensive. We know that because we do a lot of it it takes a lot of time. A lot of effort to make a unique thing in the marketplace. And but on the other side if we could standardize the right things we could still achieve a custom design for much much less design effort. And so that whole effort of kind of standards plus customization and how we reach that is a critical aspect of how to make both affordable buildings more affordable high end buildings more affordable. And that's what I'm trying to try to do both.

- Prefab Review

So any affordability and this is I think probably the most helpful thing to do is trying to give people an understanding around price basically how are your how are your homes priced both on the unity side and on the Bensonwood side. And what would be most helpful is kind of understand. Let's call it a typical project on a flattish lot in Lexington, Massachusetts or something like you know relatively high end area. Yeah. Just basically understanding and if possible. I understand there's ranges and all the stuff kind of how much projects usually come in overall and then sort of what the differences like components are in terms of Bensonwood versus local contractor.

- Bensonwood

OK I'll take your crack at this yeah. I'll get I'll give it a try. But let me preface it by saying that listeners can go to the unity home site unity homes dot com and we do post some kind of prices for each of the platforms. So you can kind of see what we have projected for kind of the entry level models and and then how costs might escalate depending on finished packages. So there is some information there on the Bensonwood side there's less because our work is so custom. Right. So to answer your question if we were building in Lexington Massachusetts the first thing I would tell you because I know quite a bit about that area is that local building costs in Lexington are pretty high. And it would be hard to build any kind of single family home in the Lexington area for under two hundred dollars or a square foot actually. Having said that I can't imagine building one for two hundred dollars a square foot in Lexington. In other words building costs are a lot higher there. And so that's kind of good news for the unity side because we are very affordable in the Lexington Market because building costs there are so high and and so you know we would be two hundred dollars a square foot just because a lot of the local labor inputs are also expensive in Lexington.

- Prefab Review

This is this is for all in a unity house.

- Bensonwood

Yeah. And on the Bensonwoodside doing the same thing because of the higher level of customization and the higher level finishes its probably more in the neighborhood of 300 which might be fairly normal for Lexington but all the way up to five hundred or even six hundred dollars a square foot depending on customization complexity and levels of finishes.

- Prefab Review

Yeah. I mean three hundred actually it would be surprisingly inexpensive to me for an area like that for a custom house. We would obviously like soft costs like design and such. Yes. Yeah.

And then part of that part of the reason I guess we built a lot in that area. So I'm sure you're confident about that. But I think we should know from the listeners point of view we should put this in context. And let's take it all out of Lexington and and move it to Walpole, New Hampshire where I am currently know which is much more rural. Yeah. And and here you know costs are much lower than a place like Lexington which is a more urban area. And so you could build a standard home in the Walpole area for you know really one hundred and fifty is fairly normal one hundred maybe a hundred and seventy five for a relatively decent local builder type of home and and so here with unity we compete with that. We don't beat it but we try to build a better product that makes sense.

- Prefab Review

What are the costs that basically you're paying Bensonwood or Unity versus contractor is it like 50/ 50, 60/40? Just trying to get an understanding because that's also helpful in terms of our perspective. We understand that illegitimately like, I live in San Francisco. In San Francisco you may pay a little contractor 200 dollars a square foot it'll only be the local site cost right. So to try to understand like you know basically What are we paying the pre-fabricated on top of that?

- Bensonwood

What is a pre fabrication package or what is a premium from pre fabrication?

- Prefab Review

No. So the question is. So right. So Lexington you said it is going to be three hundred dollars but that's gonna be a split between the amount paid to Bensonwood and the amount that actually goes to the general contractor and his subcontractor.

- Bensonwood

OK yeah. So our typically the shelf package part of the enclosure with windows and doors and the weather type building envelope and all that is included in that interior partitions forces wall system roof systems et cetera is generally 40 to maybe 50 percent. And then if we've added the millwork package you know we can get that up to 60 percent OK. That makes sense. And so you know 40 to 60 percent depending on the extent or package when we do bath pods you know like it's up to 70 75 percent.

- Prefab Review

It sounds like it ends up running like a hundred fifty dollars a square foot or something in that range is that right?

- Bensonwood

Yeah yeah yeah. That's actually a pretty good number a little more expensive on the on the Bensonwood size then on the Unity side because of more war because of that customization than because of the quality of the envelope that makes sense.

