Welcome to our site. Our site is full of information that will assist anyone considering building a home themselves. Home construction is a major effort and probably the single largest investment the average person will make during their lifetime. Because of this, it is not something you should begin without a full understanding of the effort involved.
When this site was originally published it was to let you know the pitfalls of building your own home by taking you through the construction of our original dream home. Well, since then, we have also reported on the construction of my son’s log home and now, because of our age and my husband’s health, we need to downsize our home and acreage. We started getting our home ready to sell last year and worked on it continually for a little over 14 months. Our dream home was put on the market and sold within 3 months which was quite a bit quicker that anticipated.
Our new “dream home” will get underway in about 2 months and I will be letting you know how it’s going. Since my husband is unable to help, I will be acting as general contractor myself. A daunting task to say the least. If you would like to follow our progress, I will be posting a weekly update if at all possible.
If you would like to see our last project – my son’s log home – Click Here
If you find any missing links, please drop me an E-Mail. Read our Blog.
Here is my disclaimer for the rest of the information on this website.
“I do not claim to be a professional builder of any kind. The information below is simply an outline and does not in any way guarantee success in the construction of your home. It is not intended to be complete but is merely one person’s view of some of the difficulties involved.”
How Do I Know This???
In 1985, my husband and I decided to buy some land in the country and build our dream home – a place we could enjoy after retirement! Sounds wonderful – doesn’t it! Well, before you make such a decision, there are a few things you need to ask yourself first.
Have you and your spouse ever undertaken a joint project? (If so, were you able to complete it without disagreement or, if you did disagree on something, were you able to work it out to the satisfaction of both parties. The ability to communicate and resolve issues is critical to the enjoyment of building your own home. Don’t attempt it if this is not possible!)
Can you complete the task in the time allowed by your interim financing company? (Do you know what interim financing means?)
Do you have the necessary construction skills to do the work yourself or do you plan to hire subcontractors to do the work? (If you hire others to do the work – are you knowledgeable enough to know if they are giving you “your money’s worth” and if the job is being completed according to “code”?)
Can you look at the work and determine if the “quality of workmanship” is acceptable?
Do you have a job that will allow you to make frequent trips (daily) by the construction site to check on progress.
If you believe you have the right answers to the above questions then lets proceed to the next hurdle!
If you would like to follow along as we start our latest project, be sure you bookmark our site so you can check on our progress. Click on the link “First Things First” to find out what you need to know when selecting your building site.