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Universal appeal
Accessibility is a hot trend
Dr. Bill Forbus uses a sliding shelf built into his Craig Retirement Community home. The homes include accessibility features common in universal design homes, such as wide doorways, oversized showers and levers instead of door knobs.
Grab bars like these installed around the bathroom of a Craig Retirement Community home are common in universal design homes.
Dr. Bill Forbus lives in a neighborhood of cottages at Craig Retirement Community on Amarillo’s west side.
Craig Retirement Community homes include accessibility features common in universal design homes, such as tall toilets and grab bars.
Accessibility features common in universal design homes are lever-operated doors and wide doorways and halls.
Barry Christy’s company, B&M Asset Group LLC, is planning to build 20 homes designed for older people who are downsizing, but want to stay independent.
When Dr. Bill Forbus retired five years ago, he and his wife, Patsy, looked around at housing options.
The Dumas couple wanted to downsize to a comfy, convenient home “that could grow old with us.”
The cottages at Craig Retirement Community - featuring wide doorways, oversized showers, and levers instead of door knobs - fit the bill.
“Right now, we don’t need some of these things,” Forbus said, noting that their bathroom grab bars are stored in the attic. “But we want to be prepared for the future.”
They aren’t alone.
Every year, 4 million Americans turn 50. Most are looking for ways to stay independent longer, and that means living in homes built with accessibility in mind.
But baby boomers don’t want the stigma of unattractive homes with wheelchair ramps and an institutional feel.
The solution: universal design - stylish homes touting features that look good while accommodating folks of all ages and physical abilities.
“Universal design isn’t just for people with special needs,” Amarillo home builder Barry Christy said. “The features are ones that appeal to a lot of people because they make life easier and fully functional for everyone.”
Like stepless entries, necessary for someone in a walker or wheelchair, but also a perk for moms pushing baby strollers.
Lever door handles are as ideal for a 30-year-old holding an armful of groceries as they are for elderly people with arthritis.
After mulling the concept for three years, Christy is building 20 fully accessible homes in City View, a development of 1,800 homes in southwest Amarillo.
“The deal is, these homes won’t look like institutional housing,” he said.
“They’ll have the advantages of assisted living houses, but they’ll look like other homes in the neighborhood.”
Tweaking specifications in a home’s design can make a huge difference in livability, said Dr. Daniel Salim, an Amarillo chiropractor who has looked at Christy’s plans.
“Like the heights of counters,” he said, “and how the kitchens and bathrooms are set up.”
In his practice, Salim sees an increasing need for accessible housing.
The American Association for Retired Persons also endorses universal design as a way to meet the needs of the country’s aging population.
“Universal design features can be an important factor in determining how long people can remain independent in their homes as they age,” spokesman Rafael Ayuso said. “And that makes a heck of a lot of sense.”
Christy is using guidelines from The Center for Universal Design at North Carolina State University, established by the late Ron Mace, an architect who spent most of his life in a wheelchair.
“I’d been thinking about doing this for a while,” Christy said. But the idea clicked when he built some luxury two-bedroom town homes near his office. The four-plex features such design elements as pullout cabinets in the spacious galley kitchens, tile floors and wider doorways.
“They leased within a week,” he said. “It made me realize that there’s a demand for this kind of housing.”
Major manufacturers are offering more appliances and products that comply with universal design.
“One of the things that’s really neat is a Whirlpool drawer-style dishwasher,” Christy said. “Instead of a door that folds down, you just slide them out to load them.”
He’s also looking at smooth-top electric stoves with sensor activation - “they don’t turn on unless something is setting on it.”
While some universal design amenities can be costly, Christy intends to keep the City View houses reasonably priced.
Last year, one of his traditional homes in the development sold for about $96 per square foot; the universal design homes will be about $3 to $4 more.
“Barry is awfully innovative,” said Matt Griffith of Rockrose Development, which is developing City View. “When he gets an idea, he digs in deep. And I think his universal design homes have a lot of potential for Amarillo.”
Click here to view the full article on Amarillo.com’s website
Universal design eases living
Features help make homes more accessible
Penny Mooney shows some of the features of the custom home built by Amarillo builder Barry Christy. The home has special features designed for people with disabilities.
Doyle Mooney can get his walker through the 3-foot-wide doors.
“He’s got a lot of his independence back,” said Penny Mooney, who is disabled with a back injury herself. “I think it’s wonderful.”
The newly built house at 8505 Taos Drive has 3-foot doorways, wide enough for Doyle’s walker.
There are no lips or steps anywhere. The outlets are higher and counter tops lower, making it easy to reach from a wheelchair. The bathroom is fully accessible.
“There’s 1,000 things you wouldn’t even notice if you don’t live here,” builder Barry Christy said.
Christy intends to build homes easily accessible to people with disabilities but that don’t have an institutional feeling.
“That’s the whole concept behind a universal design,” Christy said. “It’s functional, whether you have a disability or not.”
He hopes to reach an aging population who long for more independent living.
Christy and his company, B&M Asset Group, have built or plan to build up to 22 universal design homes around Amarillo.
“Our goal is to have fully handicapped-accessible homes that don’t look institutional,” Christy said.
Tax credits make such homes more affordable.
The Mooneys pay nearly $1,000 a month on their mortgage for the three-bedroom, two bath home - roughly the same as their old house.
“It’s no higher than the other houses we looked at,” Penny Mooney said.
In fact, she said it’s less per square foot than other houses the Mooneys shopped for.
