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Rick,
You might not have heard of it, but Arvi Freedman at McGill university has developed (with other designers) what they call the “Grow Home”, which is intended for the market between “standard” housing and Habitat. I don’t have a site offhand, but you should try McGill university’s site. If you can’t find anything, email me in a week and I will get back to you.
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Hello again
Thanks to all who responded. I have been tossing around the idea of building "afordable housing"
For first time home buyers in my area . I am a carpenter though I do mostly remodeling ,I prefer new construction. I experimented with a presure treated foundation addition to my own house,they use gravel for footings . , I worked in the arctic -Barrow Alaska most of the buildings up there are built on pilings .I guess a slab house might be cheapest. I can build them but I am not real good at prices.I do alot of my own work from building cabinets to concrete work.I would like to hear from others on their ideas and experiences. I once worked for a guy in New Hampshire who was building small home/cotages in the early 70's He called them expansion mansions(I guess like "Grow Homes" -I will search for that web site and check it out. The expansion mansions were small but designed to be added on to as one could aford it .Land and utilities are a big one .What about options like incinerator toilets vrs. septic sewer systems.I talked to a plumber who had al grey water in a home in Nevada diverted to a tank used to water a lawn in Nevada.Said the guy had the best lawn around.
I would apreciate your insight and feed back.
*Rick,Please do not equate affordable housing with cheap construction. The two ideas are actually contradictory. Housing like other buildings must be built well and built to last a long time in order to be truly affordable. The actual cost of owning a house is far greater than the initial construction cost and many cost cheapening measures actually increase the cost of owning a house over the long run. The three largest costs of ownership are 1. The cost of the money that you borrowed, 2. The costs of maintenance and repairs over the life of the building and 3. The costs of utilities when living in the building.If you really want affordable housing, you must do some of the following: 1. Help people build it themselves with a minimum amount of borrowed money or find money that is very low cost.2. Find lower cost or free land, such as from a land trust or a co-operative form of land ownership.3. Build smaller homes that can be expanded over time as the family changes.4. Build buildings with the intention that they will last at least 100 years.5. Build buildings that are energy and water efficient.6. Find good quality buildings that can be recycled into housing.7. Build buildings are are flexible enough to change over time. My parents house was built in 1950 with a veteran's loan for $20,000 with construction help from family and neighbors. They've remodeled it more than 10 times as the family changed. They still live there and haven't had a mortgage in 20 years. That's good quality affordable housing.
*David,It's a refreshing pleasure to hear from someone out there that really understands just exactly what affordable housing is.I always try to educate my cleints on the subject and will always try to avoid situations where clients insist on making compromises in quality so that they can afford that whirlpool tub like the neighbors have. I think you will understand what I mean.Wayne
*This is not exactly what I had in mind.This is an actual house in the Arctic.Again I apreciate all the feed back .I don't think I meant shoddy .Dave your points are well taken .I personaly bought a 2500 aproximate Victorian house built in 1899 for less than $19,000 It has most of the original woodwork 2 full baths and central air.There was no storm cellar and the back porch was in rough shape so I tore it of and dug down and added on a 16 x 20 foot addition with a full basement underneath using presure treated 2x6's with presure treated ply .80 .The footings are gravel . It has been a very wet year except the last few weeks . I think it will last a long time. Time will tell . I personaly do not like being in debt . So i do my own stuff as i can afford it. I helped frame an all wood school (80,000 plus square feet) in the Arctic it was about a $30,000,000 project built on 12x12's fir pilings sunk in the ground about 27 feet.greased and wrapped 3 times with visqueen . I just framed a house that sold before we were done for about $140,000.It was a spec house i framed it for another company who sold it . I would like to get into building and selling my own. I believe the proverb a good name is better than riches ,so I am not saying shoddy . More costly does not always mean better.I am into practicality. I helped build a timber frame home and I do not think it is a practical house unless you have lots of money and a lot of friends who would like to donate a couple of weeks just to get the frame cut whatever the lingo is. Thus framing with 2x4's is much more practical ,and you can do it your self with less friends. Or workers .I know helping build one timber frame far from makes me an expert but i do know it is more technical harder to lift without a crane . I also would like to build a new home in the next couple of years after i am finished with the house I am living in now .If the economy holds out,(no gaurantee)I should be able to make a decent profit on the house I own now. So i don't have to be in hock to a bank.So if things slow up they can't throw me out. I think about how i would build my house .I have almost 11 Acres in New Hampshire there is a lot of ganite on my land . I wonder what the advantages are to going down ie, a full foundation or building on pilings vrs. a crawl space ,Cost efective.Pardon my ramblings I am a subsriber to FHB and JLC because I am always looking for better ways to do what i do . I appreciate the imput.Rick
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Yeah, i appreciate how hard it must be to run a site, and i certainly don't mind painting, but I tell you this was some of my worst work. The sun made the paint dry is about 5 minutes. Next time I'll bring my own brush. They'd said they were drywalling that day and I brought tools for that; but when i asked, the guy said, oh, volunteers would just mess that up.