- Prefab Review

How long do these homes you typically take to build particularly in the unity side I can imagine it could be fairly fast?

- Bensonwood

Yeah pretty fast we we just did put together a unity home last week in Vermont it was two and a half days for the complete shell including the garage. So that was on site assembly of the building shell and on top of an existing foundation.

- Prefab Review

And how about the process from the time you guys want a fast process with a client from when they meet you like when they're in their home?

- Bensonwood

So for unity which is really fast because of the standardization we've actually had several instances several meaning two of where where we've gone from first client meeting to turn key in the same quarter. So that's incredibly fast and don't expect it but it's happened you know if we're just choosing a product that we know how to make and we can manufacturer deliver it. So more typically you know is in the four to six month kind of period for unity. And then Bensonwood is much longer because of the customization of the design which can take four to six or eight months on its own. And then you know then from there we go into production and that is you know six months or eight months or so.

- Prefab Review

Well it's been great learning a little bit about Bensonwood and Unity. Well we just want to transition quickly to our fire round basically i'll fire a few questions at you sort of on a variety of topics tapping into your expertise if possible to give giving your answers in one minute or less. That would be great. And we'll discuss a few things. So first of all tell me a little bit about cross laminated timber. I hear about it all all the time not all the time pretty regularly. I also hear about dowel laminated timber. Do you use it? What's special about it etc.?

- Bensonwood

OK. We do use cross laminated timber and we do use dowel laminated timber especially on the Bensonwood side so cross laminated timber is a way to think about it It's like a really big fat sheet of plywood and and so the cross is actual planks of wood that are oriented in one direction for one layer and then the opposite direction for the next layer and glued under pressure with with incredibly good glue to make a composite panel that may be anywhere from three and a half inches to six inches thick and eight feet up to 40 feet. And the idea of it is more wood kind of developed in a way that it could displace concrete and steel as a building. So cross laminated timber buildings can go much higher because there is not a shrinkage issue that you have in other forms of wood. And they're very very strong and very stable. So that's cross laminated timber dowel laminated timber. If you can think about it as planks side by side by side with dowels driven through horizontally across them to essentially be the glue that connects those planks into a single panel that then can be lifted and installed on site usually as for systems or roof systems in place of you know a more independent light structure.

- Prefab Review

It makes it really helpful. How could buyers think about doing diligence on land? We get this question all the time because a lot of manufacturers don't want to actually even work with buyers before they at least have land in their contract.

- Bensonwood

Well it's you know it's really important to understand the side of the building site and the opportunities and the constraints that may be embedded in that building site. So we do like to work with clients who are in the kind of searching phase. And simply because of Google Earth we can actually help even if we don't always go. And so we can learn enough about the location the adjacencies you know the building restrictions and so on. Even if we haven't visited if we can visit because of proximity is just obviously even better but as designer architects engineers it's really helpful to have some input because always the building design whether it's unity thats standardized or Bensonwood thats custom, nothing happens until you understand the site because design begins on a building site that has orientation as a road. You know there are some logical architectural party that comes out of understanding the building site. So if we can have some influence on helping our clients to understand its opportunities and constraints that's helpful to us.

- Prefab Review

How do you see most people, and this can be a long question so, paying for/financing homes these days? For example is it - Are you seeing two in one products are you seeing a lot of people buying land and find finding financing the construction etc..

- Bensonwood

Nearly everything. And you know it's these days it's it's often it's often an obstacle because not so many lending agencies are or have experience with offsite fabrication. And so we're often in conversation with the lending agencies to help our clients understand and help the lending agency understand how offsite fabrication works. But I would say that most of our businesses with clients aren't necessarily going out and needing to collateralize the land in order to finance their construction loan. I think that many of our clients on the Unity side are having to make sure that comparables have been established, lending institutions are on board, and know that they as individuals qualify for the kind of loan that they're asking for. But we're almost always in the conversation with the livlending agency.

- Prefab Review

Is there a secret to finding good local contractors who can build the kind of foundation and take care of the sort of finishing aspects of the home like yeah. How should a buyer due diligence on this?

