Image source: sheltercouses.com
This blog was written without AI. I used Gemini, Grammarly, and my wife afterward to check for simple spelling and grammar mistakes. This is unrelated to the app itself, but reflects my concern on the housing market and pursuing alternatives.
The Problem: Housing is Expensive, and the Options Stink
Since getting married and living on one income, I have thought quite a lot about having our own place. However, my income is the average family income for our rural location, and I have a couple of other part-time jobs to make ends meet.
As a millennial, my situation is not uncommon. On social media,I see many in my generation and younger noting that housing costs and rent prices make it nearly impossible for most of my generation to buy a home.
Some of this is, of course, corporate greed: BlackRock and other large corporations buying up housing to inflate the cost and then sell it at the higher, inflated cost is the sort of thing that will send people to hell. I can’t see how it is not equivalent to robbing the poor for corporate gain.
But add to this that there are fewer people in the trades (so the cost is higher for labor), debt from college because many of us got useless degrees, higher cost of materials, and inflation due to government spending, and the result is that we are just making ends meet.
The types of family houses that are on the average level in my area don’t look the greatest and would require me to make monthly payments for the rest of my life on a house that doesn’t look beautiful. I don’t want to spend my life sending money to the bank.
My Childhood House
This has led me down the YouTube rabbit trail to consider other types of housing, and I wanted to share my little twist on it. In doing so, I figured it best to consider my childhood home.
The house I lived in growing up (and where my parents still live) was pretty terrible. My grandpa had someone build it, but grandpa was pretty cheap, and I think he hired the lowest common denominator to build the house. When I was very young, my mom discovered, after the drywall started to bubble, that part of our basement exterior wall was made of wood and was rotting away. The wooden studs were also at odd intervals, just slapped together with a hope and a dream to hold the weight of the building.
When I was 10 or so, my parents added an extension to the house. The builder didn’t install the seal under the new sliding glass door, so air blew into the kitchen below the floor.
In high school, I noticed some snow coming in from the bottom corner of the frame of my window. The wind was strong enough to blow out a candle.
Note: if I had actually told my parents about this, I am sure they would have fixed it.
In the summer, the basement always smelled like mildew, and a dehumidifier had to be constantly running. In the winter, the basement was constantly cold.
At some point, my parents installed an outdoor wood-burning stove instead of relying on the cast-iron stoves that were upstairs and downstairs. Basically, the outdoor stove boils water, and then that water gets circulated through the central fan. It burned a lot of wood, and we spent many weekends chainsawing and moving firewood.
With this setup, there was quite a lot of loss of efficiency. Water was always boiling off and needed to be refilled. The pipe running from the boiler to the house was not as sealed as it could be because the snow would always melt first over the line running to the boiler.
Even within the house, if we used the indoor wood-burning stoves, I noticed that a lot of the heat would go out through the chimney, and I was already curious as to ways to capture that heat. Create more surface area - like a stainless steel sink sponge around the entire stove? So much was going outside the chimney.
Alternative Building Concepts
My mind has a few foci: 1) efficiency of a building, 2) sustainable and locally sourced nature of the materials, 3) the environmental impact of those materials, and 4) cost!
In terms of efficiency, a home can be made to be stable, in the sense that you do not have to put a lot of energy into it to make the climate inside cool or warm. How can the house make the best use of the sun? How can I limit the amount of electricity and/or wood needed to keep the house cool/warm? Having an interior thermal mass helps regulate the temperature, but in some climates (like mine), a layer of insulation is necessary. Having more thermal mass means it takes a long time to heat up and cool down the building, making the temperature more stable inside. In construction, you will hear “R-Value” thrown around a lot, and this is the value for how long it takes for the temperature on the outside to pass through to the inside.
In terms of materials, most alternative building methods focus on what is readily available and locally sourced. This cuts down on needing manufactured parts, which adds to the cost. 5 years ago, the cost of a single 2x4x8 rose to almost $12. If you can build with resources from your property for free, it cuts down dramatically on the cost. Dirt/clay can be found almost anywhere, so using that as an interior plaster for thermal mass can dramatically increase the efficiency of the building. One of the things that makes an alternative build an alternative build is being able to source materials locally, cutting down on transportation and manufacturing costs in materials.
In terms of the environmental impact, a lot of modern-day houses are thrown together as quickly and as cheaply as possible, with those houses maybe lasting a generation before mold or the shortcuts made destroy the building. There’s a YouTuber in Arizona I follow that often walks through multi-million dollar homes with termite, mold, and insulation issues in new homes. Many of those homes are basically paper.
