Our city ordinances only allow one residence per lot (if there’s a kitchen it’s considered a home), there’s some go arounds if you connect it with a dog trot, but it ends up being costly and kind of a pain. We were thinking of doing something like this with a large metal building garage with 2 bedrooms, but then it’s like we need a kitchen and what about a common living space and before you know it you’ve overbuilt and it detracts resources from the end goal. I did the math on converting a shed to a tiny home here once, and the numbers were laughably bad, like almost 200k. Then there’s septic permits which you’re not really supposed to be able to apply for more than you need. Might be able to “for future use” permit it, but by the time you add in site work costs, fill dirt, concrete pad, all that effort it’s like you might as well have built the SFH. In our state there are a lot of requirements other states don’t have, like everything, even garages, has to be engineered and stamped so it’s several more thousands of dollars to get even get to the plans stage and specific permits/inspections.
We’re in hurricane central so a portable/stick frame/temp housing is sketchy. It’s block/metal or nothing. It’s several acres, nothing crazy so don’t want to split it, it’s just rural-ish AG a stone’s throw from a desirable town and the coast so that ups the value. We’ve added utilities out here, paid in cash, so we’ve got a lot of $$ tied up in it; not easy to draw that equity if you’re not building directly on the land. Our lender will apply full market value to our construction loan which would bring total cost down a lot, but then the backend is just terrible with taxes. It’s happening all over the state, tons of people moving out of state after $xx,xxx in taxes and insurance. People dumping their AIR bnbs/VRBOs. Mega builders dropping prices + offering big incentives. I expect this to improve if there’s a big dip in sale prices, but that’s gonna take some time. Let’s say there are 2 homes… one is a 20 year old McMansion that hasn’t had a single thing updated, got several inches of flooding despite being built on a hill, and has a cracked slab and the other is a mega builder new construction home that’s the same size with same features and they pay closing costs. They’re both the same price. Actually, the new one can be had for 20k less on certain models. That’s the tipping point we’re at.
Closer to 200k, absolutely doable in 2-3 years, closer to 300k would take a couple more years. Same price as this new build per month, except a couple thousand extra going towards principle instead of interest, and if something happens, we have flexibility. No debt, drive paid off, older cars with affordable (for here) insurance, biggest help with kids is that our state pays for homeschooling through a scholarship so you get basically the equivalent of what the public school would get if your child enrolled. It covers so much: classes, sports, curriculum, some furniture, teaching aids, so that takes the pressure off my husband cause that stuff adds up quick. We’ve survived off of 50k a year with a mortgage that ate up half that once upon a time and no govt benefits, so totally willing to scrimp for a decent paid-off property. Problem is finding one that cheap that isn’t a total disaster. Right now you could definitely buy something for sub 200k and probably lose your shirt still and live in a mold pit and face total loss of belongings every other year. It’s super annoying because we’ve found a couple good value properties but we’re competing with realtors and cash investors. The scary thing is that they don’t even cash flow at the prices they’re paying + Reno costs. Even new construction in town on a mini mountain of elevation is not entirely out of the flood zone. Paying $4k a year for mandatory NFIP flood (not including general insurance!) insurance on a sub-1500 sqft *new* build is insane. It’s not like that price is likely to ever go down. So those are the cons for buying pre-existing right now (in our area).
Sorry for long post, we’re in kind of a funny situation and it’s stressing me out a bit because pregnancy, and we’re like 2 years deep into one direction. My husband is really happy about all this, he says we have many options and I should be happy, but I just want to have a home again. It took us 6 months from start to finish to design these plans and see them through engineering, and at this point I wonder if we should just find stock plans for a small block home, get them stamped, and go from there.
PS, if anyone here needs a new AC, get ‘em now. Prices are going to increase several thousand because they require a different refrigerant.
but I’d be making duplicate threads.
but I have a baby due in November and just want to be settled in. We can build a home in 3-4 months start to finish. I’m usually really on the nose with real estate, but this market is so weird and there’s uncertainty about flood/home insurance and whether a new bill increasing homestead to lower property taxes is going to take off next year. 99% of properties do not cash flow for rentals andthe rental market is cooling too. I see many Air BNBs hitting the resale or long term market as well.