For Sale: Eco-Friendly Home with Free Prius

Real estate developers often offer drastic price cuts or expensive upgrades for free to combat a sluggish housing market; Clarum Homes, builders of energy-efficient and eco-friendly real estate, is taking a different approach. In a move they're hoping will help sell off the last five remaining units in a development in Watsonville, CA, they are offering a free Toyota Prius with each house. Clarum, whom we featured before in a discussion of "Zero Energy Communities," started their environmental quest by installing solar electric systems as standard equipment and have since moved on to other products and systems that reduce energy consumption, encourage conservation, and use recycled or sustainable resources. John Suppes, Clarum's founder and president, decided he could do more for the environment by putting home buyers into the energy efficient cars than further reducing prices; this is a bit of a head-scratcher for us, but we do applaud their marketing savvy. ::Clarum Homes via ::AutoblogGreen