Anyone build a house recently??? (construction, living, cabins)

[QuinnsBestDad]

Pricing per sq ft varies tremendously. It depends upon quality of materials and the cost/quality of the skilled labor to build the home.

[Stringer]

Originally Posted by forest beekeeper

To get someone to give you an easement across their land, that you can use for a driveway, will cost you whatever the land owner wants to charge you. When you buy an easement it is almost like buying the land, so many folks would not want to sell an easement.

If you are simply putting in a driveway on your own land. Ours cost us $3,000 for a 300 foot long by 40 foot wide and 3 foot tall driveway of crushed rock.

I helped a friend to clear a path for a driveway, a couple days ago. Stumps cut really low, do not require to be dug-out, and you do not need to fill in ruts. When they begin bringing in the crushed rock; each dump truck will just dump, the bulldozer smooths it all out, and the roller packs it down solid. Around here you want the driveway to be above the surrounding land, so the water runs off, and you do not get stuck in the snow.

Thanks for the info! I have an easement already, its listed on my warranty deed. Looks like it's 75 feet wide and 775 feet long. That is great that the stumps do not need to be pulled, I would imagine that would be really expensive. I am new at all this, but judging by your experience it may cost me about 4 grand or so Is there a reason for the average person to get a 40 foot wide easement like yours? I was curious as to how wide to go, I figured I'd be ok with 20 -25 feet but again I know nothing about these things.

Thanks again your posts are very informative!

[julz]

Forest Beekeeper, did you construct the house yourself and if so what was the heaviest beam?Did you need a crane for the roof? Sorry, I just went back and see that you used a crane for the archways.Did you do the rest yourself?Any pics of your completed home.Thanks for sharing.

[forest beekeeper]

Originally Posted by Stringer

Thanks for the info! I have an easement already, its listed on my warranty deed. Looks like it's 75 feet wide and 775 feet long. That is great that the stumps do not need to be pulled, I would imagine that would be really expensive. I am new at all this, but judging by your experience it may cost me about 4 grand or so Is there a reason for the average person to get a 40 foot wide easement like yours? I was curious as to how wide to go, I figured I'd be ok with 20 -25 feet but again I know nothing about these things.

Thanks again your posts are very informative!

The contractor had given me a quote to build a 300 foot long by 30 foot wide driveway, level with the paved road.

My 'driveway' started with a dirt trail leading straight to where I wanted to build. Right away it dropped 1 to 1 1/2 foot from the height of the paved road, then the land slopes very slowly down as you approach the river. Down by where the house site is, the land was at least 3 foot below the level of the paved road. The dirt trail was heavily rutted, both in ruts from jeeps trying to pass along the trail, and in ruts that crossed the trail made from heavy equipment during the last timber harvest. And there were a few low stumps along the way.

Our contractor is a big concrete supplier for all of Penobscot county. They operate a dozen concrete mixer-trucks, and a dozen dump-trucks. They own three rock quarries. Each quarry has heavy equipment including: digging stuff, rock crushers and rock graders. They dig rock, they grade it to separate it into various sizes. They pile up each size, and sale them individually. Each time that they pass rock through a crusher to make smaller sizes of rock, they also make 'crusher dust'.

This 'crusher dust' is rock chips and powder. They can not use it in their concrete mix, it can only be used in driveways and parking lots.

It is my understanding that while they do sale a great deal of concrete, and they sale a lot of stone in various sizes, the crusher-dust does not sale as fast. So it tends to pile up, and they look for any excuse to use-up the crusher-dust.

On the day that they had scheduled for my driveway, I was living in a motorhome on the property. When they showed up, I moved the motorhome across the road, and parked it on my SIL's land. The foreman said that since I would be parking a motorhome on the driveway, he wanted to widen the driveway to allow for the motorhome to be parked, and still have the 30 foot width. I agreed to his thoughts.

They had four dump-trucks running in constant laps, between a quarry and my land hauling crusher-dust. They just backed into my driveway and dumped. The foreman stayed there with a bulldozer spreading it out, and a roller to compact it. He went in about 75 feet, and made a blister on one side, wide enough for my motorhome. Then he was looking at it, and thought it looked odd, so he went back and made the driveway that width beginning at the pavement. Then he continued the driveway at that width for the entire 300 foot. They had four dump trucks running in continuous laps all day.

When he finally stopped the dump trucks, he spent another hour packing it down with the roller, and from the pavement I thought that my driveway looked like a landing strip.

That is how I ended up with a 300 foot lond by 40 foot wide driveway.

I like it

[forest beekeeper]

Originally Posted by julz

Forest Beekeeper, did you construct the house yourself and if so what was the heaviest beam?Did you need a crane for the roof? Sorry, I just went back and see that you used a crane for the archways.Did you do the rest yourself?Any pics of your completed home.Thanks for sharing.

It all came on one flat-bed truck. All of the girders were banded together in one ton bunches. As was the siding and roofing. A forklift was needed to get it off the truck, however the guys that I had hired to help me get it down, had broken their forklift, so they did it with a small crane. And they left.