But of course I'll try again. And be braver to say that I can do more difficult things competently. This guy was an a**hole, but I guess he was needed or someone else might have been in charge.
$15-20k for a small lot! Here an eighth of an acre would be about $100k, and this is relatively inexpensive.
*Andrew:$100K lots!!! Where is here? Kinda shoots the whole "affordable housing" idea in the foot! - unless everybody is making $80k a year.
*Arlington VA. But there is a 6-home HFH development about a mile from my house on about an acre. Don't know where the land came from, but they are using it very efficiently. There is a pretty good spread of income levels in the county; the really expensive stuff is rather from the city in Fairfax Cty, which i've heard has the highest per capita income in the US (unconfirmed).location, location, location You get numb to whatever local prices are after a while, even I hear in the Silicon Valley where an unremarkable 2-br. townhouse goes for $400k. "Affordable" depends on what other people are making, they can drive prices up in a jiffy.
*Andrew:I grew up in that area (Fairfax Co.). Moved to Raleigh NC about 5 years ago. I miss all my friends up there, I just don't miss all those people I don't know! It's a great area if you are in the remodeling business. My good buddy is a super for a design/build/remodel co up there that routinely does $150k - $250k additions! The building business is hot here too, but the pay isn't as good.
*Agreed. Since I'm not fulltime I'm doing fine picking up the crumbs (under $10k!) that GC's don't even return calls for. A half dozen houses within a few blocks have had $100k+ "remodels" -- and on a small lot that means knock down everything but a post or two and rebuild (avoiding some of the red tape for "new construction"). The rate of construction here is astonishing -- where are all these people coming from?Maybe joining you soon in NC, ad
*Witold Rybczynski was also part of the Grow House project. I once heard him speak at a forum on low cost housing. It was his contention, that there are only three ways to reduce the cost of housing. Reduce size, reduce complexity, or reduce quality. The Grow Houses reduced size and complexity. Often the second story was left unfinished -- hence the "grow" in the name. Also, participating in that forum were architects from the third world. It seems clear that we have raised the bar of minimum standards very high in terms of housing cost, perhaps not without reason. We talk of affordable housing and not low cost housing. In this country it's ok to live in a car but not in a shack. The homeless are really houseless. We are caught in the dilema of energy conservation. The easiest way to reduce housing cost is to make the envelope less expensive.People can live in tents. The problem with this is that as soon as we lete people live in tents, they are going to heat them with portable electric heaters. These issues are not so cloudy in parts of the world where the concern is for shelter. The issue of affordable housing is as much one of land use as it is of construction. Real estate is a valuable commodity, and the supply is limited. Growth is a matter of public policy, and vested economic interests promote growth. Growth is directly connected to maximum profits, and affordability does not directly fit in. The economics of real estate dictate minimum standards, too. You can devalue property by underbuiling. Technology has done little to address housing costs. The products go to where the demand is, not the demand by numbers but by dollars. So we get products like vinyl siding, pergo and cultured stone, that allow the middle class to make their houses look like something they aren't, rather than products that could reduce the bottom line on housing costs.
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>$100K lots!!! Where is here?
I don't know where the "here" the previous writer is refering to but "here" could be Silicon Valley California where $300K+ for a 1500sf house on a 4000sf lot is considered cheap.
>unless everybody is making $80k a year
Not everybody but wages are kinda high here and most of the high rollers use stock options to buy their $1M+ homes for cash.
"Affordable housing" here is 80+ miles from work. And yes, lots of people do it. As for me, I live *only* 40 miles from work and my house (3K sf on a 8K sf lot) was almost $400K a couple years ago (worth almost $500K now, I hear).
Jeff
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Hey, you forgot to mention the horrible traffic!!
Anyone notice how out there they refer to lot size by the sf, not acre?
My sympathies. My best friend abandoned me on the East Coast to move there, and has been whining about the costs and traffic ever since. (But he loves the weather.)
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I would love to hear from some of the experts on building (decent) but low cost housing.
*Try eskimo.com! ;} Just kidding!-John
*Hi Rick:I donate a significant amount of my time to Habitat for Humanity. Their mission is to build decent, low-cost housing for the working poor. One of the reasons that I enjoy HFH is that one of their mottos is "a hand up, not a hand out".Typically, the houses are between 800 and 1200 sq ft and cost the new home owner between $50,000 and $60,000. HFH provides an interest free loan. The home owners get the house at cost which includes materials and costs of non volunteer labor which generally includes footers, masons, plumbers, electricians, HVAC and drywall. I would estimate that these type of houses would sell for $75k - $90k if purchased from a regular commercial builder in this area.The houses we build here in NC are single level houses build on crawl spaces - I've heard that some of our neighboring counties build on slabs. Roofing is asphalt 3 tab shingles and siding is vinyl. Each house has a small front porch, 2 - 4 bedrooms, 1 or 2 baths, an kitchen, eating area, living room, and a shed. Unfortunately, I'm not sure this type of housing is consistent with this site - Fine Home Building. One of the problems we have at HFH is finding skilled volunteers to help with (lead) the building process. It seems to follow that people who build Monday - Friday, 8 hrs a day don't want to do it Saturday (or any other day) for free.
