Straw Bale Building Thoughts & Opinions...

[hobbyfarm]

Has anyone built or is living in one of these?
I'm wondering about the nightmare of trying to get something like this through city hall's mountain of red tape for permits etc.

R48 walls (for 18" thick bale) sounds pretty good to me! At least worth investigating.

Thoughts, opinions, ideas, concerns....
Termites
Fireproofing
Etc.

 

[bczoom]

I've never heard of one beyond kids playing/making one in the hay loft.

I would see bugs, mice, rats, moisture, structural integrity, flammability, smell, running electric/plumbing, hvac, finishing windows & roof... all major issues.

 

[Farwell]

Hobbyfarm,
Check out Mother Earth's web site, think they address straw buildings there. I have looked at web sites that cover the straw buildings and from what I have read, straw is a great way to go. If you are going to do it yourself you should be ok, if you are going to use a contractor you may have a problem finding one that will take on the project. California and Arizona have some straw houses and I think University of California at Davis and UC Berkeley have done some research on the straw buildings as well so you might want to check out their web sites.
If I had the time and resources a straw house would be one of the buildings that would be high on my list especially with the high cost of utilities. From what I have read on the web, straw has no more problems than other types of insulation if subjected to moisture. If it gets wet it may decay where other insulation may not so in my opinion moisture would be a serious consideration. My opinions may be a little warped because of all of the years I lived in California, all of that sun shine beating down on a person's head does that.
Farwell

 

[Egon]

What ever you do codes must be met and designs stamped by a certified individual.

Find some one who is familiar with this type of construction and can sign off on it.

It is a very good way to go if all the right parameters can be met.

Note: staw building is older than the hills!

Egon

 

[SLOBuds]

We are going that direction with our new house. About 2800 square feet. I was not expecting to achieve R48 though. More like somewhere in the mid- to high-30s.

We are fortunate to live in a county which has experience with straw bale construction. So there are several architects prepared to design for us and building codes in place.

First, you DO need to have people on your project with experience in this type of construction. There are unique aspects which require special treatment.

Straw bale construction is not cheaper than other typical forms of construction. It is POTENTIALLY cheaper, but only if you are willing to do work yourself. But then, if you can do work yourself then you probably can also do work on a regular stick house too - making that proportionally cheaper to build as well!

The walls are thick and solid. This means that your windows are always set inside a thick sill - a different aesthetic for sure. The solid part means that electrical and water need to be planned in advance.

The walls are plastered, not drywalled. They do not have that flat appearance of drywalled walls. You will always see irregularities in the finished wall, depending on the precision of your plastering process. Many people purposefully leave the walls with a 'wavy' or otherwise irregular texture. These folks like the mediterranean appearance.

The plaster is applied over the straw which means that you need to pre-plan where pictures are hung. Backing is placed under those areas.

You can see that the material requires you to think some things out thoroughly before construction begins. And you have fewer options to put things here and there 'on the fly' as you do with stick built homes. (Or at least you think twice before doing so - as you may end up carving out niches in your straw walls to put in new electrical outlets, then patching them over, etc.)

The straw is not attacked by termites and is packed such that it is not a fire hazard. You do need to keep the material isolated from moisture in the construction process.

On the up side you do have walls which are highly insulative and breathes naturally. We have cool winters and hot summers. Temperatures in the summer are regularly in the low 100s and up in to the teens. Our house is planned to go live without forced air conditioning as the result of the straw bale's excellent insulating abilities.

There are good books at Amazon that you should read if you are truely interested in going forward in this direction. Other tecnologies are also pretty interesting for new construction - ICFs come to mind.

Good luck.

 

[Tom_H]

SLOBuds has addressed this question well. Many people envision such a house as does bczoom, however, such construction can be a truly outstanding piece of architecture and energy efficiency.

I will add only one thought to what SLOBuds has said. This comes from my own experience in building and owning my own house of non-standard type construction: a log home. There are a few insurance companies that may not want to deal with you, but the biggest headache can be bank loans. The majority of lenders don't want to go outside of what they consider to be "normal" parameters. Now you may well have the resources to pay cash. The problem may still come if and when you try to sell the house. Prequalified buyers may place offers on your property, only to find out weeks later that their loan has been denied. Not so much because of the construction type, but because of requirements which say that the appraiser must find two "comps" i.e. comparable houses: houses of the same size and type of construction. Many lenders require the appraiser to find two such comps within 1/2 mile of your house that have actually SOLD within the previous 6 months. I don't want to be a pessimist, but I DO believe in being aware of all the POTENTIAL pitfalls that might exist, so this is just a "be aware" thought. Best of luck to you.

 

[EddieWalker]

You got some very good replies with some great information. The one thing I'd like to add is resale value.

Non-Conventional homes are extremely hard to sell. They cost as much or more to build, but in many instances add no value to your land.

We have a house that was built into a cave in my area that's been for sale for over six years now. It's cost a fortune to build and the owners are just trying to sell it for the value the land it's on, but it's just not happening, or at least the last I heard about it.

Even if you're planning on staying on your land until you die, we can't always plan that far ahead. Katrina is direct proof that the future isn't that solid. You should also consider what you'll be leaving for your heirs to deal with. Will you be improving your kids future with what you build, or will they have to deal with a very unique property that has issues?

Adding a conventional house to your land will add tremendous equity to it, and your net worth. Building a straw house will cost you lots of money but do very little to improve your net worth or add equity to your land.

Eddie

 

[SLOBuds]

We haven't actually experienced that aspect here in California, Eddie. But that probably depends on what the house actually looks like. Maybe a cave house would be hard to sell here, as it was in your example.

Otherwise the well-designed straw bale houses are going as quickly, and some times more quickly, than regular stick built houses. There ARE a few designer houses with wavy walls that are clearly built for ONE person - those houses wait on the market until the SECOND person comes along with that same vision.

/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

The new realities of our energy costs are going to help people look seriously at alternative building solutions. A year ago when we started this project I knew that we would employ energy-smart solutions. Today we feel even more convictions toward that as then.

 

[have_blue]

If you'r after "R" value, consider 2x6 studs and 1" foil backed styrofoam sheets. I think that will get you ~R-30.

 

[SPIKER]

I remember seeing/watching a show (this old house or something similar to it) which did a profile on the ICFS and STRAW built homes, one that they were profileing under construction was using a (at the time) advantced suction system to SUCK cement into the straw bail some 2~4" deep. then it is stacked semi-wet making a fully cured cement incased wall. It was being done someplace in AZ or CA. they also detailed the rammed earth wall homes in the same issue. I think it may have been a custom new age recycled info type show? they also showed one which simply was a stick built home with the straw dry stacked aginst the framing then coated with a drivit type cement spray on... Interior walls were std construction though.

they even showed a few of the really odd homes, built form used beer cans & bottles ect. talk about working on the home one swing or swig at a time huh /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif after you are done with it you don't care if the walls are a bit wavy lol /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

Mark M