While it is one thing for famous architects, urban planners, and advocates to establish a vision for a green future, it will be the marketplace that makes the ultimate decision. To put it simply, will people buy it?

There are signs that the public is coming to that position as energy costs increase, global warming concerns continue to grow, and homebuyers seek more community and traditional interaction in response to suburban sprawl and the resulting traffic increase on ever-more crowded highways.

Developing the Green Building Market

It is consumers who will decide the future of green building design and development standards. Provide them with cost savings, well built homes, and education about the larger issues involved and the green building movement may succeed.

For the Green Building effort to succeed it must continue to shift from multi-million dollar homes, condos and designer office buildings to typical commercial properties and housing developments that are available to the larger mass market of home buyers and renters. The ability to make that move will be the ultimate factor in determining if green will truly go mainstream—and in the process move from being a cause to becoming the new conventional wisdom.

See article by Tom Blackburn Rodriquez of Real Estate Maui Style Magazine in full.