family and the clearing machine

[Highbeam]

Thanks Huck. I thank you for your input and will go through your pictures after I type. Let me try and respond.

First, there is an existing septic system and well already in place. The previous land owner had developed the very front quarter acre or so and a mobile home was there. Power and phone as well. He even planted a few fruit trees and a kiwi/grape vein, too cool. The guy defaulted on the loan and the mobile was removed along with tons of garbage. 5 cars, appliances, and a bus were left for me to deal with. While the property was for sale a lot of looting took place to include the well pump, yes someone actually reeled it up and cut it off. It appears that there were several other "families" living there in campsites with septic, water, and power hookups strung out in a most primitive manner. I have found three grow areas where they were farming Marijuana. I haven't found any needles in the woods yet.

I don't know if the rear 14.75 acres was ever explored. The previous owner pointed and said it was all swamp. Not so, there are spots where you wouldn't want to drive in the winter but a large majority of it is high and dry with monster Maples and Cedars. No standing water. The brush was impossible to walk through, it is easy to see why someone might never have known what they had. Before I bought it, I brought a buddy out with a small trackhoe to cut a path to the back line. It was January and we weren't allowed to cut trees down but I was looking for standing water and I found none so knew it was a good move and I bought it.

The septic system is located next to the old mobile site and is pretty old. I could pump to the tank with a grinder but I do not know if the county will allow me to reuse this abandoned system. They tend to take these oppurtunities to require upgrades. In the meantime I will use it as a dumpstation for my old travel trailer.

I bought the dozer in response to the 500$ per day rental for a new one vs. the 10000$ price for a used one that I should be able to sell for the same. I was time rich and money poor, except for that 10k. I started dozing and I enjoy every minute of it, I go out on weekends. Clearing this type of brush is 2500$ per acre in WA. I have already cleared at least three so I can sell the machine and make out. I also needed to explore the property and make sure that any wetland went away before any official permit was applied for. In this county, a wetland can't be destroyed and the setbacks from the wetland can be huge. It is bad news and worth taking some risk to eliminate potential land grabbing by the county.

A logger has been out and when the ground firms up he will return to harvest most of the good stuff. In return, for my half of the timber proceeds, he will do the major clearing, leveling, stumping, and burning of 5 acres or so in the middle in addition to decking the property line so that I have a firebreak and room to build a fence. A defined border from my yet unknown neighbors is always a good thing.

We thought of manufactured homes. I am leery from bad experiences with mobile homes and I know there is a big difference. I have an idea of what I want in a dream house. It is simple and should be cheap to build. Basicly a log cabin layout, you know the second story loft for bedrooms with the living room open to the roof, the traditional square layout but with the home built of lumber and scissor trusses. The actual home is another phase though and you can bet the manufactured home angle wiill be explored. Did you realize significant savings by leaving the floors unfinished and the appliances out? Do you mind sharing SF costs? What did you do to make it special. Unfortunately I am a fan of long overhangs on the eaves, wrap around porches, and tall roofs. Can you set the manufactured home on a real foundation with maybe a basement/garage beneath it?

When this all started I gave the realtor a general location and told him to find me more than 10 acres with paved public frontage and no easements, covenants, or restrictions. I got it, and the rest is just in the details I suppose. My 1/3 of an acre in the suburbs in a 1350 SF rambler is getting smaller every day.

I have mucho clearing pictures including the burn pile that wouldn't start on Saturday despite 10+ gallons of diesel (30$!!!!) and propane. I have admitted defeat on burning this wet material and will let the logger throw it on the pile that he claims is the biggest fire I will have ever seen. In the meantime I am windrowing the brush as tight and small as I can.

Thanks for your input Huck, and everyone else, I will soon start a new thread with the pictures. The warm weather sure makes a difference. I may ask you another question or two after seeing your pictures Huck. If you can do it in CA, then I should be able to do it in WA.

 

[HuckBB62]

I can hardly wait for your pictures. You most definitely have a handful!!!! Here in the southern Sierras, I have far less vegetation to deal with. As you can see from our pics, there's not much chance for wetlands either! My dad's dealing with that wetland problem. One thing's for sure, they don't know it exist, you can fill it in! He's got pine tree problems. About ten years ago, shortly after great grandpa quit farming the southern Ga. property, little pine saplings popped up everywhere. Now they're bonafide TREES! He's lamenting the fact that he didn't keep it all bushhogged.

