For many homeowners that need extra space—a spare bedroom, a bigger kitchen, a sunroom, or a larger living space—home additions are worth considering. In some cases, it’s certainly easier than purchasing or building a new home, when you consider the time and money involved. And now that housing prices are on the rise, this is doubly true. Rather than paying a premium for a larger home, many homeowners will be looking to add on to existing homes.

As a contractor, you’ll probably start seeing more and more of these requests from clients. It’s important to be prepared, have an efficient process in place and take time to consider what tools and fasteners you will need for that particular job. For example, for your framing and general construction needs, SCRAIL® fasteners are by far the best choice. They fire quickly and easily just like nails, plus you can adjust them and remove them as you would with screws, making It the most efficient fastener for any project! To help you prepare for home addition work, we’ve explored several factors you’ll want to consider before you begin.

In most areas, summer is the busy season for roofing. That’s when the weather is right to get the job done—even if it means you’ll be taking various measures to keep workers safe in the heat.

As summer ramps up, it can be easy to get behind. Fortunately, there are ways to keep up when summer is at its busiest. The SCRAIL® ROOFLOC®system is one of them. It’s a fastener system designed to fire nail screws in sheet metal roofs and facades, which can make the job go much faster. But we’ll discuss that more below, along with some other tips to help you keep up.

Decks are a part of many homes that often go unappreciated for their potential. This is a major opportunity for useful renovation work. Best of all, even if you're pressed for time in between major projects, or your client is on a tight budget, many deck renovation projects can be done quickly and at a low cost.

With a few handy tools such as BECK's Splitless.Decking.SCRAIL®, you can deliver a deck renovation project that will leave your clients deeply satisfied, especially during the sunny summer months. Here are several key concepts you can propose.

Flooring jobs are common for contractors and subcontractors. Whether you’re completing the job for a homeowner or a commercial organization, it often involves work on the subfloor before you can get the new flooring installed. We recommend using the SCRAIL® SubLoc® PRO system—but more about that later.

For now, let’s discuss subflooring. Often, you can put down new flooring on top of an existing subfloor, but sometimes you’ll need to replace it before you can install the new floor. We’ll examine the issues that could lead to subfloor replacement.

Like any industry, commercial construction contracting can't escape the pull of technological innovation, at least not if you want your company to stay competitive. This doesn't mean that you must keep up with every latest trend or wear out your management budget on new gadgets at every turn. But keeping an eye out for productive innovations in the field is always a good idea.

It's, therefore, important to test new technologies if you can really see a possible use for them. New technologies might involve using innovative assembly systems, such as BECK’s SCRAIL® line of fastening tools, or something as simple as a new smart phone app for better project management. Either way, trying new things out will keep you adaptive and effective. Here are several key construction technology trends you might want to start focusing on.

A garage isn't a part of the house where people always live, but it absolutely needs to be built with the same standards of care as the rest of a home. A poorly built garage can be a source of utility leaks, heating or cooling problems and an entry point for pests of all kinds. You definitely don't want these complications!

Instead, the garage you build should be sound enough so that it could even serve as an extra living space if needed. This is very doable with the right combination of sound construction techniques, tested materials and long-lasting accessories like BECK's SCRAIL® ROOFLOC® System. Let's cover some key tips now.

Historically, builders relied on solid wood for most of their builds. With advancements in technology, however, engineered lumber became a popular material for a lot of different applications—and over the past couple of decades especially, even more advancements have made it so that there is a plethora of engineered products for just about every application you can think of.

So that brings up the question: Which is best for your build? We’ll examine the answers, plus you’ll get to learn about BECK’s Jumbo SCRAIL® Fastener System, which offers extra-large fasteners designed for heavy-duty applications, including large scale engineered lumber projects.