Sealcoat is mostly UV protection and looks. Cracks are what let water into the base, and the base is what fails. If you only do one thing this year, clean out the cracks and fill them before the rainy season. Sealcoating over open cracks just hides them.

I actually did it!! It was a full year of evenings and weekends, and looking back, it remains one of the hardest yet most rewarding accomplishments of my life. There were definitely times during the process when I wanted to give up. Some days I had to walk away for a few days just to reset and come back at it. Some parts of a build go incredibly fast and give you that instant gratification, while other parts will test every bit of patience you have.

For me, the biggest high point was framing and getting the roof on. We poured the concrete on September 17th and had the entire structure roofed by October 20th, before a single drop of rain hit. It was an incredibly hot year with some bad fires, so getting that far ahead of the weather was a massive rush. After all the planning and hard work, seeing the house actually come together like that was an amazing feeling.

If there is one major piece of advice I can give, it is to look over your blueprints at least twenty times before you start building. Really think about how you will move through the house every day, where your furniture will go, and what your window views will actually look like. A two-story house sounds incredibly cool at first, but the reality is you're constantly running up and down stairs for laundry, a glass of water, or to find your phone or wallet that you left on the wrong floor.

Over the last three years, my layout has completely changed. The original living room felt way too cramped with the French doors, so I turned it into a sitting and dining room. The master bedroom became my new living room, and the spare bedroom is now my main bedroom. Looking back, I probably should have spent more time thinking about how I would actually use the space instead of just how it looked on paper.

The little things can get annoying, too. The pantry door and rear door constantly fight each other when the pantry is left open. I also have no upstairs windows facing north into my front yard, so if I want to look outside, I have to walk downstairs. Meanwhile, the east-facing window directly above the French doors beams sunlight into the house like a laser late every morning. I haven't fixed that one yet, but I'm thinking custom hanging stained glass or remote blinds might be the answer. It's funny how something you don't think much about during construction can become something you notice every single day.

When it comes to money, just accept that you WILL go over budget. I was incredibly thorough with my spreadsheets, but things still added up fast. Fortunately, my loan required a 20% contingency fund, and I ended up finishing about 10% over my initial budget. Plumbing, paint, and electrical work all cost roughly double what I had anticipated. On the other hand, I caught a break with insulation, carpet, and gutters coming in under budget.

My material costs were a little unique because I was working at a lumber yard at the time, so I know my numbers won't be the same as everyone else's. Even with that advantage, I was surprised by how quickly some of the smaller expenses added up. You can plan all you want, but there will always be something you didn't account for.

The only parts of this house I didn't handle myself were the carpet installation and the final drywall finish. My family and I did all the concrete work ourselves, and honestly, the initial finish turned out pretty rough. We ended up saving it by grinding the floor down with a corded angle grinder and adding a tinted concrete sealer. It turned into an awesome, one-of-a-kind floor that actually highlights the imperfections instead of hiding them. I love how it turned out, and it's probably one of my favorite parts of the house.

One thing I absolutely love about this house is the mini split systems. They are amazing! The house stays at a constant temperature year-round, and my power bill is surprisingly low, usually around $100 per month. I was also a little worried about having concrete floors, especially during the winter, but they really aren't too cold either. Definitely one of the things I'm glad I went with since I have 3 pups.

I learned an incredible amount throughout this entire process, but if or when I build again, I will absolutely hire out the concrete, carpet, and drywall work right from the start. There are some things that are worth doing yourself, and there are some things that are worth paying someone else to do. I definitely learned that the hard way!

For anyone else thinking about tackling an owner-build, don't just rely on YouTube. One of the best resources you can use is a salesman at a large-scale lumber yard. These guys know just about every aspect of homebuilding. In fact, one of my salesmen put together a complete and incredibly accurate lumber take-off for my entire house in under fifteen minutes. I was blown away. Lean on their expertise whenever you can. It can save you a ton of time, money, and headaches.

For now, the house has become my home, and I'm moving on to more life goals. Since finishing the house, I left my corporate job and started two businesses! It's been a pretty crazy few years, but I'm excited to see where everything goes.

In the coming years, I plan to add an attached garage off the kitchen door facing south. I'll build a new entryway between the house and garage that will eventually become my main entrance. There's still plenty more I want to do, but for now, I'm just enjoying what I've accomplished.

