How do we build a house on our own with a smallish budget?
Great question! This is something River and I have been working on since July 2023.
In August 2023, we sold the house that I had grown up in to build our dream house on six acres of property down the road. When we were first married,13 years ago, we talked about building a house together. At the time we decided to stay where we were and try to make the house work for us. Our house was located on one acre in a lovely neighborhood and we didn’t really want to leave the area.
We ended up selling our house because we had mold in it and it had made us sick. You can hear more about our journey to selling our house here.
We had to take out a loan to remediate the house. River and I decided that if we had to have a loan, we would rather have a loan on a house we loved and that fit us perfectly, then on a house I didn’t think my body would ever feel safe in again. We had one year left on our mortgage when we sold the house, it was heartbreaking to have to start over.
Our goal is to build our house with the smallest mortgage we possibly can, no mortgage would be ideal.
Our Options
There are many options available to build a house these days.
- Build a stick built house
- Buy a modular house
- Design our own house and use a modular company to build it and put it on our property
- Build a post and beam house
- Have another company build panels and trusses based on our design and assemble them on our property.
Stick built
The stick built house is the least expensive option if we do it ourselves, without hiring help, HOWEVER, it would take the most time and require the most labor by ourselves or people we would have to hire.
Pre-designed Modular
We could buy a pre-built modular house, we could have easily found one in our price range. I looked and didn’t find any that fit our needs for a large living area with bedrooms on the first floor. I could find large living areas with all the bedrooms on the second floor or houses with bedrooms on the first floor but small living areas. They were all nice houses, they just didn’t suit our wants and needs.
Modular Design and Build
This would have been the quickest way to get the house we wanted. I spoke to a couple of companies that build modular houses to your own designs. It was going to cost at least $50,000 for their design team even if we had a basic design already. The price for the house itself was going to be close to $400,000 without a garage. This was more then we wanted to spend on just the house.
Post and Beam
I love the way post and beam houses look and the concept of building a giant puzzle is so cool. Post and beam houses can go together quickly with SIPS panels. I wanted something easy to clean and I find beams joints can be tricky to keep clean. If you want to see some neat post and beam houses or learn how to build your own post and beam house, click here. Post and beam houses are so neat!
Pre-built Trusses and Wall Panels
In the end we decided to design our own house, use pre-built wall panels and pre-built trusses to build the house more quickly with less labor on site. Time is important to us, we would like to be in this space by September 2024.
The Design
What we wanted in the new house
The first thing we did was list everything that was important for us in the new house.
- large mudroom
- garage (at least two bays)
- two bedrooms on the first floor
- four bedrooms
- two bathrooms
- lots of light
- metal roof
- a screened in porch
- a butchering room in the garage
- storage in the garage for all our sporting activities
- detached woodshed close to the house
- large with enough room for all of us to hang out with friends comfortably
- accessible bathroom on the first floor
- an office for River
- a small apartment over the garage for guests
- a space for crafting, reading and puzzles that was not in the living area
- the possibility to expand the garage to house a conversion van for adventures
- as low maintenance as possible
We wanted all these things in a smallish package.
It was a LOT to ask of this house and we knew it.
We tried to do the design ourselves. Most of the designs came out as rectangular buildings attached to a garage. We tried single story ranches, capes, modern designs. So many designs! None of them were pretty, some of them were okay. I wish I saved some of the drawings so I could show them to you. Where the stairs should go was an obsession for me. I did not want stairs in the middle of the living area and I couldn’t figure out another place to put them that worked well. The houses kept being huge and we just couldn’t seem to make it work.
We ended up hiring an architect to help us with the design. We worked with Aura Doak Architect, PLLC. She was fantastic, she listened to everything we said and provided the basis that we used for the finished design. I can’t even begin to tell you how amazing she was, she continues to check in with us to see how we are coming along and the design is beautiful. I loved it as soon as I saw it. Aura did three sets of drawings for us. What I am showing you here is the third draft.
We have made some changes to this design as we have gone along that I will explain in future posts. This design was from November 2023. It is March of 2024 as I write this and things have changed as we have moved through the process of preparing to build.
I can’t wait to live in this house!
I may be slightly obsessed.
To read about compromises we are making on this build click here.
To see how much money we have spent click here.