RobertSmalls - now with 350ft²! - Page 3

redneck · 01-11-11, 07:18 PM

Build a three or four car garage and split it in two, living in one half.
Or a two car garage with the living quarters above. Or a two car garage
with living quarters above for a tennant and a attached living space for you.

The last one can be done for only a little extra money that will pay all your monthly expenses, plus put money in your pocket...

Most subdivisions have minimal sq. ft. restrictions to perserve property values. Finding a lot in a good neighborhood maybe hard.

You may have to move out to a more country setting.

Where in Buffalo are you ?

I'm from N.T. originally.

>

MN Renovator · 01-11-11, 10:42 PM

redneck, I'm not sure that you would be able to find anywhere that would allow someone to just build a garage on a property. It would be a strange looking house to just live in a garage, even if it is an efficient use of space. I wouldn't want to live above a garage, mine smells like gasoline fumes right now because my snowblower leaked out a bunch of gas from a bad gas valve, I cleaned up and dried up all the gas but the smell stays around for a week, if I had to sleep there, I'd probably be in a hotel right now.

strider3700, Yeah, I don't understand the McMansion stuff, I don't live too far from that sort of neighborhood and it seems that the current sprawl in suburbs of the Twin Cities are these gigantic houses that people buy outside of their financial means, they are designed to have a patio in the back of their upstairs patio door, instead they have the wood beam there with no patio and the entire back of the house is completely flat. We derogatorily call them flatbacks around here because the people living in them don't have the money to turn the house into what it should be. I went to one once from Craigslist and found out that most of the neighborhood was sold with unfinished basements but with everything roughed in for the basement but that a good majority never actually get around to completing the work. They buy them for a steal based on dollar per sq ft but they are stretching it by going broke buying them and having half of a house that isn't even done and won't be for a long time, if ever. Huge waste of space, money, and resources that don't get used just to say they live in a big house amongst other big houses.

I hadn't thought of the code requirements much while reading through this thread but I do know that the city I live in does have requirements for the size of the lot versus the size of the house and the level of proportion allowed. Here every lot is about quarter acre, not sure how big the houses are required to be here but even if it is wasteful someone could just build a cheap uninsulated but attached 3 season porch to have the square footage and use cheaper windows and have that part sitting on slab. That would be a solution to energy bills since it is essentially always passive and not connected to an area that might need heating and cooling from time to time. If the square footage for code is measured from the outside of the house, that space can be used to pack the insulation and should expand it a bit and the foundation size would be larger because of it.

I personally wouldn't settle for living in a mobile home park and the lot rent cost is painful for what you get. Hopefully you can find land that allows you to build the size you want or something the size of those 5xx sq ft houses you saw. There are numerous houses in a very highly rented(ratio of renters versus owner occupants) area in Minneapolis where the renters dropped out when they could afford a better neighborhood and lots of break-ins and copper theft caused many others to rent somewhere else, crime went up, and renters went broke. There are numerous houses of that size but the neighborhood is nowhere I'd dare to live even if it were free, less than 1/2 of the houses are occupied but driving down some streets 3/4 of the houses have either a for sale or for rent sign on them. Many go for $10k and could, sadly, probably be negotiated lower.

I figured that basic structure like you described would be more than $30k, seems like a ton of labor and you'd need to find land in a decent safe area too if you plan to live there for awhile and maintain the desire to stay. There are construction loans, the approval process is probably very difficult and you'd have to do a good job of proving your build plan and financial abilities to carry through and repay but in the end for a cheaper house, financing it might help bring the dream a little closer to reality, of course figuring that you pay it off quickly the mortgage servicing cost shouldn't be too terribly high.

redneck · 01-12-11, 12:08 AM

MN Renovator

I know of several homes in my area that are either converted garages or purposly built garage apartments or homes. (new construction)

24'x36' is a typical three car garage and if you don't put any garage doors on it, they call it a house.

In the North East there are many homes that are 24'x24' which just happens to be the typical size of a two car garage or 30'x30'. They typically are found in the older sections and were built for blue collar workers near industrial areas.

One of the main reasons for the building of larger homes came in the years following WWII. Municipalities were looking for a ways to raise money, home builders were looking for a way to increase their bottom line. Since one taxes by the sq. ft. and the other builds by it, they got together and pushed minimal sq. footage laws. Also, I should add, the bankers didn't mind one little bit. Magazines and TV advertising also played a major part in driving the bigger is better theme.

>

AC_Hacker · 01-12-11, 01:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by redneck

One of the main reasons for the building of larger homes came in the years following WWII. Municipalities were looking for a ways to raise money, home builders were looking for a way to increase their bottom line. Since one taxes by the sq. ft. and the other builds by it, they got together and pushed minimal sq. footage laws.

That would have been in the 1950s, right?

Look what was happening to US oil production at that time...

And also look at the enormous growth in oil imports, to offset America's declining petroleum production, which really began around 1968, but it wasn't apparent until later. Now the beginning of decline is generally agreed to be 1971

Now look at US debt since 1971, and how debt goes up as oil production in the US declines.

