At $2.55 million -- not counting $300,000 in furnishings -- this year's New American Home is not exactly mainstream. But affordability has never been the purpose of this annual homage to many of the country's top building products manufactures.

No, the showhouse is intended to allow builders from throughout the country who attend the 2005 International Builders Show in Orlando to see the various applications in a real-world environment rather than in simply a catalog or showroom.

Veteran Florida builder William Nolan calls it "a WalMart" of concepts, materials, designs and construction techniques that can be replicated, in whole or in part, in houses built anywhere. "It's loaded with stuff!" he exclaimed.

Maybe so. But at prices like these, it's much more of a Neiman-Marcus than a WalMart.

Still, many of the things shown here earlier this month are destined to eventually find their way into less expensive homes -- including, perhaps, an elevator.

"A number of elevator companies are really starting to shift their focus to residential," said Kim Goehring of Goehring & Morgan Construction, the custom builder who built this living laboratory. "We had two or three show interest in this year's house and nine or ten are lining up for 2006."

Now an elevator is something that's expected of a $2.5 million house. But a $250,000 tract home?

Sure, said Goerhing, noting that lift prices are dropping dramatically.

The one here by Residential Elevators of Crawfordville, Fla., cost $25,000 or so. But ten years ago, it might have run $40,000. And you can find less expensive ones in the $15,000-$17,000 price range, said designer Ed Blinkley of Bloodgood Sharp Buster Architect & Planners.

"It's become something you can factor in that won't blow your sales price," the architect said.

An elevator, of course, is an important feature for owners of two-story houses who intend to age in place. And this house is purposefully laid out to suggest it was built over time to accommodate a growing family.

It "started out" with a bedroom suite, parlor, dining room and kitchen across the front. And as the family matured, both in wealth and size, so did their home.

Now pushed back and encompassing nearly 6,000 square feet of conditioned space, the original first floor bedroom has become a guest suite. Also on the first floor are a massive master suite and family living area, and the expanded upstairs holds three more bedrooms, a library-sitting area, gallery and technology center, and a game room-home theater area.

In the future, after the kids leave the nest and Mom and Dad slow down -- perhaps not to a crawl, but slow down nonetheless -- the house can still serve the old folks. For example, low doorway thresholds, a far less expensive feature all builders should be using, make the place handicapped accessible.

With more than 3,000 square feet, the New American Home's outdoor living area is larger than inside of most houses. The huge space includes a 21-foot deep upstairs covered deck that wraps around the courtyard below and has multiple access points from the second floor.

Still, it is another feature that can be scaled back to fit any tract home or lower end custom house, said builder Goehring. And with the latest in glass wall systems, it's easier than ever to let the outside in -- or vise versa.

Replacing not just sliding glass doors but entire walls, the system's panels fold together in train. There are hundreds of configuration options, according to Nana Wall Systems of Mill Valley, Calif., and panels can be hinged off both sides of the opening or stacked to one side.

Goehring sited several other features he believes will eventually find there way into production houses. Perimeter-edge swimming pools in which the water flows over the entire circumference was one. Epoxy garage floor finishes and insulated garage doors that allow what is normally a place for cars or storage to be turned into living space were others.

TNAH also demonstrates a superior level of energy efficiency and performance. It uses 47 percent less energy for heating and cooling and 64 percent less energy than for water heating than a traditionally constructed house of the same size and in the same climate.

That's all the more remarkable when you consider the first floor ceilings are 12-feet high, the second floor ceilings are 10-feet, and there are four -- count 'em, four -- staircases.

The huge savings is achieved because the home's systems are designed and built as an integrated unit rather than independently. For example, because the house is so large, it takes four air conditioners to cool the place.

But they're not as large as they otherwise might have to be, because they work in tandem with two dehumidifiers that help the AC units remove excess moisture.

Builder Goehring gives a large part of the credit for the impressive energy savings to the Icynene Insulation System, another feature he believes will find its way down the housing price ladder.

An expanding foam that contains no volatile organic compounds, the insulation is sprayed in place to create rigid air barriers to minimize random air leakage that results for as much as 40 percent of the energy loss in a typical house. The Ontario, Canada-based company also says the product seals out outdoor allergens and pollutants, minimizing the conditions in which mold grows.

All told, the extra energy features cost $25,000, but the show home's sponsors say the eventual owner will earn that back in the form of lower heating and cooling bills within four years.

A lot of this technology has been around for years -- Icynene alone has been used in more than 100,000 building projects across North America, the company claims -- but has been slow to catch on because of cost.

Costs are coming down, however, and it's almost fashionable now to live in an environmentally sensitive "green" house.

But just how far and fast the movement progresses will be dictated by home buyers and how much they want to spend. And traditionally, energy efficiency has been difficult for builders to sell.

"Some of the neatest things in this house are behind the walls, and that becomes a hard sell," says Nolan, vice chairman of the 2005 TNAH Task Force and a former president of the Orlando Home Builders Association.

"People want to see where there money goes."

Published: February 2, 2005

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.

When Lew Sichelman first started writing about housing in 1969, he was the youngest real estate writer in the country. Now, 37 years later, he's one of the oldest -- and most decorated. He has been rated the top housing columnist in the country by the National Association of Realtors as well as by his peers in the National Association of Real Estate Editors. Indeed, NAREE has recognized his work on numerous occasions. One year - due to his advancing age, he can't recall which one - he earned top honors in the annual NAREE Journalism Contest in three out of the four major writing categories. It was the first time one writer has won so many NAREE awards in a single year. Known for his ability to make even the most difficult topics understandable, Sichelman also has been honored by the National Association of Home Builders and the Mortgage Bankers Association. He began providing in-depth coverage of and consumer-oriented information about housing and housing finance at the Washington Daily News, where he was real estate editor. He held that same position for nine more years at the Washington Star, which purchased the News in 1972. The Star, a so-called "writer's newspaper" which also had the misfortune of being an evening paper, was put out of its misery in 1981, and Sichelman, who had begun self-syndicating his column in 1978, decided to become a full-time columnist. Today, his column, "The Housing Scene," is distributed by United Media to newspapers throughout the country. He also is on the staff of National Mortgage News, an independent newspaper which is considered the bible of the mortgage business. And he writes for numerous other publications, including MarketWatch.com, where he answers readers questions once a week, Sports Illustrated (don't ask), RealtyTimes.com, BigBuilder and others. Sichelman is married, the father of five and grandfather of eleven.