The main problem is usually when land is cheaper to buy to do this is fairly remote. In 1980 my then wife and I chose the Mount Shasta area to buy our 2 1/2 acres of land. It was at 4000 feet. At that time we were very resourceful and built our A-Frame relatively inexpensively. Even the 2 1/2 acres of land was only $8000 Dollars with Pine and cedar and Oak trees and some manzinita bushes on it with a truly spectacular view of Mt. Shasta and a spring that was running then for water.
My father was still alive then and had built several homes with me so we set out to build this A-Frame together. First we discovered what I would call cement pyramids with the tops cut off that were used to build a wood mill in the early 1900s in McCloud at the dump there in McCloud. We had to get enough people to even pick these things up because they weighed about 400 pounds each. We found that by getting 4 men (one to each side) we could lift them one by one into the truck. We got 9 of these into my father's 1975 Ford F-150 think then. The next thing we did was we had to level the tops of all 9 of these because these were going to be the base of the A-Frame. So, we used a hose and used grey duct tape to tape on a 5 foot length of clear plastic hose from a hardware store to find the level then we filled the hose (with clear hoses on either end of the garden hose) to find the level throughout where we wanted to build then. (This is very old school but it works great) by the way.
Then on all these levels you have to decide how remote you are and what the building codes are for your area and what the county is going to allow to be built and whether you are going to have inspections of county building inspectors or not regarding what you are building. If you want your home to be there 100 years from now I recommend getting building inspectors involved in your project. It will make it cost more but then you won't have to tear it down at some point when they discover it.
Where we were building there were no electrical lines so no electricity other than if you brought a gasoline or diesel generator in yourself. So, mostly I built this place with a chain saw so I had to be more careful regarding the cuts because a chain saw is usually less accurate then a circular electric saw blade is.
We owned this land and home from 1980 until 1989 when we moved to Hawaii then and it saved us about
5 years of rent which can be a lot of money. It didn't cost that much to build and the land was only 8000 Dollars so when times were tough in the U.S. (the early 1980s) when we thought the government might collapse and go bankrupt from the Viet Nam War then we didn't have to pay rent and were very happy there home schooling our children. Our kids missed Television some and we had to drive into town for play dates with their friends but since we had 3 children then who were ages 5, 6, and 8 until the oldest was 12 years old we had more time together simply because we didn't have to make the money to pay rent and only had to pay taxes on the land instead.
This was maybe one of the happiest times of my life home schooling our older children and cross country skiing on up to 7 feet of snow that often fell in the winter on the land then and riding my off road motorcycle all over that side of the mountain and driving our then 1974 International Harvester Scout II over very remote 4 wheel drive roads with the family and all sorts of fun stuff with friends.
So, 1980 to 1985 really healed my wife and I from past traumas in our lives. However, when the oldest got to be 12 he wanted to return to school so we bought a business in the San Francisco area and put them all in school again from Grade School, Junior high and High school. And now the older three have college degrees and all three are married and my son also has a son and my oldest step son is also a retired Fire Captain from Calfire (CDF) here in California now. the oldest stepson will be 50 this year.
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