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Ask HN: Have you built a house?

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Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#71

Post by beat »

gwbas1c wrote: post #65

I just built a "normal" wood house. I have no experience with building concrete houses. Are they normal for your area, or are you trying to follow unusual construction techniques? Something to keep in mind: If you're doing anything slightly unusual, you need to be very careful about who you work with. There are people who will ignore your request to do something a certain way and just do it the same way that it's bee…

If a construction technique is unusual in a particular area, it's usually unusual for a good reason - cost or impracticality or both. For example, in Minneapolis where I live, every house has a basement; they're required by code. The reason is deep frost cycles in the winter. But in Houston, nobody has a basement. It'd just be flooded all the time, and there's no freeze cycle to worry about.

Standard house construction in any given area is a product of what works well and what is reasonably inexpensive. You can see this by era, too. Like my neighborhood is almost all 100 year old bungalows on basically the same floor plan. They were state of the art in 1913, dependent on the new technology of manufactured nails for their cheap 2x4 balloon frames, and stucco for the sturdy weatherproof exteriors. But they're also designed for hand tools and, um, inaccurate measurements. No reason to build that way in an era of power tools and prefab.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#72

Post by emodendroket »

koliber wrote: post #6

I've built a house, in the sense that I was working as the general contractor and hiring out crews and tradespeople to do the actual work. My involvement differed anywhere between hire-a-crew and pay them when they are done down to doing certain things myself 100%. A few takeaways: - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as…

> - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as straightforward as painting a wall will be hard when you are doing it for the first time. You will make mistakes if you do it yourself. Try to do it yourself only in areas where you can tolerate such mistakes.

I'm not a home-builder but I am a home-owner. Let me add that any work you do yourself the flaws will be about 10 times as noticeable and annoying to you as if you'd hired someone to do the work and it had the exact same flaws.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#73

Post by emodendroket »

ars wrote: post #60
koliber wrote: post #6

I've built a house, in the sense that I was working as the general contractor and hiring out crews and tradespeople to do the actual work. My involvement differed anywhere between hire-a-crew and pay them when they are done down to doing certain things myself 100%. A few takeaways: - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as…

> Why a concrete house? How will you insulate it? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insulating_concrete_form > Do you have enough funds to do it this way? For basements they are cheaper than traditional ways, for above ground they cost more initially, but are cheaper longterm.

I'm thinking the point was to make the OP think about this question, not to given an answer to the comment.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#74

Post by beat »

alphabettsy wrote: post #69
beat wrote: post #66

I did not build this, and it doesn't meet all your design criteria, but it's very interesting... A couple of months ago, I visited a friend and her fiance at their home in the Colorado Rockies - way up in the mountains, not down on the front range. The architecture was very interesting, straightforward, and inexpensive. They simply cut a house-sized trench into the side of a mountain (about a 45 degree slope there),…

Sounds cool, but the fire concern is very real and not so much flames as it is being unable to escape the smoke.

True. But like I said, there's not a lot to burn... just furniture and the kitchen cabinets. Everything else is concrete and metal.

Of course, if there's a forest fire, you don't want to be on the mountain regardless.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#75

Post by johnchristopher »

trhway wrote: post #35
libria wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you spout that last paragraph off the top of your head? That is a staggering bullet list that I suspect has several layers of unwritten sub-bullets. I have a whole new respect for home builders.

if we knew or cared about anything like that almost 3 decades ago when we were building houses in Siberia as summer student jobs i don't think we'd have been able to build anything :) (just out of curiosity checked couple years ago using satellite photos - the houses are still there :) Though right now i'm very happy knowing that my townhouse meets all the CA tough building codes :)

I am curious. Which points of that list didn't you consider in any way and at anytime - except for specific features of the land that would force you to take into account the possibility of earthquakes or flood - while building the house ?

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#76

Post by phil21 »

beat wrote: post #71
gwbas1c wrote: post #65

I just built a "normal" wood house. I have no experience with building concrete houses. Are they normal for your area, or are you trying to follow unusual construction techniques? Something to keep in mind: If you're doing anything slightly unusual, you need to be very careful about who you work with. There are people who will ignore your request to do something a certain way and just do it the same way that it's bee…

If a construction technique is unusual in a particular area, it's usually unusual for a good reason - cost or impracticality or both. For example, in Minneapolis where I live, every house has a basement; they're required by code. The reason is deep frost cycles in the winter. But in Houston, nobody has a basement. It'd just be flooded all the time, and there's no freeze cycle to worry about. Standard house constructi…

I agree, but what if you don't care about inexpensive? Seems pretty much everything available newish construction has been cost-optimized to absurd levels.

What if I want to build a European-style concrete or stone building, that will still be standing in 300 years? Not a throwaway structure that has a 50 year designed lifespan?

I was looking at new construction (or a full gut rehab of an older 1800's building) and it's just real hard to find any contractors even interested in the "quality" angle.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#77

Post by dpatru »

If you want to build with concrete, look into ICF (insulated concrete forms). These are foam panels that easily fasten together make the forms. After the concrete is poured, the forms stay in place to form the insulation. If you are handy, you could probably do the pour yourself with friends and family, saving you a lot of money.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#78

Post by jerrre »

emodendroket wrote: post #72
koliber wrote: post #6

I've built a house, in the sense that I was working as the general contractor and hiring out crews and tradespeople to do the actual work. My involvement differed anywhere between hire-a-crew and pay them when they are done down to doing certain things myself 100%. A few takeaways: - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as…

> - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as straightforward as painting a wall will be hard when you are doing it for the first time. You will make mistakes if you do it yourself. Try to do it yourself only in areas where you can tolerate such mistakes. I'm not a home-builder but I am a home-owner. Let me add that any work…

I think that depends on personality maybe? I'd rather live with sloppy work I'm proud I did myself than to think I hired somebody and they delivered a bad job.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#79

Post by mturmon »

emodendroket wrote: post #72
koliber wrote: post #6

I've built a house, in the sense that I was working as the general contractor and hiring out crews and tradespeople to do the actual work. My involvement differed anywhere between hire-a-crew and pay them when they are done down to doing certain things myself 100%. A few takeaways: - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as…

> - Things seem simple from the outside, before you do them for the first time. They are in actuality quite complicated. Even something as straightforward as painting a wall will be hard when you are doing it for the first time. You will make mistakes if you do it yourself. Try to do it yourself only in areas where you can tolerate such mistakes. I'm not a home-builder but I am a home-owner. Let me add that any work…

And, you will start to notice those flaws weeks-to-years after having completed the work. E.g. after something fails, or a flaw comes up.

Re: Ask HN: Have you built a house?

#80

Post by mywittyname »

vidanay wrote: post #34
mywittyname wrote: post #24

I've had a custom house built by a very well-respected GC in my region. Despite not doing any of the actual labor, I'm doing an incredible amount of work. Since it's a totally custom house, I spent all weekend for five or so months going to supplier offices to pick out materials, designing tile work & shelving, tweaking layouts, etc. Since the project has taken so long, I've had to deal with suppliers running out of…

I think it's time to reassess that "well-respected GC in my region" statement.

Not sure what you mean. He delivered a wonderful house for exactly the price he said it would be.

My point is, building a custom house is a lot of work, even when you're not the one swinging the hammer.

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