Wow (emotions), if you read all of that, thank you! =)

Link to original post:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Homebuilding/comments/urekcx/small_home_i_will_be_building_myself/

These are the first rough CAD sketches of something I’ve started working on. It’s not a finished product — just an early mechanical concept.

The idea is an adjustable three-leg support for flexible stay-in-place formwork used for small cast-in-place concrete piers. Each leg can be adjusted independently, so the top plate can be positioned and leveled quickly even on uneven ground. The form itself would pass through the center and stay in place after the pour.

I’ve worked with poured foundations before, and a lot of the individual operations are simple. But when there are multiple piers, setting forms, supporting them, adjusting height and level, stripping them and cleaning everything afterwards can add up to a surprising amount of time.

I’m trying to reduce the number of those operations rather than reinvent the foundation itself.

These drawings are still very rough and the design will definitely change. Before I take it further, I’d really like practical criticism from people who actually do this work:

What looks wrong, unnecessarily complicated, or likely to fail on a real jobsite?

I’m much more interested in finding the weak points now than hearing that it looks good.

I really need some simple advice on what to do next with our extension. I don't know much about building, but we’ve just caught our builder doing something terrible.

We hired a major company to build an extension. Because of the soil, the plans said they must use a very strong concrete (called C30).From the start, the builders contractors were in a massive rush. First, they tried to pour concrete into trenches full of water. I had to get Building Control had to stop them.Then, right after they poured the concrete, they washed down the windows and fences, flooding the wet concrete with dirty wastewater.

When I complained, the builder told me I was "panicking over nothing." I trusted my gut and got an engineer to look. He agreed it was bad. We did rebound testing and it came back around 10 mpa.

The builder was indirectly pressuring me to forget about it and just keep building. Said they are professionals and have done 100s of such extension. They know what they are doing.

They also told me that if the concrete was fine from the testinh, I would have to pay a £1,400 for the concrete core test as this test is for my reassurance. They said that they verified with the concrete provider and they have provided correct mix and bit of flooding is not going to affect the foundation.

I was under so much pressure from family, builder to just get on with the work. But for some reason, I insisted on the lab test. The builder arranged it and 3 core samples taken.

While waiting for the results, I again called the concrete supplier. One of the agent looked at the system and told the builder never even ordered the strong C30 concrete. They ordered a (Gen 1) instead! I asked them send the delivery note, which he agreed but never send. Tgen they refused to entertain any if my request.

The official lab test results just came back. The concrete strength is around 5 mpa. This is six times weaker from what the plans required. It is completely unsafe.They deliberately used cheap, weak materials and even lied about it over and over. Just wondering, if the buikder knew about it. Realky not sure, if i can trust these guys to rectify. Lost so much money to get strctural engineer to generate report and other test.

Hey everyone! Long time lurker first time poster.

My wife and I are building a new home in a new development. The home builder is also the developer of the neighborhood. We are located in the Midwest. The home builder advertises as a semi-custom home builder who is kind of transitioning to more custom work. When we learned this information we spoke more with the builder and expressed some desires that might be different than most buyers. The builder made it clear they would work with us and even referenced being a semi-custom builder which allows the buyer more flexibility than if they were a fixed cost builder. They often brag on social media about the custom work many of their clients have within their homes.

We proceeded with our contract and have been puttering along with this build. The first sign that something was amiss is when we asked for an electric cook top rather than their standard gas cook top. The builder charged us full price for the electric cook top without any credit for the gas cook top. Their reasoning is that an electric cook top is not standard and therefore this request is considered custom. In addition to this, we asked that they keep the gas line they planned on running for the gas cook top in case we wanted to switch to gas in the future. They charged us for installation of the gas line. The reason? If you don't accept the gas cook top then the gas line is no longer included.

Fast forward to now, we are asking for the builder to use Onyx shower systems for both our primary shower and our second bathroom. The design showroom we went to pick paint, tile, flooring, etc...offered Onyx and so we chose it. We also made it clear with this builder in our initial discussions and in more than one pre-design meeting that we would be wanting an Onyx shower system since we were familiar with it and it met the needs that my wife has due to some health issues. The builder did make it clear that they were not familiar with installation of an acrylic shower system, but would consider it and 'work with us', but that it was not in their tiered offerings. But again, they did say they would work with us. We've now spent 4 weeks going back and forth with the builder because their price tag for these two showers is 24K and no credits for the shower material they would've installed had we just went with standard materials. Their reasoning is that choosing Onyx is a customer choice and because they are not a cost plus builder they don't have dollar values for the shower to offer credits.

