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I built my house for materials cost. You can absolutely most definitely do it for nothing but material cost. My community is also all private roads with easemen

by tk6855 1y ago

I built my house for materials cost. You can absolutely most definitely do it for nothing but material cost. My community is also all private roads with easements, so no public development costs of roads. I built mine with an axe and a shovel. As always the solution is to remove the government from the situation -- with private roads, private water, private septic, and private power there is no one to screech their deranged ramblings on why we need 1,000,000 safety regulations and $30,000 worth of paperwork and permitting to break ground because their precious public resources will be impacted. $60k for a house, near jobs, USA. Anybody with half a brain and a little brawn can do what I did, if they can come up with what would be a down-payment on a house in a coastal area. Although I admit, it would be much easier for most just to whine on the internet while watching others do what they say is impossible .

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago
> You can absolutely most definitely do it for nothing but material cost. > $60k for a house Where did you build the house? Presuming it's on land you own, how did you come to own the land? If you purchased it, the purchase amount should be included in the cost. If you did not purchase it, consider how lucky you are. Edit to reply to the dead reply: I do see the context of this being on already-owned land so my point is moot. Apologies for that. (For what it's worth, I'm not really convinced by the fact that you can get free land where nobody wants to live but that's another matter.)
- tk6855 1y ago
  [dead]
gamblor956 1y ago
Private water works well until the well dries up. It's hitting a lot of homesteaders in the Coachella Valley (CA) and in Arizona right now. And people discover why CA's building codes are so onerous after the first earthquake knocks over their self-built house. Homes and offices built to current codes are designed to survive a Ritcher 7.0 earthquake with minimal to no damage. People don't even get out of bed for anything below a Ritcher 5. According to Caltech's earthquake tracker (https://scedc.caltech.edu/recent/Maps/Los_Angeles.html https://scedc.caltech.edu/recent/Maps/Los_Angeles.html, L.A. has had almost 3 dozen earthquakes in the last 3 days alone (the biggest was a 2.8)...and nobody noticed. (For comparison, a 5.x earthquake caused several billions in damage in Washington D.C.; comparable earthquakes have caused so little damage in SoCal it's impossible to find numbers. Fracking-related 2.x earthquakes have caused hundreds of millions in damage in the Midwest, but in L.A., even pets sleep through something that weak.)
- sir0010010 1y ago
  Have you done research and found that the majority of the excess cost of constructing California homes is due to the specific regulations dealing with earthquakes? Are you sure there aren't other regulations and/or building codes there that have nothing to do with earthquakes or health/safety, yet massively impact the cost of homes in California?
  - rstuart4133 1y ago
    People love to blame regulations. I live in a bushfire, cyclone and flood prone part of Australia. We have lots of regulations. For example a category 5 cyclone recent hit us, but no one overly concerned because it is a new area, and if you live in a cyclone area your house must be able to withstand 300 km/h winds. If you live in a bushfire area, you are required to have 20,000 litres of water on hand at all times. If you live in near a freeway, you are required to have 14mm glass to dampen the sound. As it happens, I am building a house now, and an subject to all those regulations. It added maybe 10% to the total. But in real terms housing price has gone up far that that more since the 1970's. Why? The reason is fairly mundane really: https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/new-us-homes-today-are-1000-square-feet-larger-than-in-1973-and-living-space-per-person-has-nearly-doubled/ https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/new-us-homes-today-are-1000-s... Combine that with modern houses being air-conditioned, need to garage 2 cars, have stone benches and multiple TV's (none of which are mandated by regulation), and you get to the real reason. It has nothing to do with the regulations, yet people blame it anyway. We just need to build affordable housing. You would think given there is a demand for it, capitalism would make it happen. Yet it isn't happening. If you want to blame the government for something, not putting the regulations in place to create a market place to ensure it does happen would where I'd be looking. I doubt they would have much to do with reducing building safety, or opening up unsuitable land, and more to do with somehow arranging the financing so that it becomes attractive to build smaller, plain, boring looking cookie cutter houses.
    - sir0010010 1y ago
      "If you want to blame the government for something..." * 88% of California jurisdictions have a minimum lot size of 5,000 sq ft or more * Prior to 2024, jurisdictions in California required a minimum of two spots per single family home, or one to two spots per unit in a multifamily. California created a law to address this in 2024, but jurisdictions in most states still have similar requirements. * Most jurisdictions in the US have restrictions around density - many only allowing single family homes or strictly limiting the number of multifamily units. Other countries, including Australia, have similar restrictions. Google says the cost of adding central AC to a home is between $7k and $12k, so likely not a primary driver of the increase in cost of housing. "Multiple TVs" are definitely not a significant driver in increased housing costs.

