Building a forever home. Do's and don'ts

[Loggerdude]

as said above no stairs, steps, auxiliary wood heat, which we always use, lots of windows for natural light. And no neighbors has been a plus.

 

[ETtikka]

I'm curious about the regrets over stained concrete floors. I'm considering stained concrete for my basement. The waterproofness and durability seem appealing with little kids and a dog in the house, but I'm sure there are downsides too. I would be interested to hear from someone who has been there, done that.

my last house was a one level brick rancher built on slab, the, we ripped out linoleum and carpet. Tiled the bathrooms and kitchen and stained the remainder.

the first room we polished then stained, it was too slick.
without polished the others were fine. If your concrete is “pretty”, a lighter stain will highlight nicer concrete, if your concrete looks crappy, pick a dark color / pattern. If you ever decide you don’t want stained floors you can install whatever on top without doing anything unlike other options

after fooling with different remodels over the years, tile, concrete, and hardwood ( real 0.75” stuff), are best investment over time. It amazes me that people will pay more for”luxury “vinyl planks over tile, or pay more for some fake wood over real 0.75” prefinished stuff.

 

[Yellowknife]

as said above no stairs, steps, auxiliary wood heat, which we always use, lots of windows for natural light. And no neighbors has been a plus.

I really really enjoy my wood heat. It’s currently 2F and blowing, and I’m heating the whole place on a few sticks of spruce.

 

[KoolBreeze]

I built 14 years ago and there are a lot of things I'd do differently if building it again. Small bathrooms are of little use. Make them all big, big. Same way with bedrooms, make them big enough so they aren't cramped. Have a dedicated wash room with a hanging rack, counter, and sink. I'd love to have a dedicated mechanical room as well, with all of the utilities terminating in it. Oh and the kitchen, need a big kitchen with walk in pantry. Dining room big enough for a 12 chair table would great for all of the family gatherings we host as well. I could spend a fortune on a "forever" home without much effort.

 

[Agross]

I’ve done concrete flatwork for about 20 years and actually only acid stained one floor, a clubhouse at a nicer golf course. It was kind of a pain cuz they already had all the walls framed in It turned out absolutely beautiful. I would consider doing it in my next house if I ever planned on moving but I don’t. A buddy just did his floors in a barndo he just finished. Turned out great as well

On topic, a lot of people have already said most everything I would’ve said. Wide doors and hallways. Heated garage, bigger than u think. You mentioned a basement, an entrance to the basement from the garage as well as the house. Water spigot in the garage. And please don’t put it a foot off the floor. Can’t believe how many new houses we do and the spigots are so low. U have to stand on yer head to use it, can’t fit a bucket under it, and a pain to put a hose on it.
As mentioned, best windows and insulation u can. We just poured the floors for another buddy building a barndo and he did in floor heat throughout everything and the garage was more than twice the size of the living quarters. Look forward to seeing it when it’s done.

 

[Newtosavage]

I'm curious about the regrets over stained concrete floors. I'm considering stained concrete for my basement. The waterproofness and durability seem appealing with little kids and a dog in the house, but I'm sure there are downsides too. I would be interested to hear from someone who has been there, done that.

Tough on backs and knees and if you drop anything it’s as good as broken. I’ll never have stained concrete in my home

 

[Mojave]

Don’t forget to wire in two EV ports!! Lol

There will be a robotic way for placements E-Wife. They will need charging points.

 

[Forestryguy]

Build the house that will allow you to easily renovate or is ADA compliant. Wider doorways, halls, easy entry/exits. Use quality products that will last. Put way more electrical outlets than you think you really need, and have them correctly wired to the breakers if at full load. Add in vertical electrical conduit in interior walls for future electrical/wiring projects. Make all plumbing and electrical easily accessible for repairs. Do you really need 4000 sq ft vs 2000 sq ft that is built to a higher quality and better craftsmanship. Design/redesign and think of how you function in a house before you have plans drawn up. Have a qualified HVAC person that knows how to properly figure heating and cooling design that system to avoid under or over working units. Learn about some building techniques and standards so you can know if your contractor or subs are cutting corners or being lazy.

Look at Fine Home Building magazine and websites to get some education. Some of their stuff is over the top but you will have an idea what is acceptable practices.

 

[dtrkyman]

Radiant floor heat, including in the giant attached garage!

 

[tony]

Waterproof that basement. Maybe poured basement walls.
Last two friends that built homes had "vaults" built into the basement. Bought bank type vault doors, said the price wasn't bad. Used for gun and valuable storage, safe room, fall out shelter, and reloading.

Bought a house and had the basement waterproofed. They cut the floor, dug down to the footer, drilled holes in each block, laid continuous black drain pipe with holes and tied it into a sump in the corner.
Now the neat thing they did was leave a 1/2 gap from the block and floor when they poured the replacement concrete. Installer said the idea was water that ran down the wall would exit in that gap.
And you could wash the basement floor and squeegee the water into the gap.
Always said if I built a place, I'd do the same thing again.