We have tons of oak trees, not much of anything else. I really wish we had all those others that you're talking about.

On your questions: Palm Harbor's down in Millersburg and at the very least, the tour is interesting. They didn't cut us much slack by leaving out the flooring and such. There were some savings, we just counted it a discount towards what we really wanted. Leaving out their appliances was a no brainer too as we really enjoy the Kenmore Elite appliances throughout. On the cost: We got completely hosed because we're in California. Our house would've cost only about 65% of what we paid if we lived north of the border, we looked! The problem was, we couldn't get another manufacturer that could 1. Deliver where we live. 2. Do it timely. They're so booked up. Because of the housing boom, the manufactured market as really taken off. Our bill for our 2000 square foot house with customized floor plan was $176k. The same house up in Oregon was $120k. All transport, fees, setup was included. We paid $55k for the property and have $45k in site preparation (well, power, septic, earthwork, fees etc.) We put $15k in the hardwood flooring and carpeting and about $10k in the appliances (wide dual fuel stainless range, HET4 washer and dryer, fridge, dishwasher) I know this seems like so much but that's the real cost. Everything's new, everything's nice. I have to put nice decking/steps around the house, a garage (probably will go steel building) and want to pave the driveway. We'll have a 14 acre home then for around $350k total. Shoot, we sold our three bedroom with a pool in Bakersfield for $340k! I've changed all the fixtures faucets, door handles etc. We left off all of their "decorative" touches and are doing our own except we left their mini blinds in. Just making it our own. We had tons of flush can lights put in, made floor plan changes, added sky lights, and light tubes etc. We opted for Hardy plank lap siding. It's fire proof and the woodpeckers hate it!

The difference in quality of life is astounding! We're almost into the "pinch me, this can't be real" mode.

I can tell you again, that if you're a no compromise type guy and want the house to reflect you, I'm not sure you'd like a manufactured, no matter what. Our house is super nice but there's little things that I don't care for but we're willing to accept in the name of cost and expediency. I'm not saying it's cheap, far from it. It's very VERY well built. It's square and plumb. I could write a volume about site preparation and other considerations.

We heavily researched log homes and again, really wanted one. Perhaps we shoul've suffered through it. Kuhn's Bros are excellent homes.

We're going on a driving vacation in a couple of weeks. Don't know how far north we're heading but I sure do like how green it is up there.

I really look forward to your pictures. Property development is absolutely my favorite thing, I wish I could do it for a living!

 

[EddieWalker]

Highbeam,

I'm enjoying your post and agree with your methods and reasoning. In fact, I'm doing the same thing myself. My dozer has paid for itself already in what I'd have to pay somebody else to do.

The question about what to build and how to build it really comes down to what you really want. The cost is secondary in my opinion. You can always take longer to build it or finish it off. One guy I know build his custom 5,00 sq ft home one stage at a time. It's all sealed in and water tight, but only a few rooms have carpet and sheetrock. In time, it will all be done, but not for awhile.

If your building to sell right away, then resale is a big consideration, but if your building your dream home, I wouldn't worry too much about resale. If you build qualitiy, you'll get your money back when you sell.

Some of my really big concerns with mobile homes deal with value. They depreciate from the day you buy them. They are much harder to sell then frame homes. They require much more maintenance and they still age much faster then frame homes.

Price is always a factor, but for $165K for 2,000 sq feet, I can build a custom brick home for under $60 a square foot here in East Texas using subs to do all the work. I reckongnize prices here are less then most of the country, but if you can swing a hammer, cut a board and keep a straight line, then you can build it yourself.

As for the earlier posts about the commute and living in the country. I moved from the SF Bay Area 2 1/2 years ago to start living my life as oposed to surviving in an area I no longer wanted to live. Everyone I worked with was just surviving. Conversation was about who had it worse, how bad traffic and crime was. Now I talk about building, mowing, wildlife and the weather. I go to kids games, spend time fishing, hiking the woods and playing frisbee.

