House building

[Clay Showalter]

I am starting this thread to share the joys, and frustrations of being the GC in new home build.
Last year we bought 11 ac that is on a lake, but the buffer is large enough that you can’t see the lake, you also can’t access the lake.

Then you might being saying why the hell did you buy it? Well to one side is 36 ac that the water authority owns, so there will not only be no building, there wil not even be any trees cut on it.

They own another 15 ac that wraps around us, so it is really like having close to 50 acs that we ca hike on, bike in, just no power vehicles or water access. Our house is going to be in the edge of a 1 af field, about 2000’ feed down a drive way.

We are building a 1.5 story log cabin, this has been a goal since we got married 26 years ago and it happening. The loan is done, the money there to be drawn on as needed.

The power was run under ground to the site.

The well was dug yesterday, 320 ft 50 gpm.

Grading to start in a few weeks to get basement set and builder can do the dry in.

We will be doing all finish work, plumbing, electrical, etc.

Here is the lot

Any comments, criticism, suggestions, 4are all welcome om.

 

[Spencie]

Very cool. I will be following along as we are in the very beginning processes of building a home on the 100 acres we bought in January. Our driveway will also be about 2000 feet.

 

[Dustinb80]

Good luck guys. Looking forward to updates.

 

[5Cent]

Looks like a great area and piece of land Clay, look forward to following along.

For the cabin, did you go custom or a kit? Round or square? Why type of joints and what's required in the joints for sealing/insulation (i.e. pad or chinking)?

 

[MoonLab]

Hell yeah. Good luck. Looking forward to it

 

[Mike]

What a dream. Best of luck!

 

["J"]

Awesome adventure coming your way, both satisfying and frustrating at times.... Loki g forward too your progression....
One question, is the property to the left also water authority as well?

 

[Clay Showalter]

Looks like a great area and piece of land Clay, look forward to following along.

For the cabin, did you go custom or a kit? Round or square? Why type of joints and what's required in the joints for sealing/insulation (i.e. pad or chinking)?

Not a kit, after a year a research I would never do a kit per say. We designed the home and are using a builder who only builds log cabins and has been doing so for 25 years. He is a distributor for loghomesofamerica.com, they are a supplier, he is doing the dry in from the basement walls to the felt paper; all exterior doors and windows and interior framing.

We are using 6x8 White Pine D logs, which are milled logs; round on the outside, flat on the inside, with dovetail corners. The logs have a tongue and groove milled into them and are sealed with Butyl log sealant tape. Also this is a heavy timber log hybrid. The roof and porch system are heavy timber 4x8 rafters and large ridge beam.

Now why not a kit? They sell you everything, there is no need to buy dimensional lumber and have to pay for shipping when you can get it right near you. Kit companies deliver everything at once, dump it in the ground and want their money right then. They offer no engineering, which is often needed to pass inspection, now they do precut logs and give you instructions to do it yourself.

Our builder has the supplies sent as needed and nothing will ever be sitting in the ground.

Now all that being said against log kits, I did find one out of Wisconsin that I like, they seem to be good and offer engineering.

 

[Clay Showalter]

Awesome adventure coming your way, both satisfying and frustrating at times.... Loki g forward too your progression....
One question, is the property to the left also water authority as well?View attachment 77996

No that is our neighbor, but his house is up at the road, nice people. When you get back to the field you can’t see their house.

 

[5Cent]

Very cool Clay!

 

[OhioWhiteTails]

Very nice! I look forward to the updates on this project. Congrats!

 

[Bowkills]

Following.

 

[Isaacorps]

Congrats! Looks like a great spot...

 

[giles]

I have a driveway around 2,000’ now and it’s a constant battle. Be sure to put it in correctly! Also be sure that everyone traveling on it idles up and down it. Slower is better for the longevity of it staying smooth. I’m talking 5 mph kind of slow, creeping. My driveway being shared sees a ton of traffic.

With that being said, I’d blacktop it if you have the budget.

As far as the build, I’m following as I’d like to do the same some day.

Flooding area?

 

[Clay Showalter]

I have a driveway around 2,000’ now and it’s a constant battle. Be sure to put it in correctly! Also be sure that everyone traveling on it idles up and down it. Slower is better for the longevity of it staying smooth. I’m talking 5 mph kind of slow, creeping. My driveway being shared sees a ton of traffic.

With that being said, I’d blacktop it if you have the budget.

As far as the build, I’m following as I’d like to do the same some day.

Flooding area?

No issues with flooding we are about 50’ higher than the lake, plus flooding around lakes is rare here with our hilly elevation.

Yea we want to blacktop at some point. The nice thing is the driveway used to a road to something down in the bottom, I found it on the 1923 soils map, it has nice ditches and a good gravel base.

 

[Clay Showalter]

I simple square house, about 2200 sqft and full daylight basement.

 

[Qback5]

Awesome! I’ll be following too. We break ground next week on a 5 ac parcel we picked up at auction a year ago. Good luck to you and Spencie!

 

[Clay Showalter]

Awesome! I’ll be following too. We break ground next week on a 5 ac parcel we picked up at auction a year ago. Good luck to you and Spencie!

All the best to you and your construction project

 

[Clay Showalter]

Very cool. I will be following along as we are in the very beginning processes of building a home on the 100 acres we bought in January. Our driveway will also be about 2000 feet.

My advice is take your time if you can and research, research, plan, plan. Then go back and plan some more, we put off building for a year and I am glad we did, it allowed us to do more research on floor plans etc.

We designed our house, I drew it and bet I made 50 changes, then it went to the designer that draws for the log company and she made some adjustments. I hope this week to get the final plans back to sign off on

 

[hickslawns]

Looks perfect to me Clay! Perfect size. In a few years it will feel too big. Few more years it will start filling with grandkids and be perfect for the kids to come home to on the holidays. You guys are doing it right! I'm not "jealous" but I'd be happy with a similar setup some day. Happy for you.