Post 2- DECISION TIME!

I think we're currently considering the Small House on permanent foundations, because we're realistically expecting the big house to take about 3-5 years to complete (we're buying the materials as we go, so that we don't have a payment).  This was the best compromise that we can think of to give us the best of all worlds: space, cost, livability, view, safety, etc.  It will cost us roughly the equivalent of 3 years rent to build it, but with all things considered it's the best option for us.

If you're ever doing something like this, you may come to a different conclusion.  If I was a single guy, or even if the kids were grown up and gone I'd probably have gone with the tiny house on wheels.  I have a great design that you could probably build complete for @ $8-10k that would be pretty sweet (or, translated into reality: roughly a years worth of rent, ish).

One of the things that weighed heavily into the final decision (if indeed there ever is such a thing...) on the guest cottage/small house is: we estimate we can build the thing for about $20-30k, or, about 3 years or so worth of rent costs.  We've got to live somewhere while we build the big house, and I'd rather build a custom designed house that I own than giving my landlord rent.

So here's my challenge: maximum amount of usable space in as tiny of an area as possible.  I've gone through about 30 different initial designs, ranging from bunker house to tree house and every possible thing in between.  It's going to need to FEEL a lot bigger than it actually is, so everything in design will be focused in reinforcing that, while maximizing space and still taking into account all of my other considerations as well.


So, here it is, roughly:

Here's the concept:  the whole front will be a south facing wall, which looks over a nice valley so that whole front wall almost will be glass.  For costs and functionality, I'll probably end up going with about 3 6' patio doors on the front, one in the back, in addition to a few windows on front and back.  The ceilings will be vaulted to give a wider open feel and to accommodate the loft area as well.  Overall, I'm pretty pleased with this design: it gives me about 572 sq ft of living space technically, but it's designed to have about 800 sq ft of usable space in reality, plus it will feel as if the whole valley is in the living room with the wall o' glass.  Having the wider hallway and 6' glass patio at the back also gives a clear line of vision through the house, which should make it feel a lot bigger too.

Security has always been a big concern for me as well, but for security reasons I won't discuss security measures here, except to say that I'm pretty satisfied.

I'm using some passive solar concepts initially, and eventually plan to use active solar and also berm the east and west walls: keeping the flow through design but adding a bit of thermal mass.  The gutters will divert to a cistern and we'll use that to offset our water usage.  Initially we'll be hooked into city water and electric, but will eventually be moving to well/solar.  For heating I plan on a wood burning stove, for cooling I'm designing it to be a wind tunnel on demand and hoping that my passive system designs are adequate to cool us reasonably.  If that proves inadequate, my brother in law is an extremely skilled HVAC guy, but I'm really hoping to just eliminate that energy cost altogether.  Hot water heater will be tankless.

So, here's what's required in my county for the initial building permit:

1. Health Dept Certification for sewage- they've got to give the blessing and a certificate before you can begin anything.  I'm working on that right now.  I initially wanted to use a composting system (and still may), but in my county they don't grant permits for composting at residences (but will for commercial, oddly enough)
2. 2 drawings of the house design- do NOT need to be engineer certified unless there is something they question in your layout/design structurally or code-wise.
3. 2 site maps- where's the house going to sit on the property, doesn't need to be exact either
4. Register your Address (on the way up to the permit office).

From that point, they'll give you a packet with the "inspections" that are required by the city.  So, I called the Health Dept.  There is a septic system on my land currently, but it was installed back in the 60's before they had any records of such things, back in the days of free love and no permits required.  He said since there's already one in place, if it's a manufactured unit, then I just need to uncover it so they can inspect it and then they give me a certificate.  In a worst case scenario, I'll have to install a whole new system and drain field, which will cost me 3-5k.  Let's hope this one's adequate...