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Existing Buildings

Residential

Each Building is Unique

From accessibility compliance to high-impact energy efficiency upgrades, our solutions are tailored for the specific needs of your building.

  • Multifamily
  • Mixed-Use Communities
  • Healthcare Facilities
  • Senior Housing
  • Dormitories
  • Single-Family Homes

Measure. Identify. Plan. Improve.

Each building has unique investment goals and opportunities. Our hands-on team of energy consultants can help tailor reliable high-impact upgrades that maximize returns, reduce operating costs, improve occupant comfort, and minimize your environmental footprint.

We know it’s not always easy to decide where to start looking for opportunities to improve your energy efficiency, or how to fulfill local jurisdictional and state mandates– we’ll devise the best strategy to address your needs, and help you to identify appropriate funding and incentive programs.

Measure

Benchmarking

Understand your building or portfolio’s energy use. See how your building compares to others with a similar profile. Identify trends and anomalies that are impacting your energy efficiency and determine potential opportunities for improvements.

 

Identify

Energy Auditing

Pinpoint inefficient systems and maintenance practices with a hands-on energy audit and mechanical testing. After an initial audit, we’ll analyze our preliminary recommendations to prioritize a scope of work, discuss the findings with you, as well as recommend the implementation of high-impact improvements.

Building Enclosure Consulting

Our team of building enclosure experts specialize in air and moisture management and thermal performance analysis with an emphasis on high performance buildings. For existing buildings, we provide forensic diagnostics; analytical tools; laboratory and field mock-up testing oversight; product and systems recommendations and specifications; and construction administration services.

Existing and Historic Building Diagnostics
We investigate and evaluate buildings for water leaks, moisture and air migration, and thermal performance. We can assist building owners and design professionals in identifying failures in existing building enclosures through onsite observation, review of existing documents, overseeing probes, and testing. These investigations form the basis of recommendations for remedial work, while also providing valuable information to the design team.

 

Plan

Capital Planning

If you’re considering an investment in energy efficiency, we’ll help you capture your building data, organize expenditure information, and analyze it so that the assets can be managed more efficiently and accurately. We’ll detail project budgets and related cash flows so you can make funding allocations, cash flow projections, and other decision tools to help you plan your project.

 

Improve

From lighting upgrades to designing a custom state of the art central plant, this is the step where SWA shines. Our innovative technical team uses proprietary research, and new and emerging technologies paired with tried and true best practices to deliver real results. It’s what sets us apart and it’s what can set your buildings apart too.

 

Retro-Commissioning

As your retro-commissioning agent, we’ll identify mechanical defects, revise operating protocol, calibrate and sequence systems, direct equipment maintenance and train building owners and staff in proper maintenance and operation.

Building System Improvements

SWA professionals coordinate HVAC, domestic hot water, lighting, and building envelope systems with the highest efficiency standards in mind. Our licensed Professional Engineers provide all the design and construction administration needed to help incorporate the latest energy-saving and environmentally-friendly technologies into each project.

Smart Energy Sources

As cold climate heat pumps, solar photovoltaic (PV) technology, increased storage capacity in battery technologies, thermal storage, and other renewable energy systems move into the mainstream, the opportunity to leverage these alternatives is becoming more economically sensible. There are many opportunities to secure public funding for these measures if your project is pursuing decarbonization and sustainability measures.

Operations and Maintenance

In order to ensure ongoing success, we can develop efficient operations and maintenance guidelines and provide training to building management staff. We’ll also coordinate across our network of vendors and assess new technologies for future implementation.

Contact us to discuss your next project

Standout with Sustainability

Residential properties with green building certifications are more attractive to tenants and buyers alike. Achieving certification for an existing building will not only lead to lowered operating costs and energy use, but can provide a way to standout in the competitive residential market.

Whether or not your property has achieved green building certification in the past, our sustainability consultants can help you select and navigate the program that is best for your building.

Certification Programs for Existing Buildings

We have a broad range of green building certification services that include:

  • Goal setting and project priorities
  • Identify green building program, potential funding sources and incentives, as well as any compliance needs.
  • Work with project team to incorporate green construction methods and optimize energy efficient design elements.
  • Monitor and verify adherence to green construction program specifications
  • Green building program applications and submittals
  • Final testing to ensure that all project specifications have been met

Contact us to discuss your next project

Accessibility is Ongoing

Whether you are acquiring a property, need to train staff on accessibility policies and procedures, or are making alterations to an existing building, we can help you ensure ongoing compliance with accessibility requirements.

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We can help your residential building comply with accessible design and construction requirements included in:

  • The Fair Housing Amendments Act (FHA)
  • Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (Section 504)
  • Architectural Barriers Act (ABA)
  • The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
  • State and Local Human Rights Laws
  • International Building Code (IBC)
  • State and Local Building Codes
  • Universal Design

Services for Existing Residential Buildings

Plan Reviews and Field Inspections: For alterations to existing buildings, we collaborate to help attain full compliance with regulatory requirements for accessible design and construction.  We conduct field inspections during all phases of renovations and work with the design and construction teams to help ensure that full compliance is achieved.

Due Diligence: We perform due diligence inspections of existing buildings and sites to identify noncompliance with regulatory requirements for accessible design and construction.  Investors can use the results of these inspections to determine the true value of a potential real estate investment; the primary goal of our due diligence services is to protect the interests of our equity investor clients.

Litigation Consulting: We can provide litigation support to federal, state and local government agencies, law firms, architects, private owners, developers, and more.

Contact us to discuss your next project

Projects

See all Residential Existing Projects

Why Choose Us?

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Top of the Class

SWA is a leading partner in all New York and New Jersey financial incentive programs. We have been a NYSERDA FlexTech provider since the program’s inception and also provide support through implementation of all projects.

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Size

We offer a more comprehensive set of services than any competitor: Commissioning, ASHRAE 90.1 modeling, Accessibility Consulting and Passive House (PHIUS) certification.

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Building Science

Our residential offerings are founded in our history as building science research and consulting firm; originated out of HUD PATH and DOE Building America research, and that expertise is available to our sustainable housing projects.

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Established History

We have led a variety of U.S. Department of Energy, HUD, NYSERDA, and high profile industry R&D and advisory projects. Results from these projects inform our energy audit, accessibility, and design work by providing a deeper understanding of technical issues from a variety of perspectives.

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Leadership

Our team actively gives back to the industry by performing cutting edge research and presenting the findings at regional and national conferences, advancing innovations building performance. We participate in the Mayor’s Carbon Challenge and regularly engage with the Department of Buildings and the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability.

Pioneering Accessibility

Our accessibility group is a pioneer in the field, executing HUDs first research on Universal Design in single-family homes published as Homes for Everyone: Universal Design Principles in Housing