Growth Holdings and its subsidiary, Growth Luxury Homes, have added a new dimension to the homebuilding industry by including a Tesla electric car as an amenity in the price of a real estate market transaction.
GLH is collaborating with Tesla Inc. and other new technology vendors to create “superluxury homes of the future.” The company’s goal is to showcase intelligent, elegant, automated and eco-friendly homes within an integrated smart community that includes transportation as part of the residents’ lifestyle amenities.
“Imagine a company that proactively pursues what’s possible, that invents with initiative, and has the assets to execute their ideas,”said Steve Escalante, business development manager at Growth Holdings and Growth Luxury Homes. “We want to interconnect the capabilities of unique companies and showcase the promise of tomorrow, by working together with different developers.”
The GLH Southern Highlands development is being built to standards outlined by the U.S. Department of Energy through its Challenge Homes program. Challenge Homes are Zero Energy Ready, producing as much electric energy as their residents consume. Ten luxury homes are being designed and built to these standards at Shadow Canyon Estates, within the “Augusta” community.
All 10 homesites offer panoramic views of the Las Vegas Valley. Each home will have a contemporary architectural design, drawn from historic Las Vegas influences that include Mediterranean, Desert, Prairie and Mission styles.
The luxury estate at 27 Shadow Canyon Court in Southern Highlands was completed in 2018 as a Modern Mediterranean design, built on a lot size of 0.74 acres.
“It is a spacious — 9,825 square feet, six bedrooms, seven baths and is currently on the market for $5.5 million,” Escalante said. “And it includes the car.”
A private gate at the front of the property allows access up a sloping driveway to a six-car garage, where the nearby glass-paneled entrance is accessible through a porte cochere.
The six-car garage includes four integrated Tesla Powerwall 2 battery storage modules that work together with an array of photo-voltaic solar panels mounted into the Spanish clay-tile roof of the home.
The solar panels combine to provide 26 kilowatts of electric power to home appliances when the sun is shining. Excess power generated during the day is stored within 54 kilowatt hours of battery modules inside the Tesla Powerwall 2 systems. This electric power is available on demand to continue powering the home’s appliances when the sun isn’t shining.
The Powerwall 2 systems can be used to provide electricity to the Tesla high-power charging system in the garage, in order to replenish the Tesla electric car battery while it is parked overnight.
“We feel that if you are going to live a sustainable type of lifestyle, its gotta be all the way through,” Escalante said. “Part of that is with the vehicle. If you drive this car, we believe this is the type of home you should be living in. And if you live in this type of home, these are the types of cars you should be driving. That is the kind of the footprint of what we are, as a company, and what we believe in.”
A glass-paneled portal at the front entrance opens to an expansive view of the great room that extends upward 24 feet to the second-floor ceiling, as well as outward to an inviting patio and swimming pool.
The back wall is a transparent set of glass pocket doors that are motorized to open and disappear at the touch of a switch. Once opened, the great room and outdoor patio merge together into one recreational living space.
“The flow, volume and line of sight of this home, when you first walk in, is definitely impressive,” Escalante said. “This is something we believe in all our homes: That it is very important for us how you feel when you walk into the home, the feeling you get, the inspiration you get, what you see, what you look out at. As a builder, we put careful thought into every element.”
Natural light floods the home through multiple windows and glass-paneled pocket doors on each floor, making the space bright and open. A black ornamental handrail ascends up white stone steps and across a second-floor walkway. To the left of the staircase on the ground floor are bedroom suites with accompanying baths and a home theater room, which has been designed in the same style as a commercial cinema experience.
Terraced seating levels at the rear entrance of the home theater room step down toward the projection wall below. After a video screening, a lavish entertainment environment awaits guests outside the theater within the great room, which is framed by fireplace features, chandeliers and a glass-enclosed wine cellar.
The kitchen and dining area are just beyond the wine cellar. Each of these indoor spaces can be extended through glass pocket doors to the pool, patio lounge spaces and a cooking range outdoors.
Kitchen features include Wolf stoves, Sub-Zero refrigeration units and Kohler water fixtures. A kitchen island bar doubles as an informal gathering space.
Behind the kitchen is additional pantry space for storage, as well as access to the garage. Climbing the stone staircase to the second floor leads to additional bedroom suites with attached private balconies. These outer landings are tiled and surrounded with the same ornamental railings as the staircase. The balconies wrap around the top floor living space to provide stunning views of the surrounding Las Vegas Valley.
The master bedroom and attached master bath on the far right of the second floor are spacious. The bath includes a tub and a central shower behind it, that divide the room into two toiletry spaces. Each person also has separate walk-in wardrobe closets, outfitted with custom cabinetry, mirror and furnishings.
“We call these our ‘couture closets’ because when you walk into them, it feels like you are going into your own boutique shop,” Escalante said.
The smart features in the home at 27 Shadow Canyon Court are integrated through a Control4 automation system that allows touch-screen interaction with all the lighting, temperature settings, entertainment platforms, security features, sensors and motorized devices within the home.
“There are a myriad of different options that you have,” Escalante said. “It really is scaled to the individual user, as to how they want to live in the home. In this particular home we are using Control4, but we are in the process, as a company, of developing our own unique system that uses a lot of these elements and takes them to the next level.”
In addition to touch screen-control through a mobile phone, wall-mounted display panels, iPads, or switches, a resident may someday choose to interact with a home through voice recognition, facial recognition or gesture recognition as these new and intuitive control systems become more refined.
Smart, wireless devices are creating combinations of amenities within today’s home residential marketplace.
“It is technology that’s out there and is coming,” Escalante added. “We feel as a development company that we want to be out on the forefront, integrating and innovating some of these technologies within a home environment.”