Help Me Design a Texas Home

I was working at a remote weather radar antenna yesterday and found  a little inspiration across the street.

Looks just like your sketch!

Same plans, I wonder?

Anyway, it bodes well, that the area residents think that's an all-right layout.

I close on my land in 4 days.

You might get a few ideas from the channel, Tex.

@Crusader

That's beautiful, but I want a shop for working on projects.  It's a very well thought out plan for a single person.  I'm not giving up hope on having a family yet.  I do watch that channel a lot.  That and Texas Barndominiums.

I got a quote for the 2br/2bath single story plan I was considering.  The unassembled metal building would cost $52k+sales tax+ delivery costs.  About $60k.  I would hire someone to assemble the building and I still need to pay for a foundation.  It's looking like $100k for a finished slab and metal building shell.

I still need to get utilities hooked up, septic system installed, and buy the materials for framing, wiring, cabinets, plumbing, solar, and appliances.  $200k looks doable, but I'm having second thoughts about the single story.  A loft with a 3rd bedroom and game room would really increase the value if I ever try to sell it.  It would look pretty cool as well.  I could leave the loft unfinished until I've restored my cash building fund.  I'm hoping a 3br home on 6 1/2 acres would be worth at least $700-800k and only cost me about $350-400k to build.  If I was younger, I'd consider building homes for a living.

If only I'd married a hot realtor chick.........

Crusader wrote:That's beautiful, but I want a shop for working on projects.  It's a very well thought out plan for a single person.  I'm not giving up hope on having a family yet.  I do watch that channel a lot.  That and Texas Barndominiums.

I got a quote for the 2br/2bath single story plan I was considering.  The unassembled metal building would cost $52k+sales tax+ delivery costs.  About $60k.  I would hire someone to assemble the building and I still need to pay for a foundation.  It's looking like $100k for a finished slab and metal building shell.

I still need to get utilities hooked up, septic system installed, and buy the materials for framing, wiring, cabinets, plumbing, solar, and appliances.  $200k looks doable, but I'm having second thoughts about the single story.  A loft with a 3rd bedroom and game room would really increase the value if I ever try to sell it.  It would look pretty cool as well.  I could leave the loft unfinished until I've restored my cash building fund.  I'm hoping a 3br home on 6 1/2 acres would be worth at least $700-800k and only cost me about $350-400k to build.  If I was younger, I'd consider building homes for a living.

If only I'd married a hot realtor chick.........

Concrete costs are ridiculous.

A buddy of mine just had his foundation poured for $19k. 2500 sf.

Wish I had the money for a place like that.

It would be perfect for me. A few small modifications, and I could easily live in it permanently.

Alas, though...I have money but land-prices are insane just now. And labor isn't cheap, either. And, mid-sixties, never worked as a carpenter, with a bad back, I'm not going to try to build.

My, how things change. Back in 1966, my old man came on a nice piece of land in New York State - it was a series of slopes, about 25-30 degrees, and in the center, a level area that had been a railroad right of way. The railroad had been pulled up twenty years earlier; an elderly woman (or maybe her husband) had bought the land on speculation, when the line was ripped out. Did nothing with it, and her estate was being liquidated. Lake frontage

Price was $7000, back then. Be $65k now.

I just came across the catalog for the pre-cut cabin he bought. The price was $2000. That was just a shell - not a frame house; it was interlocking cedar 1x6s The outer walls were two deep, sandwiching styrofoam insulation; the inner walls were just that.

Sounds hinky but it's still standing. My brother owns it. Fifty-five years of carpenter ants, weather, some wintertime vandalism, and it's still standing.

Finishing the inside - which involved laborous sanding, varnishing, laying a textured linoleum floor throughout - was another thousand and two years of work. Wiring was done using Wiremold, on the wall surfaces - power was run to rooms through the basement, up through the floor to outlets via Wiremold.

Nine thousand dollars for the whole mess. Back in an age when a professional's wage might be about $20,000. It was an expense, but it was an achievable dream.

Not now.