So what's it going to mean if the world oil supply starts to decline? We can't import more oil from other planets...

Some people think it's already happening... in spite of increasing global demand, the oil supply is not increasing.

I think it's time to live frugal, and be proud of it.

If you're gonna build, build small, insulate well and get out of debt as quickly as possible.

Minimum house size zoning codes are outmoded now. The housing bubble has burst and it's not coming back.

The too-large McMansions are already albatrosses around the owner's necks and ultimately around the community's necks. They will stay that way until the US discovers another Super Giant petroleum supply in mainland USA (don't hold your breath).

There is a vigorous and growing movement in the US called The Small House Society

Also a lively Yahoo Group.

Small houses are not only thrifty, they can also be beautiful.

Regards,

-AC_Hacker

strider3700 · 01-12-11, 02:07 AM

You can get around the minimum size requirement by having it portable. There is a guy here building I think 12'x8' or 10' homes but because they don't meet size requirements he is putting them on travel trailer frames. Vancouver recently changed the rules to allow small homes in the 400 sqft range. They are secondary homes on the property and are intended to be used as rentals to help the owners pay the mortgages. When you're paying 1,000,000 on average for a modest home people are pretty desperate to get additional income and to have somewhere cheap enough to live.

RobertSmalls · 01-12-11, 06:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by redneck

Where in Buffalo are you ?

I'm from N.T. originally.

I was born and raised in Orchard Park, lived in Amherst and North Buffalo while going to UB, and now I live in Cheektowaga and work in Lancaster. I'm thinking about buying in the village of Lancaster, because I'd get neighbors who actually care about the neighborhood.

Where in the northeast did you escape to?

MN, that's part of why I make sure the driveway and lawn are small enough to handle with corded electric appliances. There will be no small engines, except maybe in a project car, and that would have a good evap system. But still, is it appropriate to have air exchange between a garage and a house? How about attaching the garage attic to the house to claim additional square feet of interior space?

I could boost my square foot count, assuming a finished attic bed-room counts towards the total. If I can't get my square feet high enough, I might have to live farther out in the country than I wanted to. Before I resign myself to that, though, I would petition a few Towns for a variance, explaining that I'm a non-poor, trendy individual (

), and though I'm proposing to put up a small house, it's not a trailer, and I'll be a worthwhile member of the community.

I would also place the two car garage next to the house, so that people looking from the street don't know there's not more house behind the garage. It will have the appearance of being larger than it really is. Perhaps a street-facing dormer in the attic would improve the appearance of the house by giving the illusion that the house has two complete floors.

Piwoslaw · 01-12-11, 08:50 AM

Robort, how about a fake façade, like this one in Bristol?

MN Renovator · 01-12-11, 09:14 PM

I've done the corded electric mower, it didn't seem too bad pushing it but it was dragging the thing around trees and corners of the house and getting caught on landscaping that bugged me so much about it. If I had a yard with no trees, shrubs, and the house was a simple square with an outlet on each side, I'd be cool with it but I am plugged into the garage with a 150' extension cord to get the sides of the house or I'd have to pull window screens to fish a cord out a window.

My solution: Turn the corded mower into a battery powered one, I proved to myself last year that it would run, just never got around to giving it a full run around the yard. Seemed like a decent use of Insight NiMh sticks that fail at being good enough in an Insight but still pump out enough amps for other stuff though.

01-12-11, 08:50 AM	#27
Piwoslaw Super Moderator Join Date: May 2009 Location: Warsaw, Poland Posts: 961 Thanks: 188 Thanked 110 Times in 86 Posts	Robort, how about a fake façade, like this one in Bristol? Attached Thumbnails __________________ Ecorenovation - the bottomless piggy bank that tries to tame the energy hog.

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01-11-11, 07:18 PM	#21
redneck Helper EcoRenovator Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: US Posts: 57 Thanks: 1 Thanked 17 Times in 11 Posts	Build a three or four car garage and split it in two, living in one half. Or a two car garage with the living quarters above. Or a two car garage with living quarters above for a tennant and a attached living space for you. The last one can be done for only a little extra money that will pay all your monthly expenses, plus put money in your pocket... Most subdivisions have minimal sq. ft. restrictions to perserve property values. Finding a lot in a good neighborhood maybe hard. You may have to move out to a more country setting. Where in Buffalo are you ? I'm from N.T. originally. >

