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'All I wanted to do is build a house' (2010)
- legulere 10y agoThis article by far doesn't give enough information to judge the situation. We don't know which regulations he broke. The issue isn't really the amount of regulation but if certain regulation makes sense or not. The whole deregulation crowd never actually talks about which regulations should be abolished.
- vivekd 10y agoBuilding a home with my own two hands has been a bit of a dream of mine. The government, governments in general but particularly the government in my own country, have become so overbearing, with a desire to micromanage and control and monitor every little aspect our existence. They want us to get their okay and stamp of approval before going about the ordinary course of our lives. There's something beautiful in ordinary men like Morrison who choose to stand against that.
- Kluny 10y agoPlease bear in mind that there's no actual information in this piece. The author clearly decided what the story was going to be before they had any details about it. If you want to build your own house, go ahead and do it - and research people who did it successfully and imitate what they did, instead of giving up before you start based on one thin story about some edge case.
- codeddesign 10y agoI completely understand your point of government intrusion, but there are actually building codes in place for a reason. An example is the San Francisco fire of 1906. Building codes set safety requirements for construction for the general safety of everyone living in or around a building. Whether it's fire codes, plumbing codes, earthquake codes...etc. If there were no building codes, we would he of housing fatalities daily on the news, and LA would look like favela. You can't just construct a building however you wish, no different than you can travel down an expressway as you wish (i.e. walking in the middle of the lane).
- dpc59 10y agoI don't think any one in this thread is saying building codes or regulations shouldn't be a thing, it's more that regulations shouldn't be so complicated that they become barriers to entry, and that common sense should be applied alongside the regulations. Who gives a shit if there isn't a sticker on your lumber if the lumber is of good enough quality?
- delinka 10y agoBut that sticker is how you can tell that the lumber is of good enough quality. Who sets the standards? Who certifies that the lumber meets the standards? How do you get rcompense if someone lied about the quality of their lumber? That sticker says "this lumber meets quality specs. And if it doesn't, this company is responsible for the resulting catastrophe."
- Tempest1981 10y agoPerhaps a structural engineer could have been hired (at owners expense) to report on the wood quality. It's not uncommon to spend a few hundred dollars during a remodel for load calcs. I.e. it's probably not a huge extra expense for a major project.
- ars 10y agoThere is a difference between safety and blind obedience to building codes. Building codes are about standardizing things so builder and inspectors barely have to communicate - at a glance they can see they followed x, y, z. But the law should have a place for homeowners who do things safely, just not exactly how a builder would do it. That's why many places require permits for various work (for example electrical work) - unless you do it yourself, in which case you are exempt. And that's the right way to do things. Just like you don't need the health department in your kitchen, but you do in a restaurant.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Broken_Hippo 10y ago
- pjc50 10y agoThe trouble with this stuff is it starts with sympathetic cases like the secret castle: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3044537/Farmer-given-90-days-tear-mock-Tudor-castle-built-without-planning-permission-hid-bales-hay.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3044537/Farmer-given... And ends with people burning to death in slums: http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/thirteen-deaths-across-london-as-more-people-found-living-in-beds-and-sheds-9541239.html http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/thirteen-deaths-across... Building regulation is there for a reason, usually a good one, sometimes involving fatalities. Blithely disregarding it in its entirety is a non-starter. It would be nice if the system were easier to work with, but picking a fight with it so you can play the hero is not really to be admired.
- merb 10y ago> And ends with people burning to death in slums: Mostly these "cheap" slums were built with regulations, but with a short amount of money. Actually mostly they became slums because the owner does not care and the regulators never look at those since the owners has dozen of houses and it would be problematic to look at it every x years. so the houses getting worse over time and nobody actually keeps them in a good state and than bad things happen. Actually this is a BIG problem in our modern world. some people actually need _cheap_ homes (not everybody makes a six figures a year). And thats why the problem begins, socialized buildings never happen. Mostly they build a chunk of good homes for people with a lot of money and the old ones never get repair/refreshed, but thats the only ones people with fewer money can have.