Other homes are made to be very efficient, but have chemicals (due to spray foam), and the products used off-gas into the environment. An ICF home is very efficient. It is basically a concrete bunker surrounded in styrofoam. But add to that spray foam insulation and you’re breathing off-gas chemicals year round.
Alternative methods using clay or lime do not mold and do not off-gas. They are also breathable, allowing air into the house passively. Some modern houses, like the ICF just mentioned, are so closed off they have to have a return air system so that the occupants inside do not suffocate.
An ICF wall. Source icfhomes.com
If and when modern homes decay, most of it will end up in a landfill. Why not build with materials that, if the house burns or decays, will sink back into its environment with little impact?
Lastly, there is the cost consideration in alternative building. The cost to do an alternative build, on your own, is far, far cheaper than building a brand new home, or even buying a 30 or 40 year old home that has a lot of character to it.
Part of the reason, as mentioned before, is the readily available and locally sourced materials.
The cost of labor is another one of the most significant factors - you are paying someone else to do the work in most modern builds. Some things will need to be outsourced - like final architectural permits,(1) the foundation, (2) plumbing, electrical, septic, and possibly the roof - but with some training, you can learn alternative methods on their own. But, alternative builds like this require more labor. Most alternative builds I have seen rely on “build parties” where the owners get friends and family together to stack straw bales or apply plaster.
There is real value in professional work. There are excellent builders in most fields of framing, finishing, concrete, electrical, and plumbing (as well as any other field under the sun, just as there are terrible professionals). If you have a go-for-it and learn attitude like myself, some of things might still be able to be done by you, but I would caution and still have it double checked by a professional.
Do you see a man skillful in his work? He will stand before kings; he will not stand before obscure men. Proverbs 22:29
(1) From what I’ve read, this can be difficult with alternative builds. In Michigan, where I live, straw bale construction is in the state code.
(2) Do not skimp on this. I have seen in the alternative building sphere the use of “rubble trench” where pieces of rock are dumped into a trench and the house is built on that. An alternative house is a lot of work and skimping on the foundation could prove disastrous for the work you put into a home. In Michigan, we have a pretty decent freeze/thaw cycle, and the water in the ground will move those types of foundations.
A Warning in the Cost
In terms of cost, I must note that sometimes alternative methods to modern construction do not have codes for them in modern code books. This means that it can sometimes be harder to pull a permit for alternative builds, even if they have been used for thousands of years! It may cost additional money for plans to be approved.
Different types of Alternative Building
Many different alternative building methods exist, but some really excel in different environments. Earth bag, adobe, and cob homes do really well in the Southern US where it doesn’t get cold. When I lived in North Carolina for a while, everywhere I went, the ground was red with clay that could be used for cob or adobe.
Here are some different types:
Earth bag homes look like beehives. The method fills long tubes filled with dirt and then are plastered on the inside and outside. These have great thermal mass, but little insulation, and are great for an arid environment where it might get really hot in the day and cold at night.
Adobe and cob are similar in that they are made out of clay and straw. To make adobe blocks, the clay and straw are typically placed into molds, dried, and then stacked like bricks. Cob is typically molded, but can be put into forms. These also have great thermal mass, but little insulation.
An adobe home.
Source:architecturaldigest.com
Rammed earth uses a cement binder mixed with dirt to create thick walls. It’s basically like using concrete except much more sustainable because you can use more locally sourced materials.
A rammed earth building.
Source: naturalbuildingblog.com
Straw bale houses can be built with straw bales as the walls as the supporting structure, or as the infill for the walls for insulation. Straw is very efficient because of the air trapped between the straw sticks and, once a clay or lime plaster is applied, resistant to fire, rodents, and bugs. It’s pretty cheap for a straw bale. It is best to have the lime plaster on the exterior because it is water resistant. Some methods I have seen use a clay plaster undercoat and a final coat of lime plaster for the exterior and use the clay plaster on the inside. A straw bale can have between an R30 and R40 insulation value
A strawbale home with lime plaster.
Source: Strawbale.com
Clay Straw houses usually follow the modern stick building methods, but fill in the cavities with straw covered in a watered down clay (clay slip). Clay straw is less efficient than straw bale and still needs a clay or lime plaster.
Timberframe requires some training, and usually uses a SIP panel (two sheets of board with insulation between them or “structural insulated panel”) for insulation and sheer strength. They can be beautiful buildings.
Sheer strength refers to the tendency of a building to move side-to-side, typically with wind. You maybe have seen videos of a stick frame falling down in the wind. That is, in part, due to lack of bracing in the build (shortcuts), but also that the wood paneling (OSB or plywood) had not been applied to the exterior of the frame. These sheets prevent the house from twisting and turning, loosening connections. Paneling makes a house rigid.
