New Land, New Home Build

[mjncad]

At least the OP hasn't gone all doomsday on us with Pole Shift nonsense like the last guy who had a long house build thread going, and then bailed out on us as he was getting ready to head down the home stretch.

 

[TRR]

I'm still reading these posts, but came across this comment:

I really have no idea what type of wood this is. I assume all wood burns right?

Yeah, all wood burns, but you don't want to burn all woods. I don't know about where you are, but in Florida, Brazilian Pepper is quite common, but is posionous as are several other trees. You may not want to burn plants in the poison ivy family.

 

[EddieWalker]

Really? I have not done anything troll? Let me summarize for you.

Purchased 10 acres by myself w/o a Realtor - how many do that these days?
Contracted with an Architect to design me a house and modify it to my needs.
Worked with a local KC structural engineer to stamp the plans - do you know what that even means?
Located and purchased a tractor.
Started to prep the land and clear it of debris.
Obtain a master site plan, and survey
Submitted plans to Kansas City for review, and obtained a master building permit - which was an involved process I might add
Preformed a perc test on the land
Worked with a geo engineer to design my septic system and layout
Worked with various subs to obtain the necessary bids for my construction loan
SAVED up the necessary 20% down for the loan. How many in America do that these days?
Taken out a construction loan.
Setup an LLC to shelter all this activity under a tax entity
Just last weekend, located and puchased a F350 farm truck.
Worked with local utilities to get power, and water to my site (temp to perm)
All while I still work my 40 hour a week job.

So yeah, I have not done anything. :thumbsup:

Advice is only as good as it's source and what you do with it. From your list of accomlishments, I would say that you are going into this with no experience at all. Those things ara all nice, but really not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things. To build a house from nothing, you need a solid plan. Unless you have build a bunch of houses, you really don't know what you are getting into.

Hiring an archetect for a simple house plan is just a waste of money. If you needed engineerd drawings for your permit, then a draftsman or the engineer could have done that for you for quite a bit less money. Most people find their builder, show them a basic plan that they want, show them the changes that they want and have the builder make the changes. Anybody with a few years experience is going to figure out the plans and what works cheaper then the archetict will. For example, your plan that you showed isn't very good. You dont want to hear it, but the bathrooms are a mess, the doors are too small for the bedrooms and the dishwasher is way too close to the sink.

The thing to do is to stop what you are doing, rethink this plan, and fix it now. Once you start, then you are either stuck with a flawed plan, or you will spend more to fix it. I dont have anything to gain by telling you this, but I've built enough houses and remodeled more then I can count, and some things jump out as being a bad idea.

If you have an accurate plan, the one that has been approved for the build, why not post that plan instead of the penciled one that has so many issues?

Eddie

 

[2weelz4me]

I built a house and was the GC. It was my first house. I posted on a different forum. Funny how similar the responses were. Just finished mine in August. everything went fine. house came out beautiful.

 

[Cantoo]

Depmandog, excellent post, you are spot on with what you've typed. I'm betting some of the best help will skip this thread now. Eddie has some real experience and I'm sure would have been a great sort of help/advice. Alas it's not needed. As for me I've only built 100's of houses here in Canada, a few in Japan and a couple 100 in Michigan. I've been part of a team that built 2 1/2 houses every workday. Like alot of guys here I've been there done that and try to offer advice whenever I can. Just keep in mind that here some of it is worth exactly what you pay for it, those are the posts you read and skip over, but guys like Eddie you can't put a price on that advice. Back to the firewood forum for me.

 

[kfvintx]

Looks like you have a good start on making a dream a reality. My 2 cents on the direction this is headed -- often times people that don't do something as a primary means want to do something as part of their dream or desire in life (hobby farms, building home while working 40 hour desk job, etc.)..... the key to doing this and being successful is listening to those that do what you want as their primary means (hobby farms listen to full time farmers/ranchers, owner acting as builder listening to full time builders, etc.). What you may think is great accomplishments of having done on your own is just normal business that they wouldn't think twice of listing as accomplishment. The people doing as primary are doing so because they know how. By all meansdo your own research and such on contractors and codes and permits and ins/outs of tax code but use the full-timers as part of that research. I fit in the working a 40 hour desk job while trying to get family ranch back into order with desire to be full time eventually.

As for house plans -- assuming the ones attached to earlier post are more correct and not the link -- I have several comments.

Pocket doors -- they can be nice but only for very specific needs. The major complaint I have with them is loss of use from the pocket. Two examples in Bath 2 between secondary bedrooms. The pocket door into toilet and tub area means all plumbing for tub is on exterior wall (can't be on other end as pocket door won't allow for plumbing in walls) which means no access panel for repairs. Another example in same room is pocket door at sink. That wall is typically where a medicine cabinet would be but pocket door won't allow for standard type that is recessed in wall.