01-11-11, 10:42 PM	#22
MN Renovator Less usage=Cheaper bills Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Minneapolis, MN Posts: 939 Thanks: 41 Thanked 116 Times in 90 Posts	redneck, I'm not sure that you would be able to find anywhere that would allow someone to just build a garage on a property. It would be a strange looking house to just live in a garage, even if it is an efficient use of space. I wouldn't want to live above a garage, mine smells like gasoline fumes right now because my snowblower leaked out a bunch of gas from a bad gas valve, I cleaned up and dried up all the gas but the smell stays around for a week, if I had to sleep there, I'd probably be in a hotel right now. strider3700, Yeah, I don't understand the McMansion stuff, I don't live too far from that sort of neighborhood and it seems that the current sprawl in suburbs of the Twin Cities are these gigantic houses that people buy outside of their financial means, they are designed to have a patio in the back of their upstairs patio door, instead they have the wood beam there with no patio and the entire back of the house is completely flat. We derogatorily call them flatbacks around here because the people living in them don't have the money to turn the house into what it should be. I went to one once from Craigslist and found out that most of the neighborhood was sold with unfinished basements but with everything roughed in for the basement but that a good majority never actually get around to completing the work. They buy them for a steal based on dollar per sq ft but they are stretching it by going broke buying them and having half of a house that isn't even done and won't be for a long time, if ever. Huge waste of space, money, and resources that don't get used just to say they live in a big house amongst other big houses. I hadn't thought of the code requirements much while reading through this thread but I do know that the city I live in does have requirements for the size of the lot versus the size of the house and the level of proportion allowed. Here every lot is about quarter acre, not sure how big the houses are required to be here but even if it is wasteful someone could just build a cheap uninsulated but attached 3 season porch to have the square footage and use cheaper windows and have that part sitting on slab. That would be a solution to energy bills since it is essentially always passive and not connected to an area that might need heating and cooling from time to time. If the square footage for code is measured from the outside of the house, that space can be used to pack the insulation and should expand it a bit and the foundation size would be larger because of it. I personally wouldn't settle for living in a mobile home park and the lot rent cost is painful for what you get. Hopefully you can find land that allows you to build the size you want or something the size of those 5xx sq ft houses you saw. There are numerous houses in a very highly rented(ratio of renters versus owner occupants) area in Minneapolis where the renters dropped out when they could afford a better neighborhood and lots of break-ins and copper theft caused many others to rent somewhere else, crime went up, and renters went broke. There are numerous houses of that size but the neighborhood is nowhere I'd dare to live even if it were free, less than 1/2 of the houses are occupied but driving down some streets 3/4 of the houses have either a for sale or for rent sign on them. Many go for $10k and could, sadly, probably be negotiated lower. I figured that basic structure like you described would be more than $30k, seems like a ton of labor and you'd need to find land in a decent safe area too if you plan to live there for awhile and maintain the desire to stay. There are construction loans, the approval process is probably very difficult and you'd have to do a good job of proving your build plan and financial abilities to carry through and repay but in the end for a cheaper house, financing it might help bring the dream a little closer to reality, of course figuring that you pay it off quickly the mortgage servicing cost shouldn't be too terribly high.

01-12-11, 12:08 AM	#23
redneck Helper EcoRenovator Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: US Posts: 57 Thanks: 1 Thanked 17 Times in 11 Posts	MN Renovator I know of several homes in my area that are either converted garages or purposly built garage apartments or homes. (new construction) 24'x36' is a typical three car garage and if you don't put any garage doors on it, they call it a house. In the North East there are many homes that are 24'x24' which just happens to be the typical size of a two car garage or 30'x30'. They typically are found in the older sections and were built for blue collar workers near industrial areas. One of the main reasons for the building of larger homes came in the years following WWII. Municipalities were looking for a ways to raise money, home builders were looking for a way to increase their bottom line. Since one taxes by the sq. ft. and the other builds by it, they got together and pushed minimal sq. footage laws. Also, I should add, the bankers didn't mind one little bit. Magazines and TV advertising also played a major part in driving the bigger is better theme. >

01-12-11, 02:07 AM	#25
strider3700 Master EcoRenovator Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Vancouver Island BC Posts: 745 Thanks: 23 Thanked 37 Times in 30 Posts	You can get around the minimum size requirement by having it portable. There is a guy here building I think 12'x8' or 10' homes but because they don't meet size requirements he is putting them on travel trailer frames. Vancouver recently changed the rules to allow small homes in the 400 sqft range. They are secondary homes on the property and are intended to be used as rentals to help the owners pay the mortgages. When you're paying 1,000,000 on average for a modest home people are pretty desperate to get additional income and to have somewhere cheap enough to live.

01-12-11, 09:14 PM	#28
MN Renovator Less usage=Cheaper bills Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Minneapolis, MN Posts: 939 Thanks: 41 Thanked 116 Times in 90 Posts	I've done the corded electric mower, it didn't seem too bad pushing it but it was dragging the thing around trees and corners of the house and getting caught on landscaping that bugged me so much about it. If I had a yard with no trees, shrubs, and the house was a simple square with an outlet on each side, I'd be cool with it but I am plugged into the garage with a 150' extension cord to get the sides of the house or I'd have to pull window screens to fish a cord out a window. My solution: Turn the corded mower into a battery powered one, I proved to myself last year that it would run, just never got around to giving it a full run around the yard. Seemed like a decent use of Insight NiMh sticks that fail at being good enough in an Insight but still pump out enough amps for other stuff though.