- nojvek 10y agoHow does this work for people who build tiny homes?
- johnchristopher 10y agoTldr: senior citizen (88-92) builds himself a house but government inspectors find it unlawful. The citizen resists and after many court appointments he is finally given the permission to live in his house until he dies. And it happened in Canada. And the author laments the loss of freedom from "before".
- PretzelFisch 10y agoIf I understand this, he built it to the building codes he knew in the 60s and couldn't understand why the building inspectors kept finding violations in what he built.
- Super_Jambo 10y agoI mean obviously the story told from his point of view is going to be one sided. That said if the complaint was simply that the materials used had not been through expensive certification _and there was no cost effective alternative for individuals_. Then it starts to sound a lot like regulation as barrier to entry.
- alexandercrohde 10y agoThat's a strawman summary, and destructive to the discussion. The state argued that bulldozing his house was the right thing to do, more on process than any evidence as it seems his house was structurally superior to standard houses, plus he couldn't afford any other house... Whether he didn't know the regulations, or was performing civil disobedience isn't relevant to whether these regulations are too rigidly enforced.
- dvtv75 10y agoThere's a bit in there (paragraph 8) about how he met or exceeded modern building codes, as determined by an independent third party, yet was getting hit for not meeting modern building code. Whether that's the whole story or not seems to be left to the imagination.
- paxy 10y ago
- Cacti 10y agoI'm not a big fan of this style of online journalism. Do we have anything on this other than an opinion piece heavily lacking in detail? Could anyone even explain what the opinion is exactly?
- mcpherrinm 10y agoWell, this was in The Globe's opinion section.
- dmd 10y agoOn the other hand, following building codes is one of the major reasons why when natural disasters strike, people don't die by the thousands or millions any more.
- LeanderK 10y agowhy i think this is important and true, there is often a tendency to over-regulate things, because for the regulator it's hard to decide what is necessary and important and what does more harm due to the regulatory overhead than the increased safety/whatever. Disclaimer: I don't think this is super bad and i am german. We love to regulate things. But i think if you spend all your live thinking about fire hazards in residential areas all you care about is fire hazards and it's hard to not do everything to prevent those (even if there is only a small possibility and it would increase panning prices quite a bit).
- mstodd 10y agoIt's not because they were constructed to survive a natural disaster?
- dmd 10y ago...
- therealdrag0 10y agoHis point is the codes require a certain stabilities so that they are "constructed to survive a natural disaster". Without the codes, people cut corners, and then later disaster strikes.
- peller 10y agoI'm torn on building codes. They increase the cost and duration of building a new dwelling by exorbitant amounts and limit the creative freedoms of the builder into practically following cookie-cutter templates (esp in terms of materials). On the other hand, they theoretically provide some semblance of assurance that when you buy a new property that it was built to a certain standard. Unless it was grandfathered in, or the builder "knew somebody," or work was done without a permit after the dwelling was built, or ... As somebody fully capable of building my own house though, damn do I wish they didn't exist. It means putting off that dream for an untold number of years of further saving and wasting money on rent instead of being able to buy a piece of land, and slowly progressing from a shack to a beautiful home worthy of a family. That ship sailed long before I was born, and instead of providing their purported benefits, building codes just feel like another tool to oppress the not-wealthy.
- specialist 10y agoRemodeling my own home. Found some pretty sketchy electrical, had a contractor that cut some corners. I'm grateful for modern building codes. Ignorance is bliss, but then you get a little bit of awareness, and realize how fragile everything is, and so forth.
- cryptarch 10y agoDid building codes exist when that electrical was laid down, and did it help?
- Tempest1981 10y agoOften, yes. Often work was done without a permit, or extra work is done after the inspection.
- ocdtrekkie 10y agoThe thing is, a lot of things are done without upholding those building codes anyways. They often burden the common sense person, like the article subject, while people just trying to cheat the system will still do so.