This is a timber framed house using SIPs insulation panels.
Source: Timberbuilt.com
Other considerations:
Green roofs: where the house has a layer of dirt and allows for plants to grow on top of it. The extra water absorbs heat in the summer and snow catches on it in the winter to provide extra insulation. Extra care needs to be taken that the added weight can be supported by the structure below it. The slopes on these roofs cannot be too steep or the dirt would slough off. While having grass or flowers on a roof might seem like it would pose a fire hazard, the wet dirt below it would absorb a lot of the heat. Fire burns upward as well, so if there’s nothing above it, the house won’t catch fire.
A green roof.
Source: sempergreen.com
Masonry and rocket mass heaters: Earlier, I mentioned my childhood concern of how to make fireplaces more efficient; the solution on how to make a stove more efficient has already been solved! Masonry and rocket mass heaters use a highly efficient combustion and thermal mass to store heat. Both heaters store the heat from combustion in the masonry or clay around the stove - as the fuel burns, the air gets funneled through chutes to warm up the clay or stone before leaving the building. There is also a secondary combustion area where the off-gas from the first burn gets ignited again. These burners burn quickly and very hot, leaving very little ash and soot, but the heat is captured before leaving the house. Buying a masonry heater kit would be an expense, but it has the benefit of the viewable fireplace in the house, and even an oven. There is basically no smoke with these heating methods and they do not use much fuel.
A masonry heater.
Source: tempcast.com
Passive solar house: describes how a house is positioned in relation to the sun. A passive solar house angles the eaves so that during the hottest parts of the year, the interior of the house is shaded, but in the coldest parts of the year, the sun is able to enter and (ideally) warm thermal mass within the building. Certain windows are required for this, since some windows block the light that would warm the house up.
Geothermal Heat Pump: instead of heating up coils, there is a way to “pump out” heat from inside to outside or from outside to inside, sort of like a refrigerator. You can use the earth’s stable year round temperature as the “dump” for the extra heat, or, if heat is needed inside, less of a change from the ground temperature to heat it up to what the room temperature needs to be.
Lime Plaster: Already mentioned, but worth noting more about it. Lime plaster, when mixed with water, absorbs CO2 from the air and turns back into limestone. Applied on the exterior, it is waterproof, bug proof, fireproof, and vapor permeable, allowing moisture to move in and out of the walls without building up and condensing on the inside of the outer wall (which would create mold). It can also be used on the interior walls, but cheaper clay could be used as the thermal mass on the inside. Lime plasters can be applied and polished in such a way that they can be used in showers.
Solar Water Heater: These work primarily in the southern US. Water is pumped to the roof and instead of using electricity or gas to heat the tank, the sun warms up the water. Various types of these heaters are available for purchase, some more efficient than others, and don’t work as well in northern climates in the winter. The building would need to adjust for the added weight on the roof, if attached to the roof. The water would only be hottest in the afternoon, so it would mean waiting to run appliances (dishwasher and washer) in the afternoon, and the temperature of the showers getting colder as the evening runs later. Some versions have a solar like panel on ground level, angled to the sun. Other versions use a type of ethanol instead of water to transfer heat, which is not as efficient, but is more useful in environments where it freezes - the downside is that it is not as efficient and crystallizes in higher heat temperatures, reducing the efficiency of the system.
Earthen Floor: A type of flooring different than the traditional concrete slab. Usually, the foundation is still concrete, but the actual floor of the house is made of a mixture of clay, straw, and sand. There is still a vapor barrier and insulation added below the floor to prevent heat loss and ground moisture from coming into the house.
My Ideal House
A house preference should really take into consideration your location. I live in southern Michigan, and that rules out Earth bag, Adobe, Cob, and Rammed Earth only, since we can get to -40F and the state has minimum R-values for new builds. Some sort of insulation is necessary. Some adobe, cob, and rammed earth construction will have a middle layer of insulation to prevent thermal bridging from the outside to the inside. In the south, with less extreme cold, insulation is less likely to be an issue, since the thermal mass of the material will warm up during the day, cool down at night, and create a temperature stability.
If I could build my own house here in southern Michigan, here is what I would want to do:
Use a mix of timber frame and straw bale construction. I would take a course on how to do the right cuts for the wood and then use the straw bales for the exterior walls for insulation.
On the interior walls, I would use clay plaster for temperature regulation
Somewhere in the house, preferably near the kitchen or the living room, I would install a masonry heater or a rocket mass heater.
Passively solar in relation to the house’s angle, eaves, and the windows that are used.
Ideally, I could add some solar panels for energy.