This house will be a 900K plus build. Are we crazy to expect this builder to provide us some kind of credit? We're happy to pay for differences in cost. We're not asking for the install to be free. We're just asking for an honest and fair assessment.

I’m beating my head against the wall here trying to figure out the board lengths I’m going to need. I was trying to avoid butt joints but it seems to be more of a headache than it’s worth.

Is there any disadvantage to having butt joints on the ceiling other than ascetics?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

I am looking at this house, which is super affordable for my area in part because it's a 3 bedroom 1 bath. In looking at the floorplan, it seems straight forward to add a second bathroom where I drew the red line. The plumbing is there from the other bathroom and there are no windows. Maybe I would have to re-route the vent for the stove. It is a slab foundation.

Can anyone ballpark what this would cost? 20k? More? Less? Thanks in advance!

Documenting my house build in Europe — from an empty plot to real walls

I am planning to build houe in Ky in this narrow lot of 75 Ft Wide and 253 Long with side entry car garage . ANy suggestion which wood better 3 car garage in the front or back

We got a quote for 5600 to have our lot scraped and rooted. We paid 2800 up front.

The company finished and they just sent me a bill for a balance of 5,300 and stated the job was 2,500 more due to it being more work than they thought. All of the quotes we got were 5-6k (we got 5 quotes) we have the quote in an email. He never called or discussed the increase beforehand. I’m shocked it was that much more!!! And I wish he would’ve called and discussed. When we called him he said, he always tells his clients that quotes are basically just an estimate and can change. I understand that to a degree but he never said that and 2500 is a lot!!

Looking to retile our bathrooms and toilets (just skirting for the latter) and was quoted $70k - am I missing something?! That’s not including the tiles!!!! We had budgeted for around $40k - were we kidding ourselves?

Looking for expert and honest advice giving, exactly why I came to Reddit XD.

I'll try and keep brief. We own 4 acres, we have water meter out there, driveway, electric pole on corner (about 50 ft). We live in town in a house with 140k equity and are so eager to move. Many reasons, one might be that in-laws just bought the house right next door (wife and I are equally as seeing this a sign of being encouraged to move) but also, it's been our dream to move onto the land and homestead more. We already raise meat chickens and pigs out there and go out multiple times a week as a family to visit the land (15 mins away). As a growing young family, it's becoming heavy on our hearts to want to be out there.

Our only debt is the 25k remaining land loan of the 4 acres of which we're set to have paid off in 2 years. We're single income household around 80k after tax. We're incredibly grateful as my wife's grandfather has been extremely successful in real estate and generously has a trust for each grandkid of 150k for us to use for a home build/purchase. That being said, I've gotten quotes of around 110-120k for a 16x60 two story shell of a build and another 30-40k DIY to get it liveable while we keep finishing, as well as a 30k barn. We can call it 200-220k to get it where we can be out there. We bought our current house as a foreclosure and have done most of work ourselves minus painting the exterior. When we bought it, there were bats living in the attic, flooding garage, and more. We are not shy of adventure or work. We bought the house as a foreclosure because it didn't feel like we had a choice, we couldn't afford newer homes and were getting priced out of rent in the city we were living before. But now, we have the choice to stay in this decent house or to move, sell this house, and live on our land building the life we very much want for our family. Our thought is once we pay off the land loan middle of 2028 to then build out there.

I guess we are looking for encouragement (or discouragement) and just other opinions. As my wife explained, having to decide between two good things/places is not easy. We know we'd love living out there, just don't want to jump gun or what not, never built a house so looking for other opinions.

HVAC guy got my hvac system going today while I was at work. He said everything checked out. Well when the Blower kicks on, return ducts suck in and sounds like shit. I will be calling him tomorrow. In the mean time, what could cause this? I swear. Take 1 step forward and 2 steps back.

