Little House, Big House

**spiralsands** · 04-19-2012, 05:35 AM

Gas prices have started to restrict my day trips to Winterwood. I used to go there to just wander and think about things. But it's costing 60 bucks a round trip to the property. That's starting to feel like air fare! I've been dealing with this frustration over the past couple of months and now am certainly needing a shelter on site.

So I visited the Countryplans.com (a website that I read a lot) and for 55 bucks, less than the cost of a round trip, ordered a set of plans for 3 little houses. I originally thought I would build a little log house but the issue still remained that I have to stay on site to build the bridge to get to logs. (Cascading problems....) So the Little House plans are now in the mail, flying their way from WA to NY and I have already starting shopping for materials for my conventional build.

People have suggested that I put a travel trailer out there and believe me, I have looked for one. But all I see are pricey rust buckets that would probably fall apart on those hills during the tow. For much less money I can build Little House and it will be brand new.

I didn't realize that deciding to go ahead and build Little House and actually ordering the plans would relieve the growing anxiety I was feeling about ever getting onto the property and building the Big House. I was increasingly fretting that I would never get out there. Having Little House will now allow me to wake up less than 200 feet from where the back of the Big House will be.

I'm pretty excited about it!

**blane** · 04-19-2012, 05:46 AM

Good plan! You could put up a little house in no time and it will also give you a good place for breaks. You could build one yourself for less than a camper I would guess, then after you have the log home done you could have a small rental or some extra space for visitors. You will be able to get more work done just by being on site. We found our property with a single wide already on site and decided to live in it while we build to save rent and travel and it was a good choice. We are building 30' away from my bed.

**BenB** · 04-19-2012, 06:21 AM

Smart, real real smart IMO.
Looking to do similar if we get the property we want this week. Gas has been running me $350-$390 RT to the area and it's killing me. I can leave the truck there and run an economy car back-forth for less than $100 so it's now a no-brainer.
Had this old book on building your dream cabin in the woods for years now ....so gonna do just that. Build a simple Alaskan Trapper Style, 16-18' x20' or so and be done. It can be a bunk house, shop or whatever in future but gets me to the point I can move ahead. Outhouse, no water, simple open floor plan. And if I have a change of heart on whatever it's cheaper than a trailer too - my materials will be under $1900 plus cement for posts and the tubes...so well under $2500 anyway. I can hardly pay the plates, taxes, insurance to have a trailer on road to get it there, and the title transfer on an ugly stinkin' rust bucket for that around here.
Gas soaring like it is - this may the wave of the future and give people a more easy build scenario that they may be comfortable with.
(((and a chance to take the class somewhere besides Vegas in the future. ? lol )))

**spiralsands** · 04-19-2012, 07:11 AM

"my materials will be under $1900 plus cement for posts and the tubes...so well under $2500 anyway..."

Ben, the plans for the little house I'm getting don't even require me to be mixing any cement. Even easier. The foundations are pier blocks and posts on pavers. According to the website, they don't even have to be leveled. The beams that are on top of them are leveled.

In these plans there are 3 sizes of little house. I may build the smallest one with a flat roof first. Stay in it and then build the biggest one with a loft for longer term living. Then I could use the little one for tool storage. (Or my daughter...Actually, if my daughter wants me to build a little one for her, I could ask her to cough up some money. Really. At what age do kids just stop expecting freebies from parents? Rhetorical question....I know the answer....sadly... I just never imagined I'd still be feeding her when she was in her twenties.)

**BenB** · 04-19-2012, 07:27 AM

I'd love to just go with pier blocks but it won't work for me as the area has in past had 300" of snow and gets possibly wet in a freeze-thaw year so I want it up a bit.
Where are you building? I had a flat roof once on a cabin in northern MN and the doggone thing didn't like the snow loads to much. I had to fight leaks all the time and it started to sag so I sensed disaster and ripped it off and put up truss system. If you can get away with a flat roof and membrane - saves a lot of money and labor for sure. Or even a 3/12 slope and a 2 piece peel and stick membrane is slick. I've done a few of those in past with friends and they seem to last very well.
The parent-child thing has really changed in last 5-7 years hasn't it!
I know of quite a few families that "expanded" back to yesteryear too. Economy and other factors really changing it all.
Keep me posted on the one you build - I am big fan of that site too. Some cool things have been built using their plans

**loghousenut** · 04-19-2012, 07:51 AM

Any kind of structure helps. To pay for my logs I agreed to thin 50 acres that were 2-1/2 hours from home. For several months that fall and winter I spent 4 nights per week over at that property, working my days off while spending 40 hours pretending to work at my job. I built a little camping hut out of the firewood that was not worth hauling home, and it kept me comfy with 10" of snow on top. It had a warm bed, woodstove, campstove, kitchen stuff, and junk carpet on the ground. I even had a portable DVD player that I could run from a car battery. Usually I'd get there at 2:00 am after working all day. Made it so easy to get up early, whip out a hot meal and fire up the saw for a day of real work. I don't know how you folks who commute to your build site get anything accomplished.

You, of course, are civilized and looking for something more domestic that will be a permanent addition to your homesite. It'll make such a difference in your life.

**jrdavis** · 04-19-2012, 08:32 AM

Spiral

I like the LHN cabin.
You can get plans and even some cordword stuff form www.motherearthnews.com

I don't think that I'd like to live WITH LHN in that cabin, but it would be a nice cabin awaiting the BIG brother to be built.

**spiralsands** · 04-19-2012, 09:07 AM

I love that cordwood look! I thought about doing a shed like that at my present house. I have a lot of standing dead trees on the front of my property that would be good to use.

In '07 and '09, my daughter and I came up from FL and camped caveman style (no RV) on the property. If a leaking tent, rained-out campfire, wet propane stove that won't light and 40 degrees in June doesn't make you want a nice warm dry roof over your head, you're nuts! Ever check into a hotel when you were soaked with mud and shivering? We did. So we decided NO MORE CAMPING!!

@Ben, we get a lot of snow up here too. My property is in the Adirondack Mountain foothills in NY. I don't intend to use the little house during the winter because once the snow falls, I'd have to snowshoe in (until I get a driveway). The flat roof actually does have a pitch to it. The plans call for use of a triple header (I think it's triple) on the front so the roof is pitched to the back just enough for rain runoff. I built a shed roof before but this has less pitch. If I modify the roof to a more steep pitch, I could put a loft bed up there. But I'm trying to do it simple and fast this time. As far as snow load, the littlest house is going to be only 10x14. Not too much.

The bigger little house is going to be 240 sq feet and will have a loft. I think I could bring power and water to that one. I could be in it for awhile because I'm building alone and I get sidetracked by taking on too much.