Possibly implementing some sort of hybrid water heating by running water through thermal mass into an adjacent greenhouse. While not bringing the temperature all the way up, it could cut costs by bringing the groundwater temperature part way.
I would make the bedrooms relatively small, but the communal places relatively large. Our ancestors didn’t need huge master bedrooms and baths. Kids should have enough for a bed, a desk, and a closet, but they don’t need a huge floor space for their room. My wife and I do not need a huge master bedroom or bath. The living room, study, dining room, and kitchen is where I would put the design and build effort. We want to host and bring others into our home. We want to spend time with our kids in the open areas and with people we love. One day, I’d love to have a table that can seat 20 people! I’ve seen some house builds where the table is merged into the kitchen island only, which I detest.
Depending on the design, I might like to try a green roof. I do like traditional, triangular shaped roofs, but a green roof is appealing for the insulation value and the novelty of it. Growing a native wildflower garden on my roof seems absolutely delightful.
In the south/front of the house, I would like a garden, both for sustainability and knowing where my food comes from.
I would like to do an earthen floor, but with some underfloor heating running through piping around the masonry stove or the greenhouse. I would still need to have insulation and a vapor barrier underneath the floor.
Due to mold and humidity issues with almost every basement I have been in here in Michigan, I would prefer to have no basement. I’d prefer to build a butler’s pantry built like a bunker for storms.
Between the mix of straw bale, passive solar, and thermal mass in the house, the house would need very little to keep it warm/cool. I would probably need help and/or need to do more research on good insulation for the roof. I don’t want a ton of open space in an attic.
I am a Christian, and building in such a way as to reduce environmental impact I think is an application of the dominion mandate, which is not to “dominate” or rape the world God created, but to tend for it, care for it, live in harmony with it, and make it more fruitful to the glory of God (Gen 2:15).
We’ve been building homes for millennia
People have been building places to live for thousands of years. What’s new is safety codes - things that are meant to protect life. It is good that we have load bearing, foundation, plumbing, and electrical requirements, as these codes are meant to protect life.
Alternative building is, in a way, returning to ancient building practices. Current codes, at least in the US, focus on the speed of mass produced homes in stick framing.
To be able to build one’s own home, even if at great cost of time, is really intriguing to me, and I would love to see others buy the hype behind it while they are young to set a good foundation for their future. Learn skills while you’re young; it is harder to change skill sets when you have to make sure you are still able to provide for your family.
*An Aside on Covetousness
As a note, I do not want to throw the current predicament of not being able to buy a house on my parent’s generation. I have seen accusations on the internet that put a lot of animus on boomers just because they could afford houses. Just because older folks have money does not mean that they got that money by evil means. The stock market has done well for the boomer generation, but other factors have made it harder for our generation, noted above.
My dad has worked hard in a factory for 40 some years, getting up at 4:30 every morning. I worked at that factory for one summer in college, and I hated it. So, kudos to him for sticking it out so long. Kudos for those who have put in a lot of hard work! It is harder for us to have a house, and this is one of those outliers that makes it more reasonable for my generation to continue to rent, but just because a different age was given different circumstances does not warrant the level of vitriol I have seen.
As a citizen of the United States, I live in one of the most wealthy places in the world, and it is easy to look across at other people in our society and covet what they have, not recognizing the gift that I have already been given, and I have been given a lot. We have running water, a continuous power supply, freedom of speech and religion. Most people have the marvel of a smart phone, a personal computer, a vehicle, access to stocked grocery stores, endless free (or monthly paid) media.
The charge to the rich is to be generous to their neighbor (1 Tim 6:6-7, 17-19) - beginning with family and then extending to church, community, and nation. If you have money, God has not given it to you all for yourself, but to steward it well why you are here. You cannot take it with you.
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain, 7 for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. 8 But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. 9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. 1 Timothy 6:6–10
17 As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. 18 They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, 19 thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life. 1 Timothy 6:17–19
8 I say this not as a command, but to prove by the earnestness of others that your love also is genuine. 9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich. 2 Corinthians 8:8–9
7 Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. 2 Corinthians 9:7
34 You yourselves know that these hands ministered to my necessities and to those who were with me. 35 In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” Acts 20:34–35
If money has been gotten by ill means, God has some harsh words for those who oppress the poor:
1 Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. 2 Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. 4 Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. 5 You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you. James 5:1–6
9 Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation, 10 and the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. 11 For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits. James 1:9–11
For those of you who aren’t rich - trust the Lord. He gives gifts to all (James 1:17-18), both to the just and unjust. The rich person has more to be accountable for, but we are all are accountable with what we do with our lives.
Free Farmhouse designs - while not alternative, these are made for budget minded people, adding extensions later.