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We live in California, and with earthquakes we cannot build with bricks. This is a custom home we are building largely ourselves, and we’ve overbuilt the entire house including the foundation and frame (2x8 exterior as opposed to 2x4). I agree that many other homes are built quickly and cheaply, which is why we are building ours to last. We’ve decided to go with a Mediterranean style home with stucco siding, clay roof tiles, rockwool insulation, all copper water lines, copper vents, etc.

The main house is 4500 sqft, 5 bed, and 4 bath, but we have 3 kids and an au pair. We’re going to rent our 1200 sqft, 3 bed, and 2 bath guest house. Certainly not as large as the 10,000 sqft homes in the neighborhood. They all sit on 20 acres of vineyards with a 2 acre house pad each.

Thanks for reaching out about this! It takes about 30 minutes to upload the 4K version after the standard definition version posts. 😊

The proper tools help so much, that rebar tying tool in particular saved us so much time on the main house. We tied the guest house rebar by hand and it took a long time and was very tedious.

We’ve used our little blue tractor for so many jobs over the years, from trenching the underground electrical and water lines, digging the 100 foot long septic leach field, digging holes for percolation tests, installing fence posts, moving dirt around the property to grade the land, moving base rock around the property, landscaping, etc. It has paid for itself many times over.

What can we say? A lot of hard work has happened between 2019 and now to take our property from a dirt lot to 2 houses. 😊

Since 2019 when we bought our property we’ve been owners/builders building up our property largely ourselves. We installed our utilities, obtained our permits, built our guest house and are working on our main house. We are both PhD physicists working full time and building our house ourselves (everything besides framing, concrete finishing, and stucco). We cut out labor costs in the Bay Area and are building with cash and are going to build around $4M in equity, build our dream house and rental property. People have been interested in our story, the timeline, the process and the costs, if you’re not interested that’s completely fine, you can just swipe the other way.

Making progress everyday! 😊

Hello to Brazil! 😊

@@HarkeEstate Yours work is wonderful.

@@valmirs.dourado Thank you so much! We appreciate your kind comment!

Oh that’s the one job where I immediately knew we’d have to subcontract out. In our timeframe there was no way we’d be able to do that on our own.

@@HarkeEstate yep exactly. Too much work and very dangerous too.

Thank you so much! We really appreciate this kind comment.

We’re building 2 houses 90% ourselves with cash in the Bay Area while both working full time and raising our family and are making multiple millions in equity in the process. Some people have been very interested in the process, timeline, cost savings of the owner/builder route, etc. If you’re not one of those people, that is completely fine, as no one is requiring you to watch our content.

😊

You mean with the blue plastic hangers? Simpson makes them and it holds the anchors at the specific height and spacing per the structural engineering plans.

@@HarkeEstate ya, I think most people just put them in after you pour your concrete and wiggle them in after.

@@concice1843 There’s a way and then there’s a better way! There are lots of ways to cut corners on a build, but this is our own house so we went above and beyond code on every aspect we could.

We’ve been married almost 5 years now ❤️ Beauty, brains, and a good work ethic.

I applaud you both. That is truly hard to find!!

@@dannynoel6936 Thank you! Truly appreciate that. We’re both physicists by day, house builders by night and have two (almost three) kids under 4 years old. It has been a full family adventure, but we’ve all been embracing and enjoying it.

Rest assured the whole foundation was made 100% to the structural engineer’s plans, was overbuilt as compared to the county requirements, and inspected by the county inspector.

Thank you!

Thank you! Documenting the great adventure. 😊

We looked at Zillow. Since land doesn’t have an actual address it put it really far (30 minutes) outside of where we were looking. Luckily my husband recognized a sign on the property and we drove down from our rental property and it was actually really close to the area we were looking for land in. We’re about a 30 minute drive.

Thank you! I appreciate the encouragement and the tip.

Our oldest loves running around outside and playing in the dirt. While we were doing rebar he’d ask almost every single day to go outside and play in the dirt. Now he asks to go to the big house to play. It has been a great experience getting to involve the kids when we can. While we were doing rebar, we’d usually get our youngest son down for bedtime before we’d go outside with our oldest, but some evenings we’d start right after an early dinner and we’d bring him outside for an hour to get some fresh air before bed. It has been so nice living in the guest house right next to the job site so we can just put the kids to sleep, grab the baby monitor and go work outside.

You’ll get there!

@@HarkeEstate thank you!

Thanks! We’ve had our bulldozer for a year and a half now and it has enabled us to complete all of the work we’ve wanted to on our house build. That being said, there’s always room for improvement. Any tips or suggestions?

You have to run the blade by the seat of your pants......feeling what the dozer is doing. It takes time and practice. Your working for yourself on your own property, best place to learn.@@HarkeEstate

Thanks! It has been a huge help during our house build. Just a little maintenance when we first bought it to get it up and running. Took down those sycamore trees so easily, a very powerful piece of equipment.

4500 sqft, 5 bed, 4 bath, and a 2 car garage.

Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it

@@HarkeEstate if you would like help or suggestions with your D6, I would check out the antique caterpillar machine owners club they should be able to give you tips or tricks, and where to get parts I would also look at your local caterpillar dealer. If you do go there, make sure to write down the serial number of your D6 because if you go there looking for parts for it, they would need to know the serial number

We did the Tyvek wrap on the exterior walls and the underlayment on the roof ourselves. The framers are responsible for the windows and exterior doors for the main house. Also, the sheathing is the wood sheathing closing in the rough framing. Drywall that will go inside is different. At the moment we are planning to do the drywall ourselves for the main house.