- foota 10y agoIt seems to me like there should be exceptions in building codes if a building will never be sold and does not put others in danger (e.g., a shack in the forest)
- crooked-v 10y agoPeople doing random things in the middle of the forest where they were sure they couldn't hurt anybody else had led to any number of major wildfires over the past century.
- adamryman 10y agocitation needed
- crooked-v 10y agoTen seconds of web searching for "camper caused wildfire": http://www.cbsnews.com/news/2-arrested-for-arson-in-colorado-wildfire/ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/2-arrested-for-arson-in-colorado... http://tri1025.com/illegal-campers-may-have-started-another-wildfire-near-estes/ http://tri1025.com/illegal-campers-may-have-started-another-... http://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/index.ssf/2016/09/state_says_snoozing_camper_car.html http://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/index.ssf/2... http://www.wkyt.com/home/headlines/Cause-of-Rowan-wildfire-a-warning-to-hunters-campers-177794801.html http://www.wkyt.com/home/headlines/Cause-of-Rowan-wildfire-a... http://www.khq.com/story/32604122/11000-acre-wildfire-burning-in-whitman-county-near-colton http://www.khq.com/story/32604122/11000-acre-wildfire-burnin...
- Mathnerd314 10y agoNeeds a [2010]. Updates: there's a movie: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Still_Mine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Still_Mine and he died: http://www.inmemoriam.ca/view-announcement-348916-craig-morrison.html http://www.inmemoriam.ca/view-announcement-348916-craig-morr... and his wife died: http://www.inmemoriam.ca/view-announcement-380737-irene-morrison.html http://www.inmemoriam.ca/view-announcement-380737-irene-morr... the house was still standing (empty) as of 2014: http://www.ontariolandowners.ca/news/landowners-association-new-brunswick-shirley-dolan/ http://www.ontariolandowners.ca/news/landowners-association-... sold in 2015: http://crowtherrealestate.ca/properties/2020realestate/f-print_page.asp?action=brochure1&ID=49 http://crowtherrealestate.ca/properties/2020realestate/f-pri...
- Freak_NL 10y agoThe last link makes you wonder about the digital literacy of the intended audience of that web page: We can send this page to your printer automatically! Click "OK" to print now... Or if want to preview this page first click "Cancel". Remember, you can send this page to your printer using your "Right-Click" menu anywhere on the page.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- silentrob 10y agoThis was made into a movie "Still mine" http://m.imdb.com/title/tt2073086/ http://m.imdb.com/title/tt2073086/
- timwaagh 10y agothe thing when you build an illegal building to live in, is that it should not be obvious that: 1. a structure is here. plants should be used to hide it. 2. it should be not obvious someone lives there. so no windows or fancy shit. it should not look like a house from the outside. nobody is going to look twice at a storage shed.
- DanBC 10y ago> nobody is going to look twice at a storage shed. I'm reminded of Honeycrock farm, where he built a mock-tudor mansion and hid it behind a haystack for six years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeycrock_Farm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeycrock_Farm There have been a few similar cases in England of people converting farm buildings to homes but without getting planning permissions.
- kctess5 10y agoReminds me of when a family friend of mine (a professor of civil engineering) built his own barn on his property. He got permits and did everything the ordained way, but still got hassled over tons of details. The inspector almost couldn't grasp the idea that the tens of thousands of stainless steel screws he had bought and used significantly exceeded the specs of the nails required by code. He did manage to persevere eventually.
- cma 10y agoNot sure if this was the issue, but some grades of stainless steel screws can't be used with treated lumber because of an increased corrosion risk. The rule might have been in to simplify inspections.
- stuckagain 10y agoAlso screws have poor toughness compared to nails, and should never be used for framing. Just because it looks strong doesn't mean it is strong.
- scaryspooky 10y agoNails have higher shear strength and screws have higher tensile strength. That's the reason nails are used for framing and those nails are typically covered in a heat activated cement to prevent pull out.
