Yea, you see this a lot with the big guys like Polygon. Every company has their A, B, and C teams. You want the A team, but who the hell knows who that is. Glad to hear your sister's uncle caught the stuff that'd be hidden! Hollow core doors suck, and it's all cost savings up the chain. Shipping weight, milling time, casing mats, hinge quality, all of that shit. It's absolutely incredible to believe that material costs seem to go up despite so few things being the "real thing" anymore, especially when you combine that with all of the upstream money saving these people are doing.
Two stories of basement. Climate controlled sleeping pods. On-site battery storage. Bathroom greenhouse. The usual.
Just to throw this out there.... a lot of rural areas don't really have building codes. No plans to submit, no inspections. Sure, it can be a recipe for disaster, but if you know what you're doing and make sure the contractor does the work to your satisfaction it'll be fine. My dad's house in Mississippi was literally drawn roughly on a napkin and then he and I supervised the crews, everything was built at or above UBC standards. My property in Missouri the county has no building code, which was one of the reason's I bought it....if I do decide to build there I won't need the pricey plans or inspections.
The permits is part of it, but the other part of it is someone who knows what they're doing to say "oh, if you do that the walls will collapse from the extra weight" or "you need better ventilation or you'll suffocate in your sleep" or shit like that. No one wants a shipping-container deathtrap situation on their hands due to ignorance. Or to attempt to build something wildly more expensive than its worth when there are better alternatives.
Sometimes Darwin's Law is the best law. Anyone who thinks it's a good idea to put a metal container underground and then expects it to retain structural stability deserves to die in their rusty box.
@toytoy88 how far along on developing your property are you? Have you dug a well yet? Wondering if it is more expensive, less, or in the end about the same vs developing in a city with more regulations and permits.
I haven't done anything with it yet. I kind of got on my "I want to fix up an old house" kick and that place went to the back burner. It's got power, but needs septic and well...I'm guessing that'll run $15K or so, I'm not sure how deep the well is going to have to go, but I don't think it should have to be terribly deep in that area. Over that, put in a driveway and a bit of leveling and grading and it would be ready to build. It's a neat piece of property, but it could use more trees. I've never lived in a field before.
I mentioned yesterday that I bought two homes in 6 months. This brings up another good point- make sure you and your partner are on the same page. Our first home was in a lake community with a second lake backing onto our property. This second lake was owned by a quarry. During the week and on Saturdays, you could hear the trucks, and backup alarms. Faintly (the active part of the quarry was probably a half mile to a mile away) but you could hear it. After we were in the house about a month the Mrsanthropic lost her mind about it. She didn’t like hearing it and was convinced we’d never be able to sell the house. We sold it in two weeks. Part of why she went along with it was how much I liked it. In ground pool, backed up to woods and a lake, nice deck, a family room with a cathedral ceiling and wood burning stove that looked out onto the pool and deck, two car garage, central air, two full bathrooms, 2+ bedrooms, depending on what you did with the generous basement space. It wasn’t beautiful, just a raised ranch with amenities. But it had everything I wanted. *sigh* So we moved. Our current house, where we’ve lived for 21 years, has none of that. We do have an amazing neighborhood and fantastic neighbors, which is priceless. We also have a private beach on the biggest lake in the state. And a nice view. But when I’m lugging around window air conditioners because we don’t have central air and when I’m shoveling our ski slope of a driveway ( the other property was relatively flat, and you may recall I broke my leg in our driveway last December) I can’t help but think back wistfully. Make sure everyone can live with your home decision and you’ll save a lot of heartache.
This is going to be huge advice. Let me preface this by saying I was a structural designer for residential homes for almost 10 years, then switched to estimating, and am now an estimator/project manager for residential, commercial and industrial projects. I give my qualifications in the hopes that you'll listen to this point... FIND THE BEST DRAFTSPERSON YOU CAN AND GO FROM THERE. Do NOT hire an architect. Do NOT hire the GC to do your plans (I've known of few who do it well. My current company does, but almost all the tract home builders are a nightmare). DCC, how do you find the best draftsperson in your area? Easy peasey. Call the three largest truss plants close to you, ask to speak to the senior truss designer, and ask him who he would use to draft his plans. If you have a solid set of buildable plans, the rest is all downhill. It saves you huge cash, because all the trades will see how it goes together and nothing is missed. A good draftsman will talk you out of bad ideas (I want the powder room next to the dining area, I want the laundry room squeezed into the garage entrance vestibule, etc) and will also not draw impossible things (no way to bear the loads, roof lines that are impossible and conflict, dimensions that don't add up, etc). Seriously. Spend the money. That guy will charge you $3-10k and it will be worth every penny. It will also give you power when shopping for a contractor.
I mean, since you’re basically looking to build a climate change dystopia protection cave, you could just ask around local university science departments and see if they wanna make it for you. Maybe you won’t have to pay for anything other than the land.
Well this summer i am planning on doing everything visible on the outside except the roof. Doors, windows, siding, gutters, soffits, deck, etc. I also have to do the front yard, since i am parking my truck/trailer there i have to scrap 6" of dirt off and put some crush down.
