new house starting from scratch

Hey Daniel. That's an exciting journey to be starting! My wife and I plan on doing the same thing over the next few years. I'm sure there's some guys here that can help you out, but a great website for real estate development is bigger pockets. I started flipping houses with my dad, and I can't even begin to tell you how valuable the information on that site has been to us.

Congrats on the land purchase and upcoming projects. Start a build thread! I'll post a teaser thread later of the dump I recently bought. Everyone needs a good laugh.

Be cautious of the neighbor(s) when you have the land surveyed....people can get really sensitive when you start correcting land markers. Last week while visiting a friend we were out walking his land because he recently had a 7-acre chunk of his 30 acres marked off for a house he is building. Spent a lot of money for a surveyor ($1000’s) and the neighbor got really upset/started screaming at us and pulled out all the stakes near his land (he “thought” the land was his). We ended up calling the police.

You might want to go meet your neighbors and introduce yourself and let them know your plans..

Brad460 wrote:

Be cautious of the neighbor(s) when you have the land surveyed....people can get really sensitive when you start correcting land markers. Last week while visiting a friend we were out walking his land because he recently had a 7-acre chunk of his 30 acres marked off for a house he is building. Spent a lot of money for a surveyor ($1000’s) and the neighbor got really upset/started screaming at us and pulled out all the stakes near his land (he “thought” the land was his). We ended up calling the police.

You might want to go meet your neighbors and introduce yourself and let them know your plans..

Thanks for the advice! I definately plan on finding out who my neighbors are. 6 of the 8 parcels have been sold and only 2 have started clearing land. I plan on for sure getting a hold of both neighbors as I don’t know how long they’ve had they’re parcels and seeing what all they’ve done and making sure everyone is good to go.

I’ll definately make a build thread as we get closer and like I stated welcome any and all input cause we figure an investment this big better be perfect as we won’t be leaving anytime soon. I have a vision in my head but I’m sure when we finally get everything dialed will be totally different but that’s how it goes.

Sounds obvious, but I know of a couple of people who didn't think it all the way through before excavation and foundations. Spend a little bit of time on the place in the early morning and late evening to find out where the sun comes up and goes down and align your house's footprint accordingly. In a tiny subdivision you don't really have a choice, but on 10 acres you should definitely be able to get just the right orientation.

Check with local utilities to see if they subsidize things like rooftop solar panels, etc, so you can do things like that fresh from the beginning.

Build up high and get flood insurance! My new advice to everyone.

I want to 2nd Aplman's suggestion about calling the utilities. Not only to see about subsidies, but to plan for water usage, etc. One place I lived the water bill was several hundred dollars per month, even though we barely used any water. Some people were paying $400-$500! The water authority in that region was a bunch of crooks and the residents couldn't do a thing about it.

Also, definitely go solar! (Especially since you're doing electric appliances.)

Did I miss where you mentioned where this is going to happen?

Some areas having the property "perk" can be pretty important.

Wondering why you wouldn't use anything off propane. It is a pretty reasonable way to heat and if you are in a rural area a back up generator fueled by lp might be a consideration.

Brad460 wrote:

Be cautious of the neighbor(s) when you have the land surveyed....people can get really sensitive when you start correcting land markers. Last week while visiting a friend we were out walking his land because he recently had a 7-acre chunk of his 30 acres marked off for a house he is building. Spent a lot of money for a surveyor ($1000’s) and the neighbor got really upset/started screaming at us and pulled out all the stakes near his land (he “thought” the land was his). We ended up calling the police.

You might want to go meet your neighbors and introduce yourself and let them know your plans..

Calling the cops was the right thing to do. It is a Federal offence up here to remove survey markers.

It isn't the landowner that would re-establish markers, it is the surveyor. The landowner may have hired him, but he is a neutral party - the surveyor should be the one to defend their locations, most of the time via a plan he would prepare which would get filed in the land registry and become part of the public record. Having said that though - the surveyor is also technically supposed to be neutral, and should mark corners where they are supposed to be regardless of who hired him.

It could still get ugly however, depending on the neighbor - some would go to the ends of the earth to dispute and argue a point no matter how wrong they are. Which I guess we all know from hanging out at this place - lol.

Before you draw up a site plan, maybe camp out there a weekend or 2.
See how the Sun rises and sets. How it will work with the home.

Once you get a square footage of the house, you can get a septic system designed.
The bigger the house, the more bedrooms, the bigger the septic system.
Different parts of the country, different types of septic systems are required.
Like it's been mentioned, the perk will determine that.
Some places, the health or building dept require perk tests to be done in certain times of the year, read wet/rainy
times, so you're sure they will work year round.