- rsync 10y ago"Not sure if this was the issue, but some grades of stainless steel screws can't be used with treated lumber because of an increased corrosion risk." If it's actually stainless, that is an approved connector for treated lumber. It's more expensive than galvanized, but much more resistant.[1] It's plain old steel - untreated - that has very bad galvanic corrosion properties inside of treated lumber. [1] http://www.finehomebuilding.com/2012/09/06/whats-the-difference-fasteners-for-pressure-treated-lumber http://www.finehomebuilding.com/2012/09/06/whats-the-differe...
- innocentoldguy 10y agoI wouldn't mind building codes and inspections so much if they actually protected consumers from corner-cutting builders, and if the cities that charge exorbitant fees for permits and inspections didn't automatically sign off on commercial builders' dismally flawed products over coffee and a pastry at the nearest Starbucks. I've owned three homes so far and everyone of them has violated code in myriad ways, such as not having a speck of insulation in the roof, putting in little to no rebar in the foundation, not securing weight-bearing walls to the joists they're supporting, or finishing the shower surrounds with paint-on tar that breaks down and starts leaking in a couple of years; after the warranty on the home has expired, of course. My dad was a builder when I was growing up, and the truth of the matter is that city inspectors become friends with builders, and they often times don't bother to actually inspect the homes they're signing off on, or don't inspect them frequently enough to catch when a builder is skimping on insulation, rebar, or nails. Try to do something on your own though, and the city is there harassing you every step of the way. At least that has been my experience.
- maxxxxx 10y agoI have heard that too. One approach for solving it would be to have a pool of inspectors state wide and assign them randomly to inspections.
- mahyarm 10y agoCan you sue the city & the builder then for not actually inspecting properly and not building a house that was supposed to be built to code?
- innocentoldguy 10y agoI looked into it and I couldn't sue the city, but I could sue the builder. The only problem was that all of the builders who worked on the houses I've owned went bankrupt back when the housing market crashed, so there wasn't really anything I could do.
- notliketherest 10y agoSadly this has also happened in America. With every regulation passed that takes more money from the citizens and goes to the government, we lose our liberties one at a time.
- guard-of-terra 10y agoThere should definitely be an exception in every code for the case when you're doing it on your own land, with your own materials, for your own consumption. I think code writers understand that, nevertheless it is too often 'conveniently' left out.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- _asummers 10y agoRelated question: does anyone have any experience becoming a building inspector and what all goes into that?
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 10y agoHaven't done it myself, but in general you need training and to pass an exam. Training can come from 1 to 4 years of schooling, apprenticeship, or I believe job experience (e.g. general contractor for many years). Once that has been satisfied, you take the certification exam and pass to get certified.
- _asummers 10y agoAh, I wish you could just show knowledge without the formality of schooling or an apprenticeship. Way too much effort for something I only have a passive interest in. Appreciate the response!
- dragthor 10y agoI think we need more regulations, laws, and building codes. Not! Over here in the states, the Amish fight regulations all the time. The only way they win is religious freedom. And the fact that they have been building houses a certain way for 100 years.
- elbii 10y agoThis is one of the reasons the tinyhouse movement has become so popular. In Texas (and many other states), you can build your own house on a trailer and register it as a homemade travel trailer. RVs, being vehicles, are usually exempt from building codes. The main hurdle becomes finding a municipality that allows fulltime RV living which, depending on where you live, may be easier than jumping through regulation hoops building on a foundation.
- aminok 10y agoPeople who advocate for "regulations" (authoritarian prohibitions on voluntary action and interaction by and between consenting adults) should be characterized as what they are: human rights violators who would imprison innocent people.
- snrplfth 10y agoBut they don't think of themselves that way, often because it's easy to smuggle in an indefinite number of rules under the cloak of good intentions. "It's dangerous to allow buildings that are fire hazards, since fires spread fast in cities! People are in danger, we need rules." "True, let's have a rule about that." "Also some houses are unhygienic and don't have enough light and air. Let's ban all buildings that don't have enough of those." "I guess so, if it's for health..." "Actually, let's just ban all new housing that is not up to our extremely expensive and specific standards, arbitrarily set by unaccountable bodies, and capriciously enforced." "Wait, but why?" "You know, to keep people from dying in fires. Why do you hate fire safety?"
