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Thread: Rural Studio's $20,000 Houses

  1. #1

    Rural Studio's $20,000 Houses

    http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2...n_alabama.html
    Rural Studio, the celebrated undergraduate program of the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture at Auburn University, has been educating citizen architects since it was founded in 1993 by D.K. Ruth and the late Samuel Mockbee. Rural Studio at Twenty: Designing and Building in Hale County, Alabama by Andrew Freear and Elena Barthel with Andrea Oppenheimer Dean will be released tomorrow by Princeton Architectural Press. Here at the Eye, the authors share an excerpt of the book that centers on the 20K House project, an academic design-and-build program that delivers affordable housing for locals and is currently being developed as a commercial product.

    Rural Studio launched its affordable housing program in 2005. We were eager to make our work more relevant to the needs of west Alabama, the Southeast, and possibly the entire country. We looked at the omnipresent American trailer park, where homes, counterintuitively, depreciate each year they are occupied. We wanted to create an attractive small house that would appreciate in value while accommodating residents who are unable to qualify for credit.

    Our goal was to design a market-rate model house that could be built by a contractor for $20,000 ($12,000 for materials and $8,000 for labor and profit)—the 20K House, a house for everybody and everyone. We chose $20,000 because it would be the most expensive mortgage a person receiving today’s median Social Security check of $758 a month can realistically repay. A $108 monthly mortgage payment is doable if you consider other monthly expenditures.

    More at the link
    Based on the idea of natural rights, government secures those rights to the individual by strictly negative intervention, making justice costless and easy of access; and beyond that it does not go. The State, on the other hand, both in its genesis and by its primary intention, is purely anti-social. It is not based on the idea of natural rights, but on the idea that the individual has no rights except those that the State may provisionally grant him. It has always made justice costly and difficult of access, and has invariably held itself above justice and common morality whenever it could advantage itself by so doing.
    --Albert J. Nock



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  3. #2
    Interesting. I've been interested in building a tiny house recently. Already have a septic tank, power line close and we can share a well. I figure I can bring in a nice 500-600 sg. ft. for around 20k-25k doing all the work myself. I have a licensed electrician and plumbing friend that can just sign off on my work once they've inspected it so that we can get county approval. At 500$ a month it could be paid off in about 5-6 yrs. Then I think it could make a good supplemental income. Just an idea to bat around.

  4. #3
    The page hasn't loaded for me yet, but the things that people who design these homes rarely figure in are:

    1. plumbing/water/waste
    2. electricity
    3. heat

    I love these types of projects, but a well and waste system can easily add at least another $10k to the price. I also think it's important to make these homes so they are easy to work on and can be repaired for minimal costs with inexpensive materials.

  5. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by phill4paul View Post
    Interesting. I've been interested in building a tiny house recently. Already have a septic tank, power line close and we can share a well. I figure I can bring in a nice 500-600 sg. ft. for around 20k-25k doing all the work myself. I have a licensed electrician and plumbing friend that can just sign off on my work once they've inspected it so that we can get county approval. At 500$ a month it could be paid off in about 5-6 yrs. Then I think it could make a good supplemental income. Just an idea to bat around.
    You could definitely rent one out. We're talking about building a micro guest house!

    Those are nice designs.
    Based on the idea of natural rights, government secures those rights to the individual by strictly negative intervention, making justice costless and easy of access; and beyond that it does not go. The State, on the other hand, both in its genesis and by its primary intention, is purely anti-social. It is not based on the idea of natural rights, but on the idea that the individual has no rights except those that the State may provisionally grant him. It has always made justice costly and difficult of access, and has invariably held itself above justice and common morality whenever it could advantage itself by so doing.
    --Albert J. Nock

  6. #5
    You can buy a decent livable used single wide for under 5k and a really nice one for 10. They are usually 800-1200 sq ft. Around here they are built like tanks because of the snow load and wind zone being near the ocean. 2x6 studs 12 or 16 oc is the standard. Cheap to heat too. Honestly a used single wide looks better built and more durable than what is pictured there for half the price.

  7. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by amy31416 View Post
    The page hasn't loaded for me yet, but the things that people who design these homes rarely figure in are:

    1. plumbing/water/waste
    2. electricity
    3. heat

    I love these types of projects, but a well and waste system can easily add at least another $10k to the price. I also think it's important to make these homes so they are easy to work on and can be repaired for minimal costs with inexpensive materials.
    Composting toilet, very good levels of insulation, LED lighting, leisure batteries and cheap solar panels would get rid of a lot of these big expenses - water is always the tricky one unless you have a nearby natural supply or don't mind treating rainwater.

    Have been looking in depth at building a secret off-grid hideaway and water is always the stumbling point, without treatment / reverse osmosis etc.



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