by tk6855 1y ago

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 1y ago

> You can absolutely most definitely do it for nothing but material cost. > $60k for a house Where did you build the house? Presuming it's on land you own, how did you come to own the land? If you purchased it, the purchase amount should be included in the cost. If you did not purchase it, consider how lucky you are. Edit to reply to the dead reply: I do see the context of this being on already-owned land so my point is moot. Apologies for that. (For what it's worth, I'm not really convinced by the fact that you can get free land where nobody wants to live but that's another matter.)

tk6855 1y ago
[dead]

gamblor956 1y ago

Private water works well until the well dries up. It's hitting a lot of homesteaders in the Coachella Valley (CA) and in Arizona right now. And people discover why CA's building codes are so onerous after the first earthquake knocks over their self-built house. Homes and offices built to current codes are designed to survive a Ritcher 7.0 earthquake with minimal to no damage. People don't even get out of bed for anything below a Ritcher 5. According to Caltech's earthquake tracker (https://scedc.caltech.edu/recent/Maps/Los_Angeles.html https://scedc.caltech.edu/recent/Maps/Los_Angeles.html, L.A. has had almost 3 dozen earthquakes in the last 3 days alone (the biggest was a 2.8)...and nobody noticed. (For comparison, a 5.x earthquake caused several billions in damage in Washington D.C.; comparable earthquakes have caused so little damage in SoCal it's impossible to find numbers. Fracking-related 2.x earthquakes have caused hundreds of millions in damage in the Midwest, but in L.A., even pets sleep through something that weak.)

sir0010010 1y ago
Have you done research and found that the majority of the excess cost of constructing California homes is due to the specific regulations dealing with earthquakes? Are you sure there aren't other regulations and/or building codes there that have nothing to do with earthquakes or health/safety, yet massively impact the cost of homes in California?
- rstuart4133 1y ago
  People love to blame regulations. I live in a bushfire, cyclone and flood prone part of Australia. We have lots of regulations. For example a category 5 cyclone recent hit us, but no one overly concerned because it is a new area, and if you live in a cyclone area your house must be able to withstand 300 km/h winds. If you live in a bushfire area, you are required to have 20,000 litres of water on hand at all times. If you live in near a freeway, you are required to have 14mm glass to dampen the sound. As it happens, I am building a house now, and an subject to all those regulations. It added maybe 10% to the total. But in real terms housing price has gone up far that that more since the 1970's. Why? The reason is fairly mundane really: https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/new-us-homes-today-are-1000-square-feet-larger-than-in-1973-and-living-space-per-person-has-nearly-doubled/ https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/new-us-homes-today-are-1000-s... Combine that with modern houses being air-conditioned, need to garage 2 cars, have stone benches and multiple TV's (none of which are mandated by regulation), and you get to the real reason. It has nothing to do with the regulations, yet people blame it anyway. We just need to build affordable housing. You would think given there is a demand for it, capitalism would make it happen. Yet it isn't happening. If you want to blame the government for something, not putting the regulations in place to create a market place to ensure it does happen would where I'd be looking. I doubt they would have much to do with reducing building safety, or opening up unsuitable land, and more to do with somehow arranging the financing so that it becomes attractive to build smaller, plain, boring looking cookie cutter houses.
  - sir0010010 1y ago
    "If you want to blame the government for something..." * 88% of California jurisdictions have a minimum lot size of 5,000 sq ft or more * Prior to 2024, jurisdictions in California required a minimum of two spots per single family home, or one to two spots per unit in a multifamily. California created a law to address this in 2024, but jurisdictions in most states still have similar requirements. * Most jurisdictions in the US have restrictions around density - many only allowing single family homes or strictly limiting the number of multifamily units. Other countries, including Australia, have similar restrictions. Google says the cost of adding central AC to a home is between $7k and $12k, so likely not a primary driver of the increase in cost of housing. "Multiple TVs" are definitely not a significant driver in increased housing costs.