It’s shipped for free with no delivery charge from Lowe’s so the man was a subcontractor of Lowe’s. The exterior sheathing for the house is already done. It’s covered by the Tyvek house wrap. No, you put insulation in after the framing and roughs are inspected (electrical, plumbing, HVAC, and sprinklers). There is in general a rock wool shortage so we wanted to get insulation bought slightly ahead of time. We are nearly done with the garage so we were going to get that inspected and get the insulation in.

You’re welcome! We were happy to do it! Let us know if there’s anything else you want to see.

Not after meeting the bulldozer.

¡Muchas gracias! Ha sido una aventura familiar completa y estamos contentos de poder trabajar duro para lograr el futuro que queremos para nosotros y nuestros hijos. --- Thank you so much! It has been a full family adventure and we're glad that we can work hard to accomplish the future we want for ourselves and our children.

Yes, we subcontracted out the framing on both houses. The wall and roof sheathing was included in the framing cost along with setting the windows and exterior doors.

How much did that cost and for how much sqft? I am sorry if you have already mentioned the cost in some other video. I remember total you took $300,000 HELOC for main house build.

@@user-fo5mk6qr1c It was $62,000 for our 1927 sqft (total) for the guest house and $204,000 for our 4444 sqft (total) main house.

@@HarkeEstate hmm. How much did the guest house total cost you? Did you contract out anything else other than foundation pouring and framing, sheathing?

@@user-fo5mk6qr1c For the build it cost around $160,000. This wasn’t including the $80,000 permits. We did the foundation (excavation, compaction, digging the footings, vapor barrier, gravel, rebar, concrete forms) ourselves. We subcontracted the concrete finishing, framing (including sheathing), stucco, and tile floors. We did the foundation, underground plumbing and electrical, electrical, duct work, fire sprinklers, plumbing, drywall hanging, insulation, drywall finishing (mudding, taping, sanding), painting, baseboard, custom window casements, interior doors, trim, kitchen and bathroom cabinets, tile roof, electrical and plumbing fixtures, and tub and showers ourselves. An example of labor costs: the lowest quote we received for electrical for the guest house was $50,000. We saved so much money doing a majority of the build ourselves.

Of course! We’ll get the bulldozer fired up and get the video!

That is so awesome! Thank you so much@@HarkeEstate

@@mrneil962 Hi! Here’s the video: Caterpillar D6-9U Bulldozer (1952) Hydraulic Blade Control th-cam.com/video/GkZ2tB9PDlM/w-d-xo.html Let us know if you have any other questions.

I’m glad you enjoyed the video! We’ll keep them coming 😊

No, $152/yard is pure material cost. It was $38,500 for concrete, $3,600 for the concrete pump truck, and $4,750 for the concrete finishing crew.

About 1-3 hours a night after work just depending on the weather and what stage of the build we’re at. It has been a fun adventure together. We’ve involved the kids as well, they were both out there working on the foundation and rebar with both of us. Our oldest playing in the rock pile and our youngest safely observing from his Pack-n-play.

Thank you so much! I'm glad you found it helpful! That is our vision for this channel, to tell our story and how we've accomplished the work we've done on the property to hopefully demystify the process for others. We are planning on writing a book about our adventure, plenty of stories along the way. I'm going through the information gathering now to make sure we capture an accurate timeline and financial record of the journey as well.

@@HarkeEstate that’s great idea! Yep. One of the reason I watch your videos is also demographics. You are very relatable as you live in an urbanized expensive area (Bay Area), have full-time STEM jobs, has other responsibilities to look at, and 0 construction background. This works as a motivation too that someone just like me has already done it. So maybe your target audience is everyday commoners.

We’ve both appreciated all of the comments, questions, and feedback! It’s very encouraging for us knowing that people are interested in learning more.

We needed the 5.5 ton excavator because we were excavating the footings through compacted earth and it was very hard to dig through. The tractor is only 2 tons and has been great for uncompacted earth, but was not going to do the trick for the footings.

@@HarkeEstate interesting. Thanks.

@user-fo5mk6qr1c You’re welcome!

Thank you so much!

Great questions! I made a video with dates, costs, and details to answer your questions: Harke Estate - Buying our Tractor and Bulldozer th-cam.com/video/j5Z7is-P9Xs/w-d-xo.html

Honestly, it was one of my favorite things we’ve done so far. It was gorgeous weather while we were compacting, mother-in-law was watching the kids and making food. I just listened to podcasts and felt really productive while doing it. Similar feeling to laying on the beach and reading a good book.

We bought this one and have used it several times over the build. Compacting the guest house temporary gravel driveway, the guest house paver patio, under the HVAC unit concrete pad, around the fire hydrant, etc.

Hi! Thank you so much for these great questions! Let us dig through our records so we can make sure we get accurate answers. Thank you for reaching out and we’re looking forward to getting answers to all your questions.

Some quick answers: the permits took roughly a year, but this was also during 2020 and COVID so it is most likely a more streamlined process now. We bought ready made plans online and modified them to get everything how we wanted (a much more cost effective route). The previous owner had leveled the entire lot and there were not trees and it was flat dirt.