*Rick,You might not have heard of it, but Arvi Freedman at McGill university has developed (with other designers) what they call the "Grow Home", which is intended for the market between "standard" housing and Habitat. I don't have a site offhand, but you should try McGill university's site. If you can't find anything, email me in a week and I will get back to you.
*How helpful are the volunteers? i realize they are basically unskilled laborers, plus people with a hoddepodge of experience that must be difficult to sort through. I did volunteer at a Habitat site a couple of months ago and was discouraged when I was handed a paintbrush. It wasn't so bad to be asked to paint, it was the dictatorial a**h*le who handed it to me that was the problem. His painting instructions were specific and unusual: the primer had to be sanded with 80 grit before painting; the dark green paint had to cover in one coat; I had to use a sash brush to paint wide flat trim; it was required to paint in direct sunlight on a warm day; and a spot of paint on the siding required repainting the entire wall.Ok, this obviously was a person problem, but how do you ask to be, um, reassigned to real work? I decided to help out a neighbor as volunteer work instead. Anyway, do the volunteers save significant costs, or are they more a part of raising public awareness and ... funds?Back to affordable housing. I heard someone call into a program on the devastation in Kosovo proposing they use an all-concrete design that would cost $600 a dwelling...
*Andrew:Running a Habitat site is difficult. Many different types of people show up and there is no way to instantly recognize who is skilled and who is not. "Hi, I wana' be a carpenter... hammer? tape measure? pencil? can I borrow yours?" Since most volunteers are unskilled that is often the first assumption. On the other hand a sharp project manager is always on the lookout for folks that can add more to the project than the average person. A good project manager surrounds himself with quality people, and finds tasks for all people that is appropriate for their skill level. As far as the a-hole you referred to, part of his attitude probably stemmed from seeing so many things go wrong, and the unskilled folks didn't even realize that their product was unsuitable.Part of the volunteer attitude should be that I am not too good to do most anything - even painting. I can't tell you how many hours I've spent at HFH wearing a tool belt and digging footers to correct someone else's mistake, installing insulation on my back in a crawl space, etc. I've also built stair rails that I'm proud of, and did kitchen installs that came out great!The payback is that I have had some of the most positive feedback from the HFH homeowners of anywhere in my life. These people are thrilled to get a house, and anyone who makes a significant contribution is a saint in their eyes. (OK, so I got a lot of sinning to make up for)! A lot of people will only "donate" their time to someone who has the means to return the favor. Many other people are so wound up with their own family and own lives, they would not even consider helping out a stranger in a significant way. Also, I've seen some pretty cute women wearing tool belts at HFH!As far as your question "do the volunteers save significant costs, or are they more a part of raising public awareness and ... funds? " Do you thing you can build a turn key house for $50 a square ft including land, materials and labor? Small lots with utilities typically cost $15k - $20k in this area.Even for a small house such as these, what would the labor bills be for framing, roofing, siding & exterior trim, insulation, interior trim, paint, and finish grade be? On occasion we also get masons, plumbers, electricians, and some of us do concrete.As far as your comment about painting wide flat trim with a sash brush - I've never seen a sash brush on a HFH site - unless I brought it! And the 80 grit sandpaper - you had a choice?? What I'm getting at, is that since it's a low budget operation, we often don't have the best tools and materials to do the job so you gotta make due - it's part of the sacrifice - or you can find out what the job-de-jour is and bring what tools you need - then they give you a crew and you get to add even more value!I bet if you gave it another try - and called ahead so you'd know what the tasks might be, you might enjoy it a bit.You know, I'm not really the religious type, but they say that Jesus was a carpenter. I wonder if he had an aversion to painting?
*Rick,Building your own home is expensive even for those of us who know how. Nothing can be done about that. Material and labor cost money. You want to be well paid for your services don't you? So do we.Ed. Williams
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Mike, you're absolutely right. I knew that but in interest of brevity...
I opened my new issue of DESIGNER/BUILDER yesterday and there was a four page article on Grow Homes - now advanced into the Affordable Home Program. The website is: http://www.mcgill.ca/homes/
For those who have not heard of it, DESIGNER/BUILDER is a wonderful little magazine about small/alternative/interesting/progressive social/built environments. They can be reached at Fine Additions, Inc.; 2405 Maclovia Lane, Sante Fe, NM 87505. Their phone is 505-471-4549