I waited until the site work was done, the foundation was built, back-filled with the drainage piping all around it leading down into the marsh.

Then I used a rope from the back of my station-wagon and I drug out each girder from the bundles. I drug them into a position around the foundation, and lined up the four arches that make up our building. Each arch has four pieces, two are 800 pounds, and two are 600 pounds. I used a come-along to line-up each arch, and I bolted them together.

While the foundation contractors were here, their crane-guy had made my an offer to help me to stand up the arches. So I went back to them to ask about their crane-guy. As it turned-out they have two crane-guys, and the primary crane-guy was insulted that the other crane-guy had made me that offer. But he offered to work for me at $50/hour.

He came out on a Sunday and for three hours, we did it. He lifted each arch into place, I bolted them onto their anchor bolts, and he had to lift me up to the top of each arch to un-tie his crane's hook to dis-connect it from the arch [His crane had no remote capability to grab and release].

During the last arch, it began to rain. We finished within three hours, but during the last lift, his truck slid sideways in the mud, so that when he attempted to drive away his truck was stuck. We spent the remainder of the day trying to get his truck out of the mud.

It cost me $150 to get all four arches lifted into place, and bolted there.

I tied and lashed 4x4 beams to the vertical girders, with pulleys on the top end. I was those pulleys to lift the purlins. Purlins are horizontal beams that connect the vertical girders, they are 7 foot high, and they are the head-knocker at the top of each doorway-frame and each window-frame.

I found that I had to shift to larger beams for the rafters, so I used 6x8 beams lashed to the girders for lifting the rafters. I used those pulleys to lift each rafter up onto the top of the arches. I used 30 foot ladders to get up there and to 'walk' each rafter into it's place on the top of the arches. And I loose bolted them.

When all of the rafters were in place, I tied cross guy-wires between each corner and I come-alonged them to force them to be closer to square. Then I went around the entire structure tightening all bolts, to hold it square.

This is a view of our design, showing the front doorway:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...designs/1j.jpg

The remainder can be viewed at:
gyoung09/house/house designs - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

There are five pages of 3D pictures there, showing our architectural designs for this house.

Here is the shell completed, as seen from the driveway:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...d/72bfd25b.jpg

Closer:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...d/a2041d22.jpg

The Northside with windows and door installed:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...6/DSCN0148.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...6/DSCN0150.jpg

The Southside with a few windows and the double doors:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...6/DSCN0154.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...6/DSCN0153.jpg

It was mostly un-insulated at that point, so I was really focused to spraying the foam onto the walls and ceiling. We were living in it though

I built like crazy and then ran out of 'nest-egg' $$. I finished hanging insulation just about as the snow disappeared.

I am still building it, though a tad slower now. Each pension check buys more supplies.

I need to finish the windows, the kitchen cabinets, the garage, the wrap-around porch, and then get started on the sky-lights.

We have goats, and chickens and a pig. We garden and we sell at the Farmer's Market. We keep two kayaks in the water, we hunt, we fish, we swat mosquitoes.

[KenGriggs]

Holy hell,

That is the ugliest home I have ever seen in my life. It looks like a giant, retarded tool shed with a thyroid disorder.

Note to self - Never build a steel home.

[mollysmiles]

Originally Posted by KenGriggs

Holy hell,

That is the ugliest home I have ever seen in my life. It looks like a giant, retarded tool shed with a thyroid disorder.

Note to self - Never build a steel home.

troll....d*amn.....we go along well for a while, then we get hit again!

[forest beekeeper]

Originally Posted by KenGriggs

Holy hell,

That is the ugliest home I have ever seen in my life. It looks like a giant, retarded tool shed with a thyroid disorder.

Note to self - Never build a steel home.

Yes, well with an indoor swimming pool, jacuzzi, sunken living room, and all of it being 'TEMPEST' compliant; and still being less expensive than any woodstick home you could possibly build: I am happy with it.

Lest you forget, the building in construction little resembles the finished product.

Unless you think that all homes half built look like a finished product.

[julz]

Great info.!Thanks for sharing.I can't wait to start building our home and I should be so lucky to have a pool and jacuzzi.Sure beats living in a $500,000 home that I can't afford with a mortgage that I'll be paying until I drop dead.

[Let's tell the truth]

Originally Posted by forest beekeeper

Yes, well with an indoor swimming pool, jacuzzi, sunken living room, and all of it being 'TEMPEST' compliant; and still being less expensive than any woodstick home you could possibly build: I am happy with it.

Lest you forget, the building in construction little resembles the finished product.

Unless you think that all homes half built look like a finished product.

I looked at your home. How interesting. It show's you are a person with imagination and like to look outside the box.Sometimes if we don't do thing's like everybody else we are seen as differant.I like someone who can see all sides of life and stand by your belief's even if it might not be everybody else's.Great job so far on your home I bet it's going to end up great.