Habitat for Humanity of Greater Portland's Build it Green mini-subdivision held an open house on Saturday to showcase two of its homes that are nearing completion, and Adam and I went with my parents to check them out. Habitat hopes both will achieve LEED certification from the US Green Building Council when done. The homes are part of a four-home building project the nonprofit is undertaking on Demerest Street. Two of the homes will be sold to Habitat-qualified families, and the other two (the ones we toured) will be sold to first-time home buyers through a Maine State Housing Authority program.

You can see the solar hot water panels that are in process of being installed on this one-story, three-bedroom home. All of the home designs come from the Maine State Housing Authority's Mainestream Green Home Designs competition. The competition challenged architects to design affordable homes that are efficient and healthy places to live.

As you can see, there was quite a crowd that showed up for the tours. The refreshments were an attraction, but so too were cool features such as radiant-heated, stained concrete floors, salvaged doors from the ReStore and cabinets from Maine Green Building Supply and Indisco. The pervious concrete used on the driveways was really cool too. It looks like regular concrete, but allows water to drain through into the soil instead of running off into the storm sewers.

Both houses even have lovely granite countertops.

While the other homes are all spoken for, I hear that this one is still in need of a buyer.

And for folks who like the convenience of city living but want a bucolic setting, you really can't beat these views.