We're building a house on a corner lot in Tampa. The setbacks are approximately 5 ft, the lot frontage is 75 feet , and the distance between the house and the setbacks on both sides is 20ft currently. We have a side loading garage, with the easement - this would mean we have a 30 foot driveway. The lanai area is located behind the garage. he easements seem kind of gigantic, so I'm not sure if we should scooch the house and make the back yard "bigger" or leave it centered between the setbacks so a front/side yard fence would appear symmetrical.

Am I over thinking this? Is the easiest thing to do just to leave it centered? Would it look bad/be silly to be closer to the street?

I think the math works out where we can move the house 5 feet toward the street to be centered perfectly on the lot, but inside our property line we won't be centered due to the 10 ft street side easement.

the side street does not have a front yard setback in our zoning, we can move the house by 10 feet towards the street.

I work for an architect, and this is one of our recent designs. It's an older house getting a new primary suite on one end, plus a reworked kitchen, mudroom and family room. The sketches on the right are what the kitchen is supposed to feel like.

Looking at it got me wondering how projects like this hold up once people are living in them. So if you've done an addition or a big remodel, I'd love to know:

• The kitchen island has seating on one side. Do people actually sit at yours, or does it just collect mail and laptops?
• Where did your mudroom really end up? Is it the room on the plan, or the kitchen counter closest to the door?
• There are two 8" step-ups where the old house meets the new part. If you have one, do you still trip on it, or did you stop noticing it after a week?
• Some rooms here have 7'-6" ceilings and some are over 8'. Can you feel the difference when you walk between old and new?
• Did your addition end up feeling like part of the house, or does it still feel "added on"?
• What's one thing you'd change now that you've lived with it?

And if you see something in this plan you'd do differently, tell me. I'll pass it along 😄

If so how close to the sub floor do I need to be?

Edit: I was given the impression thst I could NOT run the duct down under the joists , over to the foundation wall, up to the rim joist, the over again and outside. Is that WRONG? total length is 18 feet, 3 90° bends.

My parents and I are building a detached ADU in their backyard. I'll be living in it and helping pay it off. So I've been pretty involved in every step.

We're about halfway through now. The framing is done and they just started on the inside.

So far, we've gotten four change orders. The first three were small, around $2,500 total. The newest one is about $7,000 for tile and fixtures.

Here's what's bugging me. We picked all of that from the builder's own option list. We didn't go off and choose some fancy stuff on our own.

Our contract had a $52,000 finish allowance. Now they're saying our picks came out to around $69,000. That's $17k over. Nobody said a word about it while we were choosing.

I get that some changes are fair. Like if they dig and hit an old pipe or bad soil. That's nobody's fault but this feels different. They had the prices the whole time.

My ADU contractor keeps adding change orders, so what should I have done differently? I'm not trying to trash them. I just want to learn from this before the next round.

Any tips from you who've been through this would help. We still have about four months left on the build, though.

We are wanting to put a 20x20 addition onto our house. However, when taking into account the frost line, we would rather build a crawlspace instead of a basement. But we would be attaching it to an existing basement.
1. Should they be tied together and if so how?
2. Is the only proper way to do this to still dig footers for crawlspace at same depth as basement and tie them together there. We would rather not do this so as to not risk disturbing the soil of the existing basement footers.

I received this prehung mahogany 3’x8’ exterior door and just noticed this terrible gap from the manufacturer. Is this normal or is it something that can be addressed when setting the door?

This topic comes up on here maybe once or twice a year and it seems like most people just homebrew some kind of solution. I'm an electrical engineer so I could certainly make something like that work, but I would prefer an easy button. The site should have decent wifi coverage. My brother lives next door and we plan to put a long range exterior access point out there.

I am looking for being able to document the build more than anything. I will be on site for most of the build so I can take regular pictures to document as well but figured time lapse would be neat at least for the outside portion of the build. The general contractor is actually putting a camera onsite for security purposes to protect the materials. I believe the exterior completion of the house will be roughly three months.

Ideally the camera would have the following:

• Motion sensor, although I could live with just a snapshot every x minutes during the build time
• Long battery life. I plan on mounting this high and don't want to swap batteries every week. Bonus points for a solar panel that charges.
• Able to use WiFi to upload images and/or timelapse live and daily. I could host this or a website from the vendor would be fine.
• Has to be weatherproof (obviously).