- fizixer 10y agoNeed minor clarification, is it really that an inspector typically wants such a house torn down or is there some paperwork that needs inspector's signature and the inspector refuses to sign it? If it's the latter then it should be straightforward. Home-owner lives in the house without a certain certificate of approval and when it's time to sell, they can't produce one, hence no one buys that house. Isn't it more about incomplete paperwork making it difficult to sell, and if the home-owner doesn't plan to sell it, they can get on with their life without worrying about it? (In this specific case, I'm guessing some personal issues may have occurred between the inspector and the home-owner that led to the inspector getting seriously pissed off and making it their mission to tear down the house?)
- DanBC 10y agoI think (but I could be wrong, I'm going off England here) it makes buildings insurance harder, and that's one of the insurances you really need.
- scaryspooky 10y agoTypically what happens is you get sued in civil court by the government. If you lose you will be required to tear down the structure. If you don't comply it will then become a case where the government tears it down and files a lein on the property to recoup the costs. Failure to pay this lein will result in foreclosure and seizure by the government. Obviously defying a court order can wind up with contempt of court where you then can serve jail time, but the general process is civil.
- Gravityloss 10y agoWith aircraft, there's various certifications within weight and/or speed categories, but also experimentals, where usually some calculations and an inspector are needed. The inspector is not a bureaucrat, but someone with substance expertise, usually someone who has built aircraft themselves. That said, there are a lot of odd regulations in aircraft in aöl countries...
- jimnotgym 10y agoI worked in construction in the UK for a good few years and hold some qualifications in this area so maybe I can add some meat to this. 1) Timber just missing a stamp...So timber used for structural work is stress graded. That is it is either bent by a machine which checked how far it deflected or it is visually graded by a qualified grader. Someone who mills their own timber could have employed a grader to do this, and it is not really a barrier. However construction timber must also be seasoned which adds strength and removes moisture which if trapped in can cause fungal rot. In the UK and for the timber we import from Canada (CLS Canadian Lumber Standard) this is normally achieved with a kiln drying process, which conveniently kills insects living in it too. It is hard to see how he achieved that. Timber in the UK used for roof members has to also be treated with wood preserver. It is rather more than just a stamp! I will add that a home mill comes with a lot of overhead and it is not clear that it wouldn't be cheaper to buy the timber, especially when you consider the better dimensional tolerance of machine regularized timber. 2) The building code is relatively strict in the UK but poorly enforced. This in the main is due to their not being enough inspections of the finished structure behind the drywall (plasterboard as we call it), especially when it comes to insulation/vapour barriers/noggins/metal straps etc. Some of the private building inspector schemes seem to be far to chummy with the builders. 3) When building something like a roof truss 'the way they used to in the 1960's' ie, not from approved plans, in general running the designs past a structural engineer will get you approval. This will cost you, but that is the cost of varying from the tried and tested. Same as if Geohot wants to build a self driving car he is going to have to demonstrate the safety himself. 4) There should be no exception for self build unless there is a covenant that the building is pulled down upon you leaving it. I would also suggest that you should have to post a bond to pay for the cleanup work. Otherwise the naive builder could be passing on a death trap. Likewise, the buildings around you rely on you doing your bit for fire prevention. The Fire-fighters who may have to go in and save people from your house should be able to rely that the fire barriers are properly in place etc... 5) Buildings are much more complex in the way they live and breath and the ergonomics they offer than what a lot of people give them credit for. You may curse that there is a regulation for the height of a light switch...until you are in a wheelchair. Keeping an insulated house dry, especially at the interface of cold warm air, is much more complex than grandpa's old log cabin. 6) The house I rent was 'done up' by DIY buy-to-let guy. He didn't see fit to run his electrical cables straight up or down from sockets so I can't even hang a picture for fear of nailing a cable. The drains block from the shower and sink as their is insufficient fall. The stair spindles are over 100mm apart and shouldn't be (this rule stops children from being strangled because they can't fit their heads in the gap). All of the doors have been hung without leading edges, so they catch when you shut them...All this stuff is stuff DIYers are not going to pick up from youtube. Personally I think the rules should be tougher and DIYers shoudl stick to painting and building sheds
- internaut 10y agoIf you would like to have a positive story this Christmas, then for Tiny Housers we had some Building Codes people formally include us into their thing. In the future it will be legal to live in Tiny Houses. http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/green-building-news/tiny-houses-join-building-code http://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/blogs/dept/green-buildin...