There's no comparing the differences. If worse comes to worse, I can always get a job at Walmart or some other minimum wage location. It don't matter to me what it is, I'm still living the good life!

 

[Lloyd_E]

Highbeam,

Get on wih it. I have been doing he commute for 16+ years - 2oo klm a day to and from work.
I have seen the traffic grow over the years from a dozen headlight to thousnads doing the run.
I live on 12.5 acres (old farmsted) with young family - 1 @3.5 years and 1 due any day now.

I work 40+ hours a week plus freelance and volunteer work. The projects at home are numerous.
Just tonight my daughter and I started aerating the lawn and fields - great quality time - she fell asleep.

The only negative time is winter. But in my old age I stay at home - why beat yourself silly trying to get to work when the rest of the city is snowed in and everybody is at home - this took me a couple of years and white knuckle drives to learn.

I cn be door to door in 1 houe and 15 minutes on a good day - roads/highways aren't great. On a bad day - winter it has been a 3.5 hour trip one way.

As for resale - my CA gave e good advice one day - buy last - they not making any more of it.
Build what you can afford. We did an old house over - and still doing it. But we have a low mortgage are not too cash strapped compared to fiends and enjoy life on the farm etc.

Go for it...the days are long but life is too short. Make a home for your fmily and start living it man.

Cheers,

all the best..

Lloyd

 

[Lloyd_E]

For some reason my spell check did not work. Ignore the typos.

lloyd

 

[HuckBB62]

</font><font color="blueclass=small">( Highbeam,

I'm enjoying your post and agree with your methods and reasoning. In fact, I'm doing the same thing myself. My dozer has paid for itself already in what I'd have to pay somebody else to do.

The question about what to build and how to build it really comes down to what you really want. The cost is secondary in my opinion. You can always take longer to build it or finish it off. One guy I know build his custom 5,00 sq ft home one stage at a time. It's all sealed in and water tight, but only a few rooms have carpet and sheetrock. In time, it will all be done, but not for awhile.

If your building to sell right away, then resale is a big consideration, but if your building your dream home, I wouldn't worry too much about resale. If you build qualitiy, you'll get your money back when you sell.

Some of my really big concerns with mobile homes deal with value. They depreciate from the day you buy them. They are much harder to sell then frame homes. They require much more maintenance and they still age much faster then frame homes.

Price is always a factor, but for $165K for 2,000 sq feet, I can build a custom brick home for under $60 a square foot here in East Texas using subs to do all the work. I reckongnize prices here are less then most of the country, but if you can swing a hammer, cut a board and keep a straight line, then you can build it yourself.

As for the earlier posts about the commute and living in the country. I moved from the SF Bay Area 2 1/2 years ago to start living my life as oposed to surviving in an area I no longer wanted to live. Everyone I worked with was just surviving. Conversation was about who had it worse, how bad traffic and crime was. Now I talk about building, mowing, wildlife and the weather. I go to kids games, spend time fishing, hiking the woods and playing frisbee.

There's no comparing the differences. If worse comes to worse, I can always get a job at Walmart or some other minimum wage location. It don't matter to me what it is, I'm still living the good life!

)</font>

Wow, Texas IS cheaper! The only way you'd get away with $60 here is if you went ultra cheap on the materials, and did it all yourself. If you can do that, well I agree, there's absolutely no better way to build equity, and have it exactly the way you want it. In our case, we wanted to live where we live, not work where we live. It's definitely a case by case basis on someone's needs.

It's a past and outdated belief that manufactured homes decrease in value. It's simply not true unless you buy one of the cheaper built ones and it's placed in a poor location. Shoot, my late wife's mom just sold the '72 triple wide that her mom bought in '76 for $15000 for $71000!!!! It's always build quality, and location location location. Again, unless someone's shopped the newer top end homes, they're in for a real surprise.

The new upper end manufactured homes are built far better than most any contractor built homes. I'm serious, for this area anyway, the skill level of the subcontractors around here is in the toilet, overpriced, overscheduled, and the laborers they hire only make matters worse. The new manufactured homes are built on laser leveled jigs out of kiln dried lumber (when's the last time you got a dry, straight stick of lumber at Home Depot or Lowe's?) by guys that show up for work at the same place and get great pay and benefits. If you take a manufacture home of the right company that's UBC graded (say a Guerdon UBC home for instance) and put it on a concrete foundation, it's not even considered a manufactured home. You can get metal roofs, tile floors, hardwood cabinets, on and on. It's insured, permitted, and appraises the same as a stick built. The stigma of manufactured, and the terminology of "mobile home" is inappropriate today. Our "mobile" home weighed just under 120,000 pounds!!!!

