Non-motoring > Self build homes Miscellaneous
Thread Author: Dog Replies: 20
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New Thu 14 Mar 13 22:42 
 Self build homes - Dog
Anyone gorn down that route?

I've often thought about buying a plot of land somewhere and sticking a Norwegian (type) house on it.

I quite like this design too: self-build.co.uk/eco-house-budget in the right location of course.

Someone did post this plot a while back: www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-20390037.html

In my case, it would have to something different though, so that means out in the sticks somewhere.

I wouldn't mind being the first man on Mars as it happens.

^_^
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 00:41 
 Self build homes - Armel Coussine
Straw bales and a lot of plaster Perro? Not as pretty as the container jobs (or some of them) but a bit warmer hey?

No way will any house come in at less than double the initial budget though. That's why there are so many homeless folk what with the cuts and that (he said with a heartless snigger).
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 07:43 
 Self build homes - Tigger
I'd love to live on Tiree half the time, but in the winter there is nothing at all to the west of you for several thousand miles. I remember being able to lean about 30 degrees into the wind and not falling over - the wind was so steady and constant.

My father built his own house just north of Oban. Took about 3 years of working every weekend, plus about 10 x 4 week periods where he worked every day.

I'd been looking to build something very substantial on an exposed plot like that! THe house my father built was a timber frame, with timber outside. Apparently at the time, many people simply rendered the outsides - but given the exposed location we had to have a brick skin added to ours.
Last edited by: Tigger on Fri 15 Mar 13 at 07:45
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 08:34 
 Self build homes - Dog
>>Straw bales and a lot of plaster Perro?

I've often thought I'd like the idea of living in a new build cob type eco-house, I used to walk with Mutley past this goo.gl/maps/azCvM new cob construction and stop to admire the simple way it was built but, I notice with all the heavy rain we've had in the last few years it's starting to crack up :(

>>My father built his own house just north of Oban. Took about 3 years of working every weekend, plus about 10 x 4 week periods where he worked every day<<

He well got stuck into it then Tigger, one can only but admire someone like that, I've often wondered why so many properties are rendered here in Cornwall, but of course it's to keep rain out :) the other way of doing it is to slate the upper elevation and then render the lower area, which looks nice IMO.

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New Fri 15 Mar 13 08:43 
 Self build homes - Dog
Here's a streetview of that cob construction I posted earlier, y'all still can't really see it but, anyone visiting the area could check it out if they were sad enough: goo.gl/maps/ZrEgk
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 08:48 
 Self build homes - Cliff Pope
I'd love to build a house to my own design and methods, but unfortunately planning rules and building regulations nowadays cripple any imaginative building. All the great buildings of the past were built entirely unregulated. (Apart from royal rules limiting the construction of over-fortified castles)

So I am reduced to building follies and such extensions as I feel I can get away with. Oh to have been an eighteenth century squire with a good fortune.
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 09:01 
 Self build homes - CGNorwich
"but unfortunately planning rules and building regulations nowadays cripple any imaginative building. All the great buildings of the past were built entirely unregulated. (Apart from royal rules limiting the construction of over-fortified castles)"

True of course but you have to remember that only the decent buildings from the past tend to have survived. Most buildings, especially those that the workers live in would have been pretty awful. Regulation and planning is not necessarily a bad thing.
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 09:16 
 Self build homes - Fenlander
I've always enjoyed constructing timber buildings. Around 20yrs ago I built stables, hay barn and tack store that covered the area of a 2bed retirement bungalow. Not long after a similar setup with larger stables plus a workshop that you could drive a tractor with cab into.

20yrs on they are all still standing completely snug and weathertight.

We've often commented how small a step it would be to make them living space. A smooth top screed on the floor plus wall/roof insulation slabs then lining on top of that and you're sorted.

Home planned every time... sometimes designed on the fly. My standard build is 4"x4" or 5"x5" corner posts and door frames, 3"x 3" interim wall uprights, 3" x 2" horizontal timber and 4" x 2" roof joists reinforced by 8" x 2" joist on a longer span.

On the fen all the corner posts, door frames etc had to go in the ground about a yard to sit on concrete pads directly on the silty clay subsoil.... the top peat layer couldn't support anything.

Given all that up now but huge satisfaction at the time standing inside something where every nail and screw was your own work.
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 09:55 
 Self build homes - Robin O'Reliant
>> Given all that up now but huge satisfaction at the time standing inside something where
>> every nail and screw was your own work.
>>

In my case, that would worry me...
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 10:09 
 Self build homes - Falkirk Bairn
Getting a reasonable plot in a reasonable area is the key to success /failure.

Locally a developer bought a large plot, put in the basic roads/services and sold off the 1/10th acre plots @ £100K................12 years later the streets are still the base road metal and unmade paths etc.