You get the floor plan of the house, you can start laying out the site plan.
The house will sit here, the septic here, the well here (it has to be a certain distance from septic), the driveway will
meet the road here, all of which can be worked out to fit, most of the time, to where you want the house to sit.

Pellet stove thing sounds good, but some places require the heat system to operate 7 days unattended,
Get a heat pump. A conventional split system, with ductwork, you need a big ass generator when the electric goes out,
Ductless mini split heat pumps, no duct work, use such little electric you can run them off a medium gas powered generator. Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Toshiba are quality brands. Conventional heat pumps, Carrier, Trane are top of the line.

Good luck guy, u can't plan enough, or ask enough questions with this.

motogrady wrote:
Before you draw up a site plan, maybe camp out there a weekend or 2.
See how the Sun rises and sets. How it will work with the home.

Once you get a square footage of the house, you can get a septic system designed.
The bigger the house, the more bedrooms, the bigger the septic system.
Different parts of the country, different types of septic systems are required.
Like it's been mentioned, the perk will determine that.
Some places, the health or building dept require perk tests to be done in certain times of the year, read wet/rainy
times, so you're sure they will work year round.

You get the floor plan of the house, you can start laying out the site plan.
The house will sit here, the septic here, the well here (it has to be a certain distance from septic), the driveway will
meet the road here, all of which can be worked out to fit, most of the time, to where you want the house to sit.

Pellet stove thing sounds good, but some places require the heat system to operate 7 days unattended,
Get a heat pump. A conventional split system, with ductwork, you need a big ass generator when the electric goes out,
Ductless mini split heat pumps, no duct work, use such little electric you can run them off a medium gas powered generator. Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Toshiba are quality brands. Conventional heat pumps, Carrier, Trane are top of the line.

Good luck guy, u can't plan enough, or ask enough questions with this.

Although a little more costly, you can get a themostatically controlled hopper fed pellet stove that uses pellets or grains like wheat and rice. Operate for months unattended...a weeks worth of ash is less than a pint. As far as heat/air is concerned...there is nothing more efficient/cheap (after initial cost) than geothermal. It's practically free after installation.

motogrady wrote:
Before you draw up a site plan, maybe camp out there a weekend or 2.
See how the Sun rises and sets. How it will work with the home.

Once you get a square footage of the house, you can get a septic system designed.
The bigger the house, the more bedrooms, the bigger the septic system.
Different parts of the country, different types of septic systems are required.
Like it's been mentioned, the perk will determine that.
Some places, the health or building dept require perk tests to be done in certain times of the year, read wet/rainy
times, so you're sure they will work year round.

You get the floor plan of the house, you can start laying out the site plan.
The house will sit here, the septic here, the well here (it has to be a certain distance from septic), the driveway will
meet the road here, all of which can be worked out to fit, most of the time, to where you want the house to sit.

Pellet stove thing sounds good, but some places require the heat system to operate 7 days unattended,
Get a heat pump. A conventional split system, with ductwork, you need a big ass generator when the electric goes out,
Ductless mini split heat pumps, no duct work, use such little electric you can run them off a medium gas powered generator. Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Toshiba are quality brands. Conventional heat pumps, Carrier, Trane are top of the line.

Good luck guy, u can't plan enough, or ask enough questions with this.

plowboy wrote:

Although a little more costly, you can get a themostatically controlled hopper fed pellet stove that uses pellets or grains like wheat and rice. Operate for months unattended...a weeks worth of ash is less than a pint. As far as heat/air is concerned...there is nothing more efficient/cheap (after initial cost) than geothermal. It's practically free after installation.

A month on pellets, pretty cool.

And yea, geothermal heat pumps operate pretty cheap.
But like you mention, it's the initial cost. You need to drill 2 wells, one for supply, one to return the water back into the ground.
Equipment, wells, a guy to install it all, 20 to 30 grand.
Or, a closed loop geothermal. They dig a big ass trench, deep as you can get, 12, 16 feet down.
Run some kind of special plastic pipe, I guess you could use copper, make a big loop and circulate anti freeze
thru it, sucking the heat out of the ground that way.
I've heard these are kinda inferior to the 2 well systems, performance wise.

I dunno, I came in to this trade as a duct installer, I'm partial to metal duct.
But, the next one I do, I hate to admit it, might just be ductless.
It pisses me off that, like motorcycles, Japan has a kinda lock on them.
And like I said, I'm a duct guy.