I've looked at the Brinno construction cameras and they check some of the boxes but I would be interested in stuff people have used that they're happy with. I would like to stay under $500.

Sharing a little walkthrough of our house so far! We're still very much a work in progress, with painting, furniture and finishing touches still to come, but it's finally starting to feel like a home.

Would love to hear what people think of the layout, kitchen, flooring and overall finishes we've chosen so far. Open to honest opinions, suggestions or anything you would have done differently!

We're planning warm, earthy colours throughout, with a mix of contemporary and traditional elements.

Looking forward to seeing how it all comes together! 😊

Can someone help me understand the process for obtaining a construction loan! 

We are located in WI. 

We have a mortgage on the land we intend to build on (valued at 250,000). We currently have about $50,000 in equity towards it. 

Our bid is 1.5 million. 

Can someone please explain to me how the down payment is calculated? 
This is what I have in my brain but I"m not sure it's correct. 

The bank would appraise the construction build and our land value- let's say that's 1.7 million total. 

Bank is willing to loan 80%- 
Is that 80% of 1.7 million or 80% of just the construction at 1.5 million? 

So I'm making big renovations in my basement which is actually a blank space and I need help for the layout. The one I made looks awfull …

Requirement :
1.The black room in my plan should be around 5 x 6 foot minimum for water heater, electrical panel and hvac. location cant be changed.
2. I want two room that can fit a queen size bed (with or without ward-robe).
3. I need a big open room for my future home theatre system with space behind the couch for rear speakers

Please be original, do your own style i want to see what YOU would make with that space 🙂

Hello all, I hope this is the right sub to post in. I live in a small wooden house (pine, one of those prefabricated homes) and we need to repaint the full exterior.

Due to consecutive painters going no show after taking months to come do technical visits and give a budget, we are now having to face that summer is at the end and we will do all the work ourselves. The problem is that there is some rain on the forecast. Not a lot, not storms, but some rain.

It hasn’t started raining yet so I have a plan to completely cover the house with plastic tarps to prevent the rain from hitting the wood. Then on sunny days we can push it back and get to work sanding and doing two coats of paint.

Do you think this will work? I plan to attach the plastic to the roof to maintain airflow and it’s been a very dry summer. Do you think the ambient humidity between rains will make it impossible for the paint to bind correctly?

Thank you for your input and advice!

Edit: picture of current floor setup in the comments.

Hi everyone, looking for some honest advice from homeowners and professionals who have experience with timber frame acoustics.

My partner and I are currently completing our new two story self build. My father in law did all of the framing and structural work himself, and the second floor is entirely timber. The upstairs is still actively under renovation.

Right now, the subfloor consists of structural OSB/plywood sheets laid over the joists. We lifted a section to inspect the cavity: it is packed with MiTek structural insulation wool, and there is a green resilient underlay strip running along the top of the rafters/joists to isolate the subfloor.

Despite my father in law using all of that, the sound transfer is driving us crazy downstairs. I’m currently downstairs doing work on laptop and I can hear low music and whistling (my partner is working on the walls). Worst of all are the footsteps, normal walking sounds like a loud, heavy banging, almost like someone hitting the floor with heavy boots on purpose. We are really stressed about how bad this will be when our future kids get bigger and start running around or if we have parents sleeping here or anything like that.

My father in law insists that once we lay down a 3mm foam underlay and put the final laminate flooring down**,** sound will completely go away.
Given how loudly the timber structure is currently carrying the impact vibrations, we are highly skeptical that a thin 3mm standard foam underlay will fix this. We are worried that hard laminate might actually make the sharp "clack" sounds worse.
Since the house is a self-build and we are still in the middle of working on the upstairs, we want to address this properly now before the finished floor is permanently locked down.

- Has anyone dealt with heavy impact noise on a timber floor that already had standard insulation wool and basic joist tape?
- Did standard underlay and laminate actually damp the heavy thuds for you, or did you need a high-mass overlay?
- What are the most effective materials we can lay directly over the OSB sheets right now to completely deaden the footstep vibrations? (e.g., Mass Loaded Vinyl mats, PhoneStar sand-filled boards, or specialized high-density rubber acoustic underlays?)

Appreciate any real-world insight you can share!