- hiddencost 10y agoThe fact that a basically empty "forwards from grandma" anecdote like this is what rises to the level of notable should hopefully cause you to question the community here? [hint: ask the question "what do we see when we look at rigorous studies of the effects of building codes", not "what can I conclude from one story with a very heavy slant, about one person in Canada", when you're trying to understand the effects of policy.]
- tomohawk 10y agoBuilding codes specify minimal acceptable standards. If you want quality, you're not going to get it through building codes adopted by government. What I've typically seen with inspectors is that if it looks cookie cutter and they know the outfit that did the work, they rarely inspect for realsies. I've seen 2x3 walls holding up a second story. By a known builder, in a very affluent county with a notoriously rigorous enforcement regime. Another issue: Building codes are also put together by private groups, then adopted into model laws by various jurisdictions. Even though it is not supposed to be possible to copyright law, this practice dodges those restrictions. You end up having to pay quite a bit of money for these codes.
- scaryspooky 10y agoThe Internet has solved the problem of paying for a copy of codes. Luckily.
- solidsnack9000 10y ago> Building codes are also put together by private groups, then adopted into model laws by various jurisdictions. Even though it is not supposed to be possible to copyright law, this practice dodges those restrictions. You end up having to pay quite a bit of money for these codes. How does this work in detail? Once the law is adopted would it not be uncopyrightable?
- sfont 10y agoAn example would be water heater must be installed with clearance meeting standards as specified in NFPA 3.1.6 (made up number). You still have to get the documentation from the private group. It is much easier to get access to those now, I did have to register an account and I believe I was limited on the number of codes I could view, but I only needed to view one so it was a non-issue.
- perseusprime11 10y ago"a cautionary tale of the tremendous power of the state over the individual in an age of pervasive bureaucracy. It is, indeed, a profound parable of irretrievably lost independence and casually forgotten freedoms." Isn't this every aspect of government?
- euske 10y agoJust food for thoughts: Software is like buildings. So, an analogy that I drew from this story is that in future it might be illegal to make your own software and let some others use it. I can imagine that you'd have to pass some sort of certification tests when rolling out your crypto code or operating system. Whether or not such tests can really work, is this the future that we really want? I have mixed feelings on this.
- malydok 10y agoMost software doesn't have a potential to kill people. And if it does it sure is certified.
- oldmancoyote 10y agoI have built three houses (designed and served as my own contractor). My homes were stylish, innovative, and a delight to live in. I'm a scientist not a builder, yet I did not find the building codes to be a burden. Indeed they kept me from making dangerous mistakes. It's a complicated world and the building codes made designing and building a home practical.
- malydok 10y agoCan you recommend any ways to get into house building? Books, articles, general information. The codes probably vastly vary between countries, but I assume the fundamentals remain the same. Thanks.
- cm2187 10y agoThis is the future of software development. We are reaching the limits where any DIY amateur can build their own website and collect sensitive data, for them to be leaked within months because they have never heard of SQL injection vulnerabilities. That will be a pain to software developers, but will give some comfort to the business that the developers they hire will not fuck it up completely. Exactly like today these bureaucratic building regulations are the only things protecting unsuspecting buyers from unscrupulous or incompetent house builders.