One of my friends, who actually rents our back apartment, is an architect/drafter. He's doing exactly this with a plot of land he bought in the Poughkeepsie area of NY. One of the big things you would need to know is if the land is already prepped for sewer/power, and if it's not, if you can actually get it connected to utilities. He looked at a few plots of land which seemed too good to be true and it turned out all of them didn't have permission yet to hook up to sewer or electric. Once he ran the numbers it was 10's of thousands to just get water/sewer to the property.
There’s a guy here in the news who bought land, lived in a trailer, built a house on it, and only now, at the end if it, is realizing that it’s going to be a $100k bill to run the power lines from the closest junction, terminate them, then hook up his house. “It’s close enough that it should have been a local hookup by now”. Saved all that money on a GC, etc, only to miss key info they’d check up front.
I guess it was $60k not $100k. Still, trying for public sympathy to get everyone else to pay for his hookup. Not getting much sympathy. https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.6201547
See i am not sure how to feel about this. IF they told them it would soon be connected that is pretty shitty of the hydro company. But still i would make dam sure if i bought property that all the utilities i wanted would be there.
No fucking way ANYONE at the hydro company guaranteed anything. They can talk all they want about plans, etc, but if you're going to build a house, you get that shit in writing. Our provincial hydro is a fucking joke... the wasted money, deferred taxes, etc, all because politician just kick the cost down the road and promise the world and let their replacements handle the fallout. Year after year, budgets get thinner and thinner. Again, no way in hell they guarantee shit like that, never mind 15 years in advance. I think it was a naive home builder who took some simple shit for granted and was shocked when he learned the hard truth.
I just lost a bidding war on a 3 bedroom 2.5 bath apartment. It was listed for $259k, I offered $275k and lost, to a "significantly higher offer with more favorable contigencies". My agent thinks this means I lost due to inspection, financing and appraisal contingencies. The last bid I lost, the seller left $15k on the table, because they wanted inspections waived....which isn't exactly a good sign. It was unlikely this would appraise for more than $275k, so I wasn't going beyond that. I'm pre-approved for $450k, and I was told I could push for more, but I'm not spending that kind of cash on a place in this market/area. I'm at a severe disadvantage because I'm buying as a single dude. I'd love to buy at 30-50% of that figure, but it's simply not going to happen in the DMV. My main requirement is I travel a lot for work, and I don't want to live alone. So, I want a place where two people can live comfortably and I'll rent out the rest of the space. A 3rd bedroom will double as an office/study and the basement is for....amusement, and I don't have to share a bathroom, and I'm good. Those requirements, plus a condo fee of less than $300/month within a 40 minute drive to the office (encompassing 4 states). I'm aiming for $300k or less. I get this market is absurd, and I understand how it's tremendously benefitted folks like my parents who inherited their parents homes, and now have a cushier retirement because of the added value. Where I struggle is that my bids are going up against investors who represent massive funds who benefit from the tax write-offs, need to sit on properties, or are going to sell to developers in 5-7 years, and have no sensitivity to spending. There's no downward pressure on home prices, especially as the eviction moratorium ended and landlords can boot tenants and raise rent to offset lost revenue. I am told it's not just a DMV phenomenon. If I'm losing to folks who are buying a house to live in, I'm ok with that...they like it more than me or perceive value differently. If I'm losing to fuckwads who have more money than they need and must finger-fuck the system to offset taxes...that's not a level playing field, and it's fucking over a broad swath of folks, not just buyers. I've been trying to talk my dad into coming to VA for a few months when he retires, and building a place with me. I feel like I could get a plot for $75k or less, and put a pretty sizeable brick shell on it, and finish it out for WAY less than the going rate for a single family. I could kick a pretty sizeable chunk into his retirement for his effort, but he doesn't want to step away from his church or other goings on to do it, and I can't blame him there. Going that route myself, especially if I'm working states away, is too risky.
The same thing is happening in my area - there's not push back to keep the housing costs down. I've hit the jackpot twice now; once in Winnipeg and now here. My current house is one you've seen a million times: roughly 1,000 SF, three beds up, one bed down, 1.5 baths and a perfect rectangle on a standard-ish 80x180 lot. I bought for around $150k in 2015 (the house missed the summer market and had been sitting for a few weeks). Since all the houses in my neighbourhood are the same, when one sells it's a pretty good metric of what mine is worth. In the last 180 days, on my street specifically, no house has sold for under $400k. Most go over asking by about $100k. It's bananas. I'm comfortable uprooting myself and moving at the drop of a hat and, let me tell ya...it's super tempting. I could pocket over $200k, buy something outright for cash and have very little living expenses. The question becomes where do you move to? So I sit here with indecision.
Right now the prices are astronomical everywhere. I'm looking at about $1200 in rent/lost taxes by not owning each month. That's about $15k/year. I'd happily buy somewhere else, and keep renting (again, having a roommate knocks the mortgage in half). But there's nowhere that's really cheaper. My hometown in SC has seen astronomical increases...a house that sold for $90k two years ago selling for $180k with fuck all different. With the supply chain fucked up, I can't see prices stabilizing anytime soon. So, I'm either blowing $20k waiting another year and a half on a bet that things come back to normal, or I'm blowing $20k over asking on an over-priced market....and I'm extremely lucky I can afford to. Most folks can't, and eventually something has to give.