Kitchen -- I would move dishwasher for sure. Imagine standing at sink rinsing dishes and having dishwasher door open. With current location and angles the door can't be open and still stand in front of sink.

Master bath -- doors typically open into a room.... even for toilet. Person using sink right there has to move just because of door opening and hitting them.

Just my initial thoughts. Best of luck :thumbsup:

 

[royboy42]

What's the plan for the tee box and green? manmade or natural?

 

[KubotainNH]

I had my house built back in 03 as the GC. It's quite an undertaking but is rewarding. There are so many decisions you don't realize until you get there. Things like door swing and where to put a light switch. Luckily we paid a friend of the family to manage the project, I couldn't have done it on my own. He was in the trade so was able to get great prices on lumber and really good contractors. The house was built and closed in after 4 days, being a simple design helped. Not many things we would change but there are a few. We did a bunch of work on it ourselves so were able to afford things like stain grain trim/doors, radiant heat, farmers porch and extra bathrooms for an affordable cost. The main thing I would say is to make sure the kitchen really works for you, so much time is spent in that room. We made sure ours would work for us by mapping it out on the ground by placing imaginary appliances within the measured space we allowed for. Worked out great. Good luck with your build.

 

[Obed]

There is a thread on here where a guy hired a contractor that he thought was great. He posted pics and it was obvious that this contractor didn't have a clue. Many of us pointed out a list of issues that we saw in the pics, but he didn't believe us at first. I even received an email from him to stop posting on his thread about what I was seeing or he would stop posting any more pics. Eventually it got so bad that he ended up firing the guy and has since corrected most of the problems. I admire him for that, but was disapointed when he dug in and refused to see some of the issues that where pointed out early on.

Eddie

I'm the guy to which Eddie is referring, I think. While some of the specifics mentioned are slightly different than the way I remember them, the gist of Eddie's comments are true. The ugly details are in my "At Home in the Woods" thread. It is true I PM'd Eddie and requested he send me PMs instead of posting on my thread some of what he was seeing. Eddie was nice enough to respect my request. He was an invaluable source of help as we built our house.

The painful part is that, all along, I did believe what Eddie was saying when he said I should fire our construction manager; I just didn't man up and fire the guy when I should have. I didn't like a lot of what I was seeing early in the job but I buried my head in the sand hoping things regarding the CM would improve. They didn't. Eddie saw signs early that the guy shouldn't be building houses at all. Once we finally did get rid of the guy, we had to remove one entire side of our garage's roof including tearing out all the rafters and the associated framing. We had a mountain of ruined lumber we had to throw away. Several other things had to also be fixed. It was both expensive and painful.

Extrakt0r, you are getting a lot of good advice on your thread; I hope you pay heed. These guys helped us build a house we can be proud of. They suggested things we hadn't considered, many which we implemented as a result.

You look like you are doing your homework and are making some good choices. I look forward to following your thread.

Obed

 

[extrakt0r]

TBN Members:

Let me first apologize for some of the tone and attitude in my prior posts. After going back thru and re-reading my content, some of my posts were defiantly out of line, and for that I am wrong and apologize.

I have spent the last 18 months planning, and learning everything I can - I don't know it all, and hope that some of the members who I have inadvertently offended are willing to continue to provide input during my project. It is much needed and appreciated, else I would just let this thread die.

Now, if anyone is still interested in my progress, quite a bit has been done since my last visit.

All of the property is now cleaned of down xmas trees. I have 5 monolithic brush piles I will need to dispose of some day soon - Big fire! :thumbsup:

I also have added a few more "farm" toys. F350 flatbed pickup, Golf Cart and Scag Cheetah ZTR.

We also started cleaning out the dry pond, and roughing in the future dirt bike track. Got a few pics of my Father In Law driving the tractor - he likes it.

I also had Morton Buildings out last week to give me a bid on a 30x40 out building. We decided to build an outbuilding in towards the center of the property for lawn equipment, and keep the building I will build next to the house as my finished man cave.

I have a few pics to share as well.

Today was a nice 60 degree day in KC - I figured out a way to pull stumps with the gear I have. I lowered the center tooth on my box blade all the way down, and basically rip the stumps out. I pulled about 20 out today.

They are half rotted, and about the size of a bowling ball when they come out. It is pretty easy actually. I go forward in Low gear to get the tooth sunk in, then lift up with the 3PT and drive forward. Come out very easy.

Also took a few breaks to take the kids for a ride in the gocart.