Most builders are familiar with Habitat for Humanity, a generous non-profit organization that builds homes for deserving individuals. The philosophy behind it being that everyone deserves affordable and decent housing. Mike Holmes has adopted it as well with his Make It Right work that encompasses both high-integrity building projects (that have literally raised building code standards in Canada), as well as ongoing children’s charity support. And while these are popular examples of benevolence among builders, pockets of similar stories can be found at every corner of the industry. 

Building waste on its way to the landfill is partly made up of broken materials that hopefully never made it to the job site, but too often do. Broken and cracked lumber is so common that builders in Canada joke and call these hockey sticks. Other times drywall corners are cracked or metal frames are bent, destined for the nearest dumpster. 

In 2010 iPads made their way onto building and construction job sites for the first time.  A mere three years later, nearly 13 000 construction, development and design apps had hit the market. Looking back at the last decade, a lot of technology has been created to support the building and construction sector, but it hasn’t been absorbed by the industry at the same rate.

The holiday season has begun, so naturally, you’d expect that construction would slow down. While that was definitely the case in the U.S. last year, north of the border Canadian construction was going strong. As the weather in Canada and parts of the U.S. turns frightful, everyone gets festive and takes time off. So why did Canada have such a good construction season last December, while the U.S. was stagnating?

We’re excited to announce that RenoRun was recognized as part of the prestigious 2019 HIVE 50! HIVE stands for Housing Innovation, Vision and Economics, and it honours leading people, products and processes in the building industry annually, through an awards ceremony and dinner event coinciding the Innovation and Disruption in Housing Incubator. This year the event takes place on December 4-5 in Austin, Texas, one of our favourite US cities!

The Canadian Construction Association (CCA) recently released a 2019 industry trends report, in partnership with Abacus Data, looking at how builder behaviour is evolving in Canada. The report covers five key areas, that we’ll cover here in five quick minutes — workforce, technology, market forces, procurement and the future of associations. Read on to get the entirely unpacked and summarized CCA trends report as it matters to you!

The RenoRun staff are all smiles today after learning that we were just named on CNBC’s 2019 Upstart 100 List. This level of recognition for our hard work is a major indicator of both past and future success. Where we believe that we are innovating and solving a huge materials procurement problem in the building industry, others see this too and agree! And we’re just getting started.

Every year builders in the Northern Hemisphere (and some occasionally in Texas!) prepare for winter’s worst and thankfully we talk about it. Sharing the best safety advice is one way we can help each other out and prevent injuries on the job this winter. Our peers have provided really helpful pro tips over the years and we took the liberty of putting them all together. Consider this your getting-ready-for-winter-building guide and read on!

Contractors and construction managers across North America will tell you this is the tightest labor market they’ve ever seen. According to the Associated General Contractors of America, more than 80 percent of construction firms are currently having trouble recruiting for hourly positions.

Thinking ahead to the year 2020 feels like we should expect a sci-fi future of flying cars and food replicators, even if it’s just next year. Warp-speed space missions aren’t with us yet, but there are still futuristic trends on the horizon. While next year looks a lot more mundane than an episode of The Jetsons, innovations abound — perhaps especially in the construction industry.