So I'm thinking about buying some land and building a house. Pictures inside! -

**Craig Artzner** · September 4th, 2008, 06:38 PM

I'm getting married in a month and pretty soon we'll have two good fulltime incomes. We want to buy some land and build a house. My Uncle is selling 4 acres of land about 7 minutes from where I live now. Anyone have any tips for pulling this off? Anyone ever done it and can give me any pointers?

What I know:

- My Uncle wants $17,500 per acre (which would be about 70K total)
- The land has been tested for septic and passed
- It's 10 minutes from 2 towns in opposite directions

Here are some pictures. This first one is a panoramic view from the top of the hill. This would be my view from the front door of my proposed house.

This next one is a Google Earth satellite image showing the boundaries of the property. The white star is where I took the panoramic picture from.

**fred2mihi** · September 4th, 2008, 07:28 PM

Craig when we moved back to area we both grew up in we purchased 5 acres with a moblie home on site. We gave around $150,000 for that property. Two years later we moved the trailer off and put a manufactured home on a full basement. That was another $75,000 for the larger home. When we moved to the mountains we sold the property for a profit. The manufactured home was a discontinued model and we got a really good deal.

A new water well is around $15,000, sewer and leach field near $7000. Electric should be somewhere around $7000-$10,000. Check with a home builder on what the cost per square foot will be. In this area you can buy a nice home in the $150 a square foot price range.

There is a manufactured home builder in Kansas called KanBilt Homes that will build a home to your specification on their site and then pick it up and deliver it to your property and set it up. Quite a site to see a complete new home moving down the backroads to your property. These are my experiences, hopefully they will be helpful. Good luck with your pending marriage and getting your home bought.

A work related question for you, do you sell synthetic cable for winches?

**Mrs. Leanintree** · September 4th, 2008, 09:16 PM

Something to keep in mind is if you're doing your own building or with some builders, you'll have to have a construction loan and you have to start paying on those right away. So you'd be making a payment on a place that you can't live in. You'd have to weigh that cost plus your current living expenses. What we did with our house is the builder carried the construction loan so we didn't pay until we had the C.O.O. to live in the house. I think there are lots of pro's to having new construction, you don't have to make alot of changes with carpet, old hot water heaters/furnaces, shoddy windows that kind of stuff on an old house that need replacing. The challenge we had was the landscaping. It's taken us 18 months of nickel and dimeing it to get the basic infrastructure done. I think everyone should have a new house built or build their own house once in their life. It's an amazing process and you learn so much about how your house is put together. It'll be stressful and you must exercise great patience but in the end, it'll be worth it for sure.

**VegasBruce** · September 5th, 2008, 06:10 AM

Thats a great looking piece of property. Here is a link to another site where some one is starting a thread on the same thing.

New Home Construction - the do's and don'ts thread - Tool, Shop, Equipment and Fabrication Forum

Good luck on all your endevors, Goofy and I are going to be building our house in about 2 years. So please keep us posted on your progress.

Mrs. Mecca · September 5th, 2008, 09:31 AM

That's amazing property, so green. I've never done anything like that, but Branndon and I have dreams of doing it in the future. We're going to build an eco-friendly house, probably modular to get done faster, and save on electricity/water. I actually just dedicated a post to the top 5 builders the other day, if you wanted to check it out. Click here.

Good luck, I look forward to watching the pictures as you go through the process.

**James** · September 5th, 2008, 10:54 AM

Nice looking property Craig, hope it all works out for you.

**Craig Artzner** · September 5th, 2008, 05:59 PM

Thanks for all the replies. I didn't want to make it sound like this was a for sure thing. I mean, we will be building a house, if not here, somewhere else. Kristen is still in school until Spring 2009 so her income won't really kick in until she gets a physical therapy job and is working. If I don't like the terms I may just back off and wait.

My Uncle is kind of a hard-nosed codger who won't give me any breaks. When I went out and saw him this evening he showed me the boundaries, etc. in person and said he had a doctor and his wife who were interested in the property as well so he said I should make a move if I want it. Well, I'm not going to be rushed into this so I just said "hey do what you have to do then." It's the perfect place, just may not be the perfect time, this time next year it would definitely be better.

Oh and when I viewed the boundaries I drove the Blazer around in the grass. Off road! Can you believe it?

**fred2mihi** · September 5th, 2008, 07:14 PM

OH LORD SURELY NOT, IN THE REAL DIRT?

**Craig Artzner** · September 5th, 2008, 07:36 PM

Yes Fred! And there was even some tall grass that may have brushed up against my rocker panels!

It turned out OK. I used the trusty ol' California Car Duster on her before I put her back in the garage.

**fred2mihi** · September 6th, 2008, 03:53 AM

Oh man I am so relieved you didn't put it away dirty, if there was any dirt!