But, a 3 or 4 ton Mitsubishi, one outdoor unit, maybe 4 to 6 heads hanging thruout the house, sucking about the same amount of juice a geo does, for around 10 grand, installed, and I don't have to even think about humping a ton of pellet
into the basement, I'd have to look,and think at going that way pretty hard.

Wash machine water should not go in the septic tank, reroute elswhere. The soap kills the delicate balance of bacteria that make it work. Spend whatever money you can to be off grid. Grid service now may be affordable but.....
Spend money on good sound insulation!!

ToolMaker wrote:

Wash machine water should not go in the septic tank, reroute elswhere. The soap kills the delicate balance of bacteria that make it work. Spend whatever money you can to be off grid. Grid service now may be affordable but.....
Spend money on good sound insulation!!

true dat. It might not be code, it might not be legal, but yes, washing machine water into a septic system no no.

And yes, thinking long term very good thing.
Just don't get caught up in the hype of something that's not gonna pay off, in a real way.

The only guys I see really beating the heat bill are the guys burning wood they get for free.
And that's a lot of work, getting it in the garage, dumping the ashes, let alone cutting and splitting it.
You gotta buy it, for what they get around here, might as well pay the electric bill.

And that brings up the wind and solar thing.
I'd really like to hear from someone, anyone, that has something going that has and is saving them money.
With the initial cost of install, and personal time and effort involved.

Did some work awhile back, guy was off the grid, totally.
Solar panels gazoo, had an elaborate roof water collection system that fed a huge, 2000 gallon holding tank in his basement, that need chlorine and some other stuff to make it drinkable,
The solar panels kept a slew of big ass, I dunno, what looked like truck or RV batteries charged.
The batteries gave him low voltage lights, and powered a pump that kept circulating the water in the holding tank to help keep it from getting stagnant.

Hot, or warm water, was held in an insulated tank also warned thru a panel on the roof for showers and dishwashing.
No sun, no warm water.

Outhouses here in my State are illegal.
But he had some kind of chemical toilet.

That's as close as I've seen someone really living off the grid.

ToolMaker wrote:

Wash machine water should not go in the septic tank, reroute elswhere. The soap kills the delicate balance of bacteria that make it work. Spend whatever money you can to be off grid. Grid service now may be affordable but.....
Spend money on good sound insulation!!

motogrady wrote:
true dat. It might not be code, it might not be legal, but yes, washing machine water into a septic system no no.

And yes, thinking long term very good thing.
Just don't get caught up in the hype of something that's not gonna pay off, in a real way.

The only guys I see really beating the heat bill are the guys burning wood they get for free.
And that's a lot of work, getting it in the garage, dumping the ashes, let alone cutting and splitting it.
You gotta buy it, for what they get around here, might as well pay the electric bill.

And that brings up the wind and solar thing.
I'd really like to hear from someone, anyone, that has something going that has and is saving them money.
With the initial cost of install, and personal time and effort involved.

Did some work awhile back, guy was off the grid, totally.
Solar panels gazoo, had an elaborate roof water collection system that fed a huge, 2000 gallon holding tank in his basement, that need chlorine and some other stuff to make it drinkable,
The solar panels kept a slew of big ass, I dunno, what looked like truck or RV batteries charged.
The batteries gave him low voltage lights, and powered a pump that kept circulating the water in the holding tank to help keep it from getting stagnant.

Hot, or warm water, was held in an insulated tank also warned thru a panel on the roof for showers and dishwashing.
No sun, no warm water.

Outhouses here in my State are illegal.
But he had some kind of chemical toilet.

That's as close as I've seen someone really living off the grid.

I guess I should elaborate my definition of off the grid is confined to not using the public utilities.
Electricity, Water, Sewer, and if you can get away with it not have trash pickup at your house.
We have been in the same house for 30+ years. When we moved in Elect was $30-$40 per month
now $300-$400 month. Water was $15-$20 per month now never less than $250. Of course we
have a lawn and trees now. Hell, we should be getting money for carbon credits for all those trees.
TM

plowboy wrote:

Although a little more costly, you can get a themostatically controlled hopper fed pellet stove that uses pellets or grains like wheat and rice. Operate for months unattended...a weeks worth of ash is less than a pint. As far as heat/air is concerned...there is nothing more efficient/cheap (after initial cost) than geothermal. It's practically free after installation.

Can't agree with this statement enough,
GEO is by far the best way to go.