Amarillo home builder Gary Rogers recently built a custom-designed, handicapped-accessible house in the Grayhawk Landing subdivision.
He said there is not much demand for them.
“It’s much better to try to design a house like that from scratch than to remodel a house like that,” Rogers said.
The extra square footage of an accessible home can add to the cost of a home.
“If you know what you are doing from the beginning, it’s not a difficult thing to do,” Rogers said.
Rogers said a builder could believe handicapped-accessible homes is a growing market with aging baby boomers.
“You would think so, but I haven’t seen an increased demand,” he said.
The Mooneys feel differently.
“Let’s face it, there’s a lot of younger people that have a spouse with (multiple sclerosis) or been in an accident,” Penny said.
For Christy, he receives satisfaction seeing a family’s reaction to their universal designed home.
“Normally, when you sell somebody a house, it’s not a life-altering experience,” Christy said.
The Mooneys say it is.
Home sweet home
Some of the features of a universal designed home:
- No concrete lips, ledges or steps
- Sliding entry doors with smooth access ramps and deep glass tint that allows occupants to have a full view out with no view in
- Tile floors throughout
- Wall outlets set at higher-than-standard levels to allow easy access without having to bend
- Rocker-style electrical switches
- Remote control window blinds and ceiling fans
- Sliding 3-foot pocket doors
- Pull-out drawer style dishwasher
- Center wall mount oven
- Levers wherever possible
- Cabinets are drawers or have retractable doors with pull-out shelving
- Fully accessible master bathroom with wheelchair-accessible shower
- Cabinets with knee space
- Faucets located at the sides of sinks
(See the article on the Amarillo Globe-News website by clicking here.)
From car seller to home builder
Amarillo building company selected for membership in Southern Living Program
By RICHARD WILLIAMS
Globe-News Business Writer
In 1991, Barry Christy was sitting in his office as general sales manager at the Autoplex on Canyon Drive when he decided the time was right to start building custom homes in Amarillo.
“To this day, I can’t say exactly what made me decide to switch to home building,” Christy said.
Almost nine years and some 200 homes later, the 37-year-old Amarillo home builder hasn’t had the time or inclination to look back.
Recently, Christy’s company was one of 100 residential construction companies in 16 southern states selected by Southern Living magazine for membership in the publication’s sixth annual Custom Home Program.
The selection is based on factors such as reputation among local businesses and consumers; strength of presence in the local market; superior quality and attention to detail; and innovative style, according to Lee Studer, spokesman for Southern Living in Amarillo.
Southern Living is a regional lifestyle magazine published in Birmingham, Ala., by Southern Progress Corp., a subsidiary of Time Inc.
“We keep pretty busy with 15 to 25 homes under construction at any one time, so being chosen to participate in Southern Living’s program was a pleasant surprise,” Christy said.
Builders who accept membership in the magazine’s annual program are required to build at least one house from a selection of award-winning plans from Southern Living.
Christy will build two Southern Living homes for his 50-home Jynteewood development in Hunsley Hills north of Canyon.
“We will promote Southern Living homes at Jynteewood, and these two homes should be completed by the end of January to serve as models for the development,” Christy said.
The models will be priced in the $175,000 to $190,000 range.
Christy began his construction business when property at Hillside Road and Western Street became available at a good price, he said. The 52-lot development, called Southside Estates, took Christy a year to develop using local subcontractors.
“It was good timing and a good location. I sold out the development that first year,” Christy said.
Since then, Christy has seen steady growth and success in a variety of custom home developments and projects throughout Amarillo and Canyon. The company has eight employees, including the office staff, a job superintendent and two warranty personnel.
Christy employs about 50 subcontractors on an ongoing basis.
“We have enough going all the time that nearly all our subcontractors work exclusively for us. That makes quality control more consistent and easier to maintain,” he said.
Christy is working on several residential developments in addition to the Jynteewood project in Hunsley Hills:
- Homestead Ranches is a 20-home rural subdivision off south Georgia.
- Pheasant Run, located southeast of 58th Avenue and Georgia Street, has 50 homes completed and is platted for 200 more.
- Highland Park Estates is a rural subdivision one mile east of the intersection of FM1912 and FM2575 on FM2575 with 20 5-acre homesites and a number of 50- to 100-acre sites.
- Academy Homes is a 30-lot development in the Westover Park subdivision at the southeast corner of Arden and Soncy Road.
Christy also has four homes under construction at the Greenways at Hillside and one home in each of the following Amarillo subdivisions: Dove Landing, The Canyons and Sleepy Hollow.
While Christy said he sees most of the demand for housing in Amarillo to the west and southwest, he said he has had incredible response to the High- land Parks development in the rural area east of Amarillo.
“There are a lot of employees for Pantex and Bell Helicopter and other companies who want to live closer to their work, and homes in that area are valued up to $350,000. A lot of people want to live in these rural, isolated settings,” he said.
The Amarillo developer said the local housing industry is busy and competitive.
“There are more builders in Amarillo than ever before. I think growth will slow down a little but we’ll continue to see a strong residential market here,” he said.
Christy, who grew up in the Amarillo area, was not a novice to the building trade.
“My brother, Paul, was a residential builder for several years,” Christy said. “He had moved on to real estate investments by the time I decided to get into the business.
“Dad (Dean Christy) was a life insurance executive who built homes on the side until he retired. Now he’s in real estate investments here in Amarillo, too. But I got a lot of experience working with Dad and Paul when they were in the business.” (See the article on the Amarillo Globe-News website by clicking here.)