By Margie M. Palmer 

Storefront opens in North Park

Building a home from the ground up can be stressful, which is why a growing number of people are exploring what prefab housing has to offer. If you’ve ever been curious about the process or have questions about how to get a project started, Connect Homes’ new storefront in North Park is a great place to start.

The local brick-and-mortar is being run by Keller Williams Realtor Gavin Grant.

Grant worked as an architect before he moved to San Diego and got his realtor’s license, he said, and it was during that time that he worked alongside Connect Homes founders Jared Levy and Gordon Stott.

“We all met when we were working at Marmol Radziner Prefab in Los Angeles and we did mostly single family residential projects,” Grant said.

Levy and Stott eventually went on to win several national design awards for their homes, but they also felt there were quite a few problems in the prefab industry as a whole, including the model design segment.

“We stayed in contact after I left,” Grant said, “and within a couple years of them starting Connect Homes they were able to come up with the right prototype. It wasn’t until last year that they built their first home that was completed for a client.”

The Sonoma-based home was featured in the June 2014 issue of Dwell Magazine, and the notoriety that Connect Homes received from that article prompted them to reach out to Grant to see if he’d have an interest in helping them expand their sales team.

His background in architecture and his experience as a realtor, he said, made him an ideal candidate, especially since he’d be responsible for interacting with clients and meeting them on-site if they needed help finding land.

Grant said they wanted to keep the storefront in a metro area, especially since Connect Homes seems to fit well with a lot of the revitalization projects that are taking place throughout the city.

“We offer a lot less disruption to neighbors than traditional construction does. Traditional construction of a site-build home is a very linear process that involves demolition of the existing structure followed by pouring the foundation, framing and adding the finishes before it reaches completion,” he said.

“With a prefab home we split the process into two. Two things are happening in tandem. We build the modules in the factory at the same time the demolition and foundation work are going on so instead of taking eight to 12 months to complete, we can generally finish things within three to four months,” Grant said.

The modules are delivered as complete as possible, which is one of the things he said that helps differentiate Connect Homes from its competitors.

“Our goal is to limit the amount of local site work,” he said.

If you’re interested in learning more about Connect Homes and are hoping to tour one of their completed properties, you’re in luck. The company is offering a tour of their Bonsall property on Tuesday, Jan. 12.

“We’ll be holding three tours on that day, at 1, 2 and 3 p.m.,” Grant said.

Anyone who is interested in being added to the tour list can call 619-609-0010 to reserve a spot.

—Margie M. Palmer is a San Diego-based freelance writer who has been racking up bylines in a myriad of news publications for the past 10 years. You can reach her at [email protected].