The houses are larger than average and look, on the face of it, pretty good............but when will the estate be finished...if ever!

Always houses for sale but the lack of the finishing of the estate makes sales slow and the house are cheap!
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 10:55 
 Self build homes - Dutchie
Can be done Fenlander but the powers to be rather have people paying a mortgage for more than twenty years paying back interest .Builders buy bits of land and cram as many houses in as they can get away with.Build houses to minimum standard and maximum price.>:)
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 10:50 
 Self build homes - Dutchie
It's finding land for a reasonable price that is the problem.They used to say every third house a builder builds is profit.A program on the television the other day a couple in Dublin had a massive house build from concrete blocks.The chap was a architect and his wife helped him to manage the project.

They had every tradesmen working together and all on time.Finished project a fantastic house for 350000 pound.Which is still a lot of money of course.

A few of the lads I knew got land cheap and done the self build route.
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 11:42 
 Self build homes - Dog
How does Diane feel about going down the self build route Dutchie?

There are building plots for sale in many areas of the UK and I feel sure that planning departments are less strict in some areas as they are in others.

But then I suppose in your case you would be considering a common or garden bungalow, faced with stone,
or rendered.

A builder I bought a small converted barn from in the mid 90's built 6 fine stone faced & slated houses up on the Bodmin Moor, I well remember one plot he bought, it had planning permission for one bungalow, he bought the plot then submitted a new application for 2 x 4 bedroom houses - and got it!

He once said to me he can often see an opportunity where others maybe cannot ...

Decide for yourself: goo.gl/maps/9VmYU
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 13:27 
 Self build homes - Dutchie
Its funny she is in charge Dog but she leaves it up to me >:)

I know a good builder he is always busy do.Had a look at a few websites of timber framed bungalows one was build in less than a month.
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 13:30 
 Self build homes - Dog
>>Its funny she is in charge Dog but she leaves it up to me >:)

Nothing new there then ;)

>>I know a good builder he is always busy do

Possibly because he's good :-))
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 12:05 
 Self build homes - Mapmaker
>>.They used to say every third house a builder builds is profit.

I should hope so. The profit takes several years to arrive, there is a significant equity requirement - you won't get a loan to buy development land, and there is real risk that the world looks completely different by the time you have your property available to sell.

If you think it's a massive profit, then buy Taylor Wimpey shares (or equivalent).
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 13:20 
 Self build homes - Dutchie
I don't mind builders having a profit but houses could be build cheaper.We have a shortage of housing and far to many old and derelict properties.There must be another way to free more land and skyhigh cost.Live isn't all about shares is it?
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 13:49 
 Self build homes - CGNorwich
".There must be another way to free more land "

Easy. Abolish green belt land and loosen planning restrictions. Prices would rapidly tumble but you might not like the consequences. Depends what your priorities are.
Last edited by: CGNorwich on Fri 15 Mar 13 at 13:49
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 13:51 
 Self build homes - Dog
This is another property built by the chap I mentioned earlier: goo.gl/maps/eb0eR
The original olde cottage went up in smoke :(

My small barn conversion was built in exactly the same style = mellow stone, reclaimed Cornish slate,
Thermalite block, insulated cavity, cheapo John Carr wood windows, stained dark to look like hardwood :)
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 14:01 
 Self build homes - Armel Coussine
>> houses could be build cheaper.We have a shortage of housing and far to many old and derelict properties.There must be another way to free more land and skyhigh cost.Live isn't all about shares is it?

The only reason governments are so keen on building new houses all the time is to suck up to land speculators and big building contractors. Restoring and modernising old and derelict buildings, perhaps not the worst back-to-back hovels but certainly the very large numbers of neglected Victorian houses, would work out cheaper in the end and wouldn't threaten to turn the whole country into a housing estate quite so soon. It would also encourage real building and decorating skills in young workers, being labour-intensive, instead of the whack-it-up, cheap (except financially) and usually very ill-proportioned new stuff which encourages slapdash work.

Rooms of a decent size and with decent proportions are good for the soul. Horrid little rectangular low-ceilinged cells are bad for it. Our old gaff in London was far nicer in this way than where we live now. You win some you lose some.
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New Fri 15 Mar 13 14:10 
 Self build homes - Cliff Pope
If they really wanted to encourage the building of new houses then they should relax the rules on doing up any existing building, however derelict, as long as it is self-build.

I believe there is a scheme in Holland where all the rules have been scrapped, and DIYers can basically build anything they like. There is a friendly council adviser who discusses people's ideas and offers help and suggestions, but otherwise there is no regulation.

If you combined that with a rule that gave anyone a right to claim a plot of unused brownfield land as long as they built a house on it, it might mobilise unemployed and people on low incomes to invest their time in something worthwhile and self-fullfilling.
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