Was in in a home that was GeoThermal the High humidity and High Temps in Ohio in the early 80's and was amazed.
That visit (Was bricking the house) gave me much appreciated knowledge of what was out there to help in heating/Cooling costs.

Think long in early stages gives you leverage in your longevity

motogrady wrote:
Before you draw up a site plan, maybe camp out there a weekend or 2.
See how the Sun rises and sets. How it will work with the home.

Once you get a square footage of the house, you can get a septic system designed.
The bigger the house, the more bedrooms, the bigger the septic system.
Different parts of the country, different types of septic systems are required.
Like it's been mentioned, the perk will determine that.
Some places, the health or building dept require perk tests to be done in certain times of the year, read wet/rainy
times, so you're sure they will work year round.

You get the floor plan of the house, you can start laying out the site plan.
The house will sit here, the septic here, the well here (it has to be a certain distance from septic), the driveway will
meet the road here, all of which can be worked out to fit, most of the time, to where you want the house to sit.

Pellet stove thing sounds good, but some places require the heat system to operate 7 days unattended,
Get a heat pump. A conventional split system, with ductwork, you need a big ass generator when the electric goes out,
Ductless mini split heat pumps, no duct work, use such little electric you can run them off a medium gas powered generator. Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Toshiba are quality brands. Conventional heat pumps, Carrier, Trane are top of the line.

Good luck guy, u can't plan enough, or ask enough questions with this.

plowboy wrote:

Although a little more costly, you can get a themostatically controlled hopper fed pellet stove that uses pellets or grains like wheat and rice. Operate for months unattended...a weeks worth of ash is less than a pint. As far as heat/air is concerned...there is nothing more efficient/cheap (after initial cost) than geothermal. It's practically free after installation.

Old-Man wrote:

Can't agree with this statement enough,
GEO is by far the best way to go.

Was in in a home that was GeoThermal the High humidity and High Temps in Ohio in the early 80's and was amazed.
That visit (Was bricking the house) gave me much appreciated knowledge of what was out there to help in heating/Cooling costs.

Think long in early stages gives you leverage in your longevity

Don't think I agree 100%.

I looked into Geo when I redid my heating system 5-6 years ago. Ballpark estimate of $20k, not including anything distribution system related. I know some people that did do Geo - their electric bills ended up more than they were anticipating, all of them. Pumping all that water 24/7 around several large loops can do that - plus the compressor unit running costs. Everyone I know that has put a ductless mini-split system in has been very happy with their resulting electric consumption - and the up front costs at around 70-80% less trump there.

Wow guys thank you for all the input. I’ll answer a few questions and I have some more info.

So I didn’t know how relevant it would be but I’m doing this in Northern Nevada. The day I need flood insurance will be a scary scary day lol. I know how the sun sets and rises in relation to the property. The wife and I spend lots of time in spring and summer out back right now. My current house faces the east so it can be pretty miserable heat wise in the summer out back which why I bought on the side of the street I did. So now my back yard will face the east and the front the west. As far as the mention of the shop door facing. It’s hard to predict the wind here, it likes to swirl quite a bit so I don’t know if I’ll ever win that battle.

As far as the property line deal. I called a surveyor just to see the cost. He looked at my info and said it was surveyed a little bit ago but for $300 he will resurveye it. He also told me how many markers I should have. I don’t wanna start a battle so I’m waiting to hear back from the county on the owners name just to have a talk with him and see what he knows or where his info is coming from. Other than that I’d also like to pick his brain on some other research he may have done, well depths, stuff like that and see if we can share some info. Not like we will be super close house wise but I’m all about being a rad neighbor and having good neighbors. So we will see.

Thanks again for all your guys input and by all means keep it coming!!

Geothermal. For the cost to put it in I’d have to be here a long time for that initial installation cost to pay off. Gas bill is never more than $60/mo. For 5 months outta they year it’s 25-30/mo. For the coldest it’s $60. Rest of the time about $45. Great insulation, central air and natural gas is great way to go for cheap energy. my parents house was all electric and the electric bill is outrageous (to me, $150+ a month)

ns503 wrote:

Don't think I agree 100%.

I looked into Geo when I redid my heating system 5-6 years ago. Ballpark estimate of $20k, not including anything distribution system related. I know some people that did do Geo - their electric bills ended up more than they were anticipating, all of them. Pumping all that water 24/7 around several large loops can do that - plus the compressor unit running costs. Everyone I know that has put a ductless mini-split system in has been very happy with their resulting electric consumption - and the up front costs at around 70-80% less trump there.