At any rate, it's worth consideration. The cost may or may not be in line with what someone wants but one thing, EVERYTHING should be considered A-Z. My costs I outlined are total and comprehensive. I kept a log book of every penny we've put into our home so I'm defiinitely laying out the way it was for us. Most people that do it yourself usually don't log all the expenses, and if they did, they'd find that it most definitely wasn't as inexpensive as they thought it was!

My dad bought a little fixer upper back in the 60s. He's just about got it the way he wants. My brother and I figure that for the amount of man hours and money he's got in that place, he could've bought or built Hearst Castle!!!

Some people don't figure their time into it. Both me and my new wife are widowed. Time's precious. Again, when they have hours and minutes on the shelf at Walmart, I'll discount that from the equation.

There's two sides to everything and I'm NOT saying that Eddie's wrong at all, in fact, after reading all his posts, I hold him in very high esteem and his viewpoint is very valuable too (except for that lighting thing! /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif) because he's a DOER and has much to show and for us to admire for his efforts.

 

[EddieWalker]

Well said HuckBB62,

I agree with you on the quality of some mobile homes and the dificulty in finding decent sub contractors. Price of materials isn't that different and is only a minimum factor in comparing price. Labor is the big killer.

Just about any home can be sealed in for under $15 a foot. The money starts adding up on the finish and special features.

I offered my suggestions on building himself based on Highbeams posts and my perseption that he's capable of doing it.

Most people who haven't built anything are usually hesitant about taking on a big project like that. but if you have a good plan and know the steps, then it's no different then any other project. Just take it one step at a time.


Eddie

 

[Highbeam]

"If you take a manufacture home of the right company that's UBC graded (say a Guerdon UBC home for instance" I have found that it then becomes a modular home and won't have the steel frame rails. The UBC code is a local code and gets you some definite benefits over the HUD codes but I suspect that the better manufactured homes are built somewhere in between. The major benefit to either of these systems is a one week construction time in a warehouse somewhere and low cost based on labor prices in most areas.

I certainly could build my own home. I helped a neighbor build a Lindall Cedar home on his 1.5 acres over the last two years. The house is great and he has tons of (2 years worth)sweat equity in it. House building is no more complicated than buiding a shed but on a huge scale. I don't have the free time to spend buiding it myself so I must compare a stick built vs. modular.

I have copied the photos to a CD and now have to downsize them to 100 KB but I haven't forgotten about the clearing post. A lot of the pictures show the mud generated by my impatience to wait for the summer.

 

[HuckBB62]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( "If you take a manufacture home of the right company that's UBC graded (say a Guerdon UBC home for instance" I have found that it then becomes a modular home and won't have the steel frame rails. The UBC code is a local code and gets you some definite benefits over the HUD codes but I suspect that the better manufactured homes are built somewhere in between. The major benefit to either of these systems is a one week construction time in a warehouse somewhere and low cost based on labor prices in most areas.

I certainly could build my own home. I helped a neighbor build a Lindall Cedar home on his 1.5 acres over the last two years. The house is great and he has tons of (2 years worth)sweat equity in it. House building is no more complicated than buiding a shed but on a huge scale. I don't have the free time to spend buiding it myself so I must compare a stick built vs. modular.

I have copied the photos to a CD and now have to downsize them to 100 KB but I haven't forgotten about the clearing post. A lot of the pictures show the mud generated by my impatience to wait for the summer.

)</font>

That makes me smile. I'm wondering how long I'll be able to live with my ag tires chomping up our dirt! I really would love some less agressive rubber. Those darned ag tires chunk up the dirt ferociously!

My dream would be to have plenty of time and build a timber frame home. We love them to death. Time time time....

 

[Highbeam]

I started that post. Take a look and tell me what you think.

I really got a kick out of the guerdon 300 series modular homes that appear to be UBC built.

Thanks