 

[Buxman]

Just a bigger home generally, so I can have a bigger garage. The other parts are pretty descent.

 

[WiscoHoundsman]

Think about the size and what space you will actually use. We built a ranch with a half finished walk out basement in Wisconsin in 2020. 2300 sf on the main floor with a 30x44 garage. One part I hate is paying taxes on some of the unused /extra space. An example is our master bed room is wide enough for a king bed with windows on each side and room to walk, but length wise we have 8 ft from the bed to our dresser. Extra space we are paying for.

Our open kitchen/living room can be loud as well with the vaulted ceiling.

Lots of other great advice already that I’m not going to repeat. Maybe go with a thicker concrete floor to act as a heat sink and help keep the place hot/cool.

 

[Coopsdaddy]

30x50 shop and 1000sf or under 2 bed cabin.
We are not rich and im not interested in a 2000-3000sf farmhouse like everyone in my area builds.
I want a nice small cabin with all my excess storage in shops 2nd floor.We are a few years out and i bet by then the builders will be looking for work.Time to downsize everything and get the few items that truly bring enjoyment.
This cycle wont last forever.Also forever home means no debt and time to enjoy.Maybe a honda pioneer,pontoon,new sauna,hot tub and mtn bike!

 

[hunterjmj]

We have a 1200 sqft shop and are building a 1500 sqft house. Single level on a crawl space. If I had more money I'd do a few other things but it's a step up from what we had and my wife doesn't want anything bigger. The main things I want are a wood stove, A/C and a good sized laundry room with lots of storage. We just finished our shop and did some things that were suggested on here from a similar post.

 

[hh76]

As has been said a few times, avoid steps.

My mother in law lost 50% of her home over the last two years because she is no longer comfortable climbing the stairs.

My father built his house completely ADA compliant. He mentioned that he wasn't going to get placed in an old folks home because it was difficult to get to the toilet in his house.

 

[jimh406]

Use a contractor that worked for someone you trust. Hopefully, you know someone who's had work done. If you live in a permit area, don't underestimate how much that will be.

If you use propane, make sure the tank is placed where it is not going to be an eyesore. Think about where you will stack wood if you will burn wood.

If you are handy, have options in your contract to finish yourself. Many contractors will take the best job and slack off on others once you are committed but be patient.

Similar materials like tile, sinks, bathtubs, etc can be remarkably dissimilar in price. There are an also a lot of open box deals available if you look. Many of our fixtures and appliances were bought that way.

Have fun. It can be a miserable experience if you are building from scratch. Investigate buying an existing house to remodel, but that isn't without it's own challenges.

 

[Yellowknife]

There are people on this thread espousing "bigger, always bigger", and other people telling you to look carefully at efficiency. You kind of have to decide early on which is going to be your guiding principle.

I'm somewhat in the second camp, although it came out pretty average size in the end. Every square foot you build not only costs money on the front end, but also needs to be furnished, decorated, cleaned, heated, cooled, maintained, and will be taxed.... forever. If one has the time and means to sink into a home on an ongoing basis, then great. But I really hate furniture shopping, so that's a reason to keep things minimal right there!

Shoot, I'd avoid extra rooms just to keep the paint selection effort reasonable. Everything you do on a custom home involved lots of decisions, and we were very ready to be done with it at the end.

 

[jimh406]

There are people on this thread espousing "bigger, always bigger", and other people telling you to look carefully at efficiency. You kind of have to decide early on which is going to be your guiding principle.

I agree with Yellowknife that you need to find what's best for you.

Just one more thing to add, I feel like the property is the key. We were going to build, but we found a piece of property that already had a house that we felt we had to buy.

 

[Sherman]

Urinal

 

[Seeknelk]

Please don't source and supply your own plumbing fixtures. There is ALWAYS a pile of wrong parts or missing things,( drain body's to match is often forgotten). And thats always at crunch time and homeowner always says, " can you just find that for us"?! It's costly for sub to make extra trips and waiting for late parts or slapping temporary things (and changing later) in so you can move in early is a huge pain.

- at least rough in for a hot water recirc system. Pump , valving in mech room can be added later if you want to.
- oh yes , speaking of mech room. Plan on a at least a decent size mech room. Doesn't have to be huge, but water heater , furnace or boiler, water softeners , electrical panels, radon pump if needed, etc all take up space. A couple well placed hub drains on perimeter of mech room keep floor area tidy ,keeps condensate pipes from snaking across to floor drain.
- avoid plumbing on exterior walls as much as possible in cold country. Kitchen and bathroom sinks are no problem. But shower valves and laundry washer boxes are IN the wall and can freeze.
- exterior hose bibs. We need an interior wall for the long frost free hose bib to slide back into, if you don't want them low ,out the rim joist. Will also work in cabinets if it doesn't bother you ,but you'll see it under there.
- fancy floor mounted tub fillers on finished concrete floors are a real problem to figure out!
- quality PEX all the way to Wirsbo brand stops is a bombproof, inexpensive system.
Just gripes, thoughts from a plumber .