Book/publication for building new house out there?

[Hippoharbor]

DH and I are wanting to build a new house within the next year. Because DH "works all day", he is leaving it up to me to do all of the grunt work...find a developer, lot, etc. I do not even know where to begin and am having anxiety about this process!! In the St Louis area, we will likely have to buy property with a house already on it and tear down to build. I was hoping there is some sort of publication, maybe from the "Dummy" series, that could get me started on this process.


Thanks,
Michelle

[nupe]

http://www.windsorpeak.com/newhouse/default.html

The Your New House book by the Fields has a lot of great information.

I think I read thorugh a Dummy one too.

Nupe

[ChunkyNicksChunkyMom]

Check out Thathomeite.com. I did the general contracting of the house we have been in for two years and that site was a godsend. Got to the building a home forum or the buying a home forum.


Susan

#1 Nick 11-18-04
#2 ETA 05-22-06

[cleo27]

nt

[tarabenet]

We're starting this process too. I've had fun digging through magazines full of home floorplans, to figure out what we really do and don't want. Lots of them post online as well, like homeplans.com, eplans.com, and others you will pop up if you just do a Google search. And the sites will let you search based on things like a range of square footage, architectural styles, width and lenth of footprint. You might enjoy starting there.

We picked up some books on sustainable housing and related topics. The one book that left me very disappointed was "Build Your Own Home on a Shoestring". I was hoping for some of those lesser-known kind of tips like what size framing to go with, roofline angles, whatever. I could figure out for myself that "to keep costs down, build a smaller home" or "3 bathrooms will be less expensive to build than 4". Duh!

[cmo]

I found 'The Not-So-Big House' by ?first name? Susanka very helpful. It helped me think about what spaces I wanted to have and how I'd use them, down to every little detail like furniture arrangement and light switch & outlet placement. Not that I didn't make some mistakes anyways in the building process, but that's another story!

Best wishes; it's an adventure like no other!

[trumansmom]

This is a wonderful book! DH & I thought about building a few years ago. We had babies instead. :) However, this book had the only floor plans and ideas that we BOTH liked.

Jeanne
Mom to Truman 11/01 and Eleanor 4/04
Independent Consultant, Do-Re-Me & You!

[brittone2]

I agree...that is a great site. I think Susan made a slight typo, which you may have been able to figure out already, but if not the website she mentioned is www.thathomesite.com

[brittone2]

Awesome book :) We haven't ever built a house from start to finish but I love gathering ideas for the future and I LOVE this book :)