- Bensonwood

Tier of good builders everywhere that's you know that's the first thing to say. And then of course the caller corollary to that is it is the obvious one that know not all builders are good. And so we also like to play a role in that in helping our clients to find the right partner builder in the process and to make sure that we have found a person or company that is highly motivated it's the same way we are to serve our clients interests deeply. Unfortunately the corollary a problem the dark side is is that it's just an industry issue that there are a lot of builders who aren't up to date about building science and the new things that are happening with building engineering and and for the builders out there who aren’t learning and aren't keeping up that is just it's just a problem. And so we generally avoid those and find the ones who are good learners who are partners. The good thing for us is we've been around for forty five years we've built in many parts of the country. So in most cases we know someone who we've already worked with as is is the case in our Denver project right now or we know somebody in that area who could make a referral to somebody else so our resources and our connections are pretty helpful.

- Prefab Review

Yeah it's funny we say our Web site gets hit. We get approached pretty frequently these days maybe once a month twice a month by companies coming from Europe who say we have a successful prefab or sometimes even Asia product in Europe or Asia. We want to enter the market can you help us get customers but also can you help us get connected to local builders because it seems like that's one of the pain points for these newer entrants.

- Bensonwood

Now let me just throw out another secret that's no longer going to be a secret but we've learned that renovation contractors are usually a better fit for prefab partnership than new buildings simply because the renovation contractors are more accustomed to the kind of rhythm that's involved. It's a very fast process and they're usually problem solvers so if there's something a little different that's unusual that doesn't throw them for a curve or curve ball to them where sometimes the kinds of builders who are only doing new construction have a lot of habits and procedures in their process. And then our offsite prefab kind of throws them for a loop that is kind of out of sequence with their normal behavior so renovation contractors are usually better fits for us.

- Prefab Review

I don't think we figured that out if we don't know someone in an area. We usually just try to find somebody experienced in panel stuff even if it's not a manufacturer and that sort of thing. All right. Final fire round question. So I know you guys have done some work on passive houses recently. We actually get a lot ofdemand for parts and houses and zero net energy stuff particularly California. Tell me a little bit about how you achieve that.

- Bensonwood

Sure we're if you go to our Bensonwood Web site and in the area where you find our building systems under tectonics you'll see kind of a selection of wall types that we offer and then and then you'll see an opportunity that we call flex spelled with a p h for you know for its connection to Passive House about how we accentuate each of those building systems to bring them to the passive house level and and so most of our building systems all of our building systems have cellulose as an insulation. And one of the wall types has wood fiber as a exterior continuous insulation layer and and the other one has zip of system on the outside and then we use a TGI or a nice stud to to minimize the thermal bridging and and thicken the wall cavities. So we have several ways of achieving it and that's important in the flex idea for passive house is really critical because each of the climate zones from climate 7 down to climate zone 2 generally has completely different requirements to get to the passive house level. So there's not like one passive house solution. There's kind of a passive house system solution but we've really opted to stay away from foams to reduce kind of the plastic element and the stick with kind of natural materials cellulose, wood, etc..

- Prefab Review

You're sort of saying instead of doing like more of a standard SIP this is kind of your answer to that in a more natural light.

- Bensonwood

Yeah yeah. We'd like a wall you could eat.

- Prefab Review

Thanks so much. This has been really great talking. The final question which I ask everyone is what are you most excited about for your company or for the industry for the near future.

- Bensonwood

Well what I'm most excited about is what the industry needs and that we're trying to be leaders for and that is to normalize high performance buildings so that all of our buildings are using much less energy and no fossil fuels. We have to do this as a country we have to do it as citizens of this planet for the climate crisis. We should have eliminated fossil fuels and buildings a long time ago. But we're stuck with it here. And it's unfortunate because building high performance good quality buildings that are even healthier for people is actually not a heavy lift. We know how to do it. It's not advanced technology or anything it's just good quality building and and so to be leaders in how as an industry we move away from fossil fuels to heat and cool buildings is important for us. But you know just plain important for the industry.

- Prefab Review

Thank you so much Ted. I really appreciate your leadership and for taking the time to speak with me today. If you want to learn more about some of the stuff we talked about you can visit Bensonsonwood.com or unityhomes.com and the transcript of this will likely be up on prefabreview.com with about five thousand other prefab articles. Nice talking to you and hopefully we get to speak again soon.

- Bensonwood

Good to talk to you as well. Thank you for the opportunity. Thanks.