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Old 05-04-2016, 11:37 PM
 
2,181 posts, read 1,369,346 times
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This guy, a total novice, built his house himself and it looks great :


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXmAwx8Imxw
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Old 05-05-2016, 12:36 AM
 
Location: New Jersey and hating it
12,164 posts, read 7,129,315 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AlaskaErik View Post
I just realized you live in New Jersey. I think you're pretty much hosed on doing anything yourself.
Yeah, I had a feeling. We are overtaxed and over-regulated beyond recognition. There's more freedom in China.
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Old 05-05-2016, 02:11 AM
 
Location: Moku Nui, Hawaii
11,048 posts, read 23,877,314 times
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I've built a couple of houses although it wasn't quite by myself, there was usually at least one other person to help haul boards around. The second house was much straighter than the first one, so building more than one will give you better results. Can you start with a small structure of some sort and work up?

There's a book called 'Basic Home Building' by Ortho Press which is basically the prime source of information we used to build the house since this was pre-internet. But, the houses were built in Hawaii so no need for heating or air conditioning. Not a lot of insulation, either. I'm also a draftsperson, so after years of drawing blueprints, it seemed a natural progression to build a house. The blueprints got a lot better after building a house or two, so there's all sorts of good results from expanding your experience base.

FWIW, building new is a LOT easier than renovations and restorations.
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Old 05-05-2016, 08:12 AM
 
1,399 posts, read 1,783,397 times
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The reason I asked how much money you have is because of the learning curve. In doing my own house projects..i.e adding some electrical, flooring, drywall, cabinets..etc there is a lot of material and time wasted while i learn how to do things quicker and better. I can only imagine how much this scales up when building an entire house.
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Old 05-05-2016, 08:19 AM
 
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You can buy kit homes that come with lumber and instructions, no power tools needed.

Now, plumbing and foundation pouring, wiring, etc. you probably will need to find professionals but the actual building of the house itself can be done by someone with no previous experience in construction according to the various kit home websites. However, some of these things are supplied with the kit house if you buy from someplace like, say, Menards.
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Old 05-05-2016, 09:10 AM
 
Location: Raleigh
13,635 posts, read 12,266,269 times
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I think most banks will require a GC license for a construction loan.
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Old 05-05-2016, 09:27 AM
PDD
 
Location: The Sand Hills of NC
8,773 posts, read 18,304,117 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by antinimby View Post
Can somebody literally build their own house? Assuming you've got the land and permits, how possible is it for someone to rent equipment, dig a hole, pour a foundation and bit by bit start putting up a house?
Can somebody? Yes
Can everybody? No

The general contractors who build houses for profit don't do everything themselves. There are always subs who can do it faster, cheaper and better.

The fact that you even have to ask the question shows that you are not knowledgeable about all the requirements of home building.
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Old 05-05-2016, 10:15 AM
 
Location: Huntsville
6,013 posts, read 6,600,115 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Coldjensens View Post
Unfortunately overseeing it yourself is a worse idea than building it yourself. Building it yourself is practical if you can commit full time and have a lt of help, and you are in good health and mechanically inclined and a good reader. Yes you can figure it all out with some help and advice.

Managing it yourself will likely be a disaster. This is because the trades do not know you. They know you will not provide any future work for them so you become their lowest priority. If you mess up the schedule, you then must pay them for return trips or waiting around. If you split responsibilities and something goes wrong, they point their fingers at each other and at you and you get no resolution. You just have to pay to start over. If you do not anticipate long lead materials and you do not understand the concept of a critical path schedule, you may end up with your job sitting for weeks or months while your trades-persons go off to other jobs, then it is a struggle to get them to come back when you need them again. If you do not understand the contracts, one or more of them will end up taking advantage of you. If you do not have connections, you will not be able to get someone to fill in if a critical trade fails to show up, makes mistakes or does not man the job sufficiently.

Lets say your plumber shows up to put in the block outs for plumbing in the slab. He drops off a kid and leaves. Part way through he day, you ask the kid what he is working on and he tells you he is blocking out the plumbing for the wet bar. Your house does not have a wet bar.The kid is sing the plans for some other house and has blocked out the wrong locations. Concrete will be placed tomorrow and the boiler arrives the next day to be placed right from the truck onto the basement slab. Framing is supposed to start the day after that. What do you do?


If you are DIY the whole thing, you do not have these kinds of problems. If you mess up YOU work until five a.m. to get it right before something shows up, Or you just start over the next day because the only one waiting on you is you. It takes ten times longer, but there is actually less risk if you use common sense.


I'm scratching my head at this one.... if your subs aren't following your plans (which you must be intimately familiar with as the GC) that's a bad sub. It doesn't mean that they don't do good work for you because they may never get any future work. Once you contract a good sub to a job, they will work it like any other job. Much easier than building it yourself.





I agree with you on scheduling.


Say for instance the HVAC guy is scheduled to come in on Thursday to start roughing in the HVAC. He gets there and finds that due to bad weather last week the framers are still working and don't have certain areas framed that have to be before he runs his drops. They tell him they are 2 days behind. He will likely leave and go to another job. Once on that job, he will probably finish it before coming back. That causes a delay in schedule. Those add up quickly.


If you're going to play GC, you better be good at managing a schedule and make sure to stay on top of your subs in the event that a date has to be pushed. You also need to be able to not schedule people on top of where other groups will be working. If the plumber, the electrician, and the HVAC guys are tripping over each other they're going to leave and come back once some of the other subs have finished and gotten out of their way.
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Old 05-05-2016, 10:38 AM
 
Location: Billings, MT
9,885 posts, read 10,897,066 times
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Many years ago, (early 1950s) my mother, sister, step-father, and I built a three bedroom house. I include myself, even though I really wasn't much help at 10 years old.
We did it all; framing, insulation, wiring, plumbing, even dug and built the cess-pool and drain field (yes, back then and in that place, it was legal) by hand.
In fact, it was ALL hand work. I don't remember any power tolls at all being used on that place! I still have the hand saws that the old man used back then.
So, yes, it CAN be done. It WILL be a learning experience!
Have fun.
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Old 05-05-2016, 11:05 AM
 
15,693 posts, read 20,211,420 times
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Hire a GC. Write the checks and stop in, with coffee in hand, and watch your house go up.




I'm pretty handy, and spent about a decade in home construction trades. I couldn't probably manage building a home , but why would I want to? It's a lot of work and stress and unless you get some sort of joy out of that, just hire a GC. Experience is critical here as you really need to have a good understanding of what each trade needs and scheduling around them. Last thing you want is a trade to show up on the job and sit on their hands because another trade hasn't completed a specific task yet that needs to be done, or is waiting for an inspector to show up and can't allow the walls to get closed, or some other act of juggling the chaos (accurate word) that is on a job site.


I really don't think it's worth it. Hire a GC, tell them what you want and go live your life.
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