I have at least two friends that would agree with this after having had GEO for the past 5 years. Probably better in a warmer climate than Canada. Very expensive electric bills up here and slow changes to temperature if your wife decides it's too cold in the house.

Alright little update for everyone. So I talked to a surveyor just to see how much I was looking at and I had been told some scary numbers from guys at work. I call our local survey company, give him map details. He calls me back an hour later and says it was surveyed 10 or so years ago and all the markers should still be out there but for $350 he will go do it when he gets 3 or more jobs out that way. That’s where things kinda sat until yesterday. My boy and I cruised out there to look for the markers and the neighboring property I was questioning has moved some dirt, a lot. So I grab my map and start walking and I’m getting nervous, he’s 2-3 d6 blade widths into my side. I figure I need to get ahold of this guy ASAP and see what he knows or what the deal is. After a little time on the county Assessors page I find his info. Well damn he lives 7 or so hours south in Vegas. But thanks to Facebook I find him. I shoot him a message just wanting to talk and see if he’s had any survey work or anything like that done and discuss my confusion. About 15 minutes later he calls me. NICEST guy ever. Tells me he put the no trespassing flags on posts just trying to make sense of property lines and clear his confusion. He also let me know his plans and we swapped info on research for wells and such. Turns out it’s gonna be his retirement home and he will be starting a Christmas tree farm. His and my family will be meeting at the end of the month for dinner and to talk about the lines more. He is also willing to pay a portion of survey.

From here my plans are to get my fencing done now that the holidays are past and settled. I’m hoping to have it done before my second son arrives April 23rd! I have a buddy who I’ve been helping get into moto racing and working on his kid’s bike at no charge that will bring the tractor and tooling to help me out!

Now my new question for the class, we are leaving our options open and I was shown mortonbuildings.com. Anyone ever heard or have any experience with them? My wife is surprisingly interested.

Hope everyone is having a great start to 2018!

A barndominium? Some are really cool, but price it out all the way through. You'll be building a house inside of a metal building, right?

Pretty much, they come in and build the shell and insulate it. Then you have a general contractor come in and do electrical, plumbing and interior. We researched some and found the building itself we would be looking at about $35 a square foot and they say plan for $50-$100 a square foot for finishing costs. So we ran an average at $75. Yes it’s a little more expensive but fairly close price wise in comparison to what we are looking at with house plus shop. Where this other way it would be all one structure.

We have friends who have one of these barn houses and it's friggin awesome!

Some solid info in this thread. I have seen a few equestrian businesses with Morton barn/office/living space combos. Really nice builds.

Build something you can sell. Even if you never plan to. 1st and foremost.

Oddball homes, geodesic, log, equestrian, working farms, off the grid, etc can't be financed unless a local lender will, and/or It's conforming and normal to the area like say a 5K Sq Ft log home in Montana. And even then buyers need a shit ton down because no lender wants to get back an unlendable asset and need to sell to cash.

It might be cool to you, but a lender looks at it like a problem asset. Private money doesn't even like oddball stuff because they look at lending like Do we ever want to own this?

We only build homes in areas in the 3-25Mm range and that is considered oddball and a high risk asset just the same as non normal homes.

They look brand new and cool, are all Green and energy efficient with Delos and shit like that, but it's oddball.
It's all private money, and now 99% of the time a lender can't give a loan to someone who is going to live in it.
Even lending as a 2nd home is running a ragged edge.
Imagine that.

So say down the road you want to sell and some self employed guy wants to buy it but it's unlendable except to a private lender.......the first and deciding question they will ask is Do you ever plan to live in it?
If it's yes, 99% chance they will say nope, won't lend. Even if you say No, they are really going to look hard at the possibility you might. And if they find out you do later, they can simply foreclose.

So whatever you Build, make sure it's sellable to the cashier at Walmart. Meaning a regular joe with a normal job with a W2 and a paystub, and unless it's a normal house, better be sure a normal person can buy it otherwise an all cash guy may be a long time coming.

Call around and ask of you were to build this, can they finance someone if you need to sell.
Be honest and tell them, well, septic, off grid, solar, barn home, whatever.

Don't talk to a loan guy. The answer is always yes. Ask an underwriter. Or a funder.

For example out in the desert a 2 unit manufactured property converted to real is a lendable property
Problem is 99% chance No lender will fund it. Once you add that 2nd unit it's out.
And private money doesn't want that on their books either. So basically it's damn near unlendable.

Think ahead.