Any formal education for own house building?

[xuros]

Does one need any formal education to build their own house? Anyone built their own house?

Can i just purchase materials, land and go watch youtube videos on construction lol?

Thanks.

You will need at least permits and an inspector to come in after the wiring is done to inspect it all. Also the person who does the electrical will need a license in most cities to get it.

[Sunseeker]

In most developed countries you need all sorts of licenses, but a general contractor license is usually allowed to do everything (may vary depending on location), and that requires an apprenticeship in many places. So it's not just something you can "go get" with a couple weekend classes.

Generally speaking, you can usually find a general contractor who will get all the permits and do everything from design to finish under one roof.

[gugu]

We reformed an old barn into a house some 15 years ago. Avoided licenses here and there. Run through different contractors for the structural bits (some concrete pillars a slab and a stair). The rest, pipes, bathroom, walls, etc was all us. It was a pain, and the result is not particularly good. It's livable, but has some quirks. You learn a lot, but it's time that we could have spent in other activities. So it's kind of a nice thing to be proud of; kinda like the people who hunt and slaughter their meals. But I suspect hiring an architect would yield better results in less time and for not a whole lot more expenses.

[Unhinged]

Measure twice cut once. This is the single best peice of advice in this thread.

[Gamdwelf]

Measure twice cut once. This is the single best peice of advice in this thread.

If you haven't done it much it's still going to be wrong.

[Unhinged]

If you haven't done it much it's still going to be wrong.

No, measuring things properly to the plan is key in building anything. Cutting to the measurements is also key. This is the most important thing to making a building not only strong but look good.

I have built a house with my father during my teenage years and worked on $20 million + construction projects.

If you cannot measure and cut properly you may as well not even bother.

Don't do bricks.

[Gamdwelf]

No, measuring things properly to the plan is key in building anything. Cutting to the measurements is also key. This is the most important thing to making a building not only strong but look good.

I have built a house with my father during my teenage years and worked on $20 million + construction projects.

If you cannot measure and cut properly you may as well not even bother.

Don't do bricks.

Exactly my point if it is your first time measuring for construction it doesn't matter how many times you measure you will get different measurements so it's pointless until you have some experience.

[Hotmail]

You mean using college degrees to reinforce the walls?

[IIamaKing]

No formal edu needed, Being generally good with your hands would be the highest requirement IMO. There are tons of books and weeks worth of YouTube videos on the subject, but if you hate working with your hands, then likely its a bad idea.

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Idk I've replumbed almost my whole house and with newer flexible pipes, and snapin joints it's fairly hard to fuck up.

Pex pipes are the BEST!!! Its like playing with kenex almost. And you are right, super simple to work with and all you need is a cutter for the pipes, as far as special tools(any tools really, for just running the pipe)go.

[Tennis]

Does one need any formal education to build their own house? Anyone built their own house?

Can i just purchase materials, land and go watch youtube videos on construction lol?

Thanks.

Why? Just get a home builder to do it.

[unbound]

Does one need any formal education to build their own house? Anyone built their own house?

Can i just purchase materials, land and go watch youtube videos on construction lol?

Thanks.

Technically, no, you don't need any formal education to build your own house.

Legally, you have to pass inspections or the house will get condemned.

Reality - If you have to ask, then you don't have the skills to do anything other than create a disaster.

[Independent voter]

One way to get experience is to help out someone who is building their house or to even go to work for a contractor for a time, let someone else pay for your mistakes and training.

[Ripster42]

Depends on your location and regulations. Here? Yes.

Without being certified, you'd not be allowed to do plumbing, electrics, waterproofing, fireproofing, and a whole lot of other things.

If you're in the US, I'm pretty sure that's only the case if you're selling those services. You can do them for yourself, no problem. In some states you still need the inspector to come and insure you've built to code, but it's not a block to you building it yourself, and many don't even require that.

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Technically, no, you don't need any formal education to build your own house.

Legally, you have to pass inspections or the house will get condemned.

Reality - If you have to ask, then you don't have the skills to do anything other than create a disaster.

Depends where the house is built. Some states don't require inspections, like mine:

Iowa
CODE
Iowa adopted the 2003 edition of the International Building Code and the 2005 edition of the National Electrical Code by reference.

ENFORCEMENT
There are no state requirements for inspection of electrical installations; but the State Fire Marshal has general authority to inspect for fire hazards. The Iowa Bureau of Labor enforces NEC Chapter 5 for installations in hazardous locations.

[Butler to Baby Sloths]

Does one need any formal education to build their own house? Anyone built their own house?

Can i just purchase materials, land and go watch youtube videos on construction lol?

Thanks.

You can do some stuff on your own, but do yourself a favour and get a proper architect who knows about how to design a house so that it doesn't fall down. Depending on local laws, you'll need to get a qualified contractors to do electrical, gas, plumbing and the foundations.

[Captain N]

You could certainly build your own house if you have the know-how. However that doesn't mean you'll understand all the required codes that go into it. Failure to have a house up to code and having residents living in it can earn some pretty hefty fines as well.

Just as a point of reference: A flexible gas line hooked up to your water heater is not acceptable (by code) in the State of Illinois. However many home improvement stores do sell a flexible connector that can used to those who don't know any better. Attempting to sell a house and refusing to change out the flexible line within 30 days of house inspection is a $500 fine for the first offense + applicable inspector rescheduling fees.

You're better off having professionals who know the codes and have the licenses to do such work. Some places have varying codes from city to city within the same state. For example you can use plastic PVC pipe for drainage in most of Cook County, but if you're inside the Chicago limits you must use Copper DWV pipe instead.

[Donimic]

Does one need any formal education to build their own house? Anyone built their own house?

Can i just purchase materials, land and go watch youtube videos on construction lol?

Thanks.

Assuming you live in the USA, no you can not. In order to do any kind of legal construction you need a permit, and in order to get a permit you will need plans stamped by a professional civil engineer.

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If you're in the US, I'm pretty sure that's only the case if you're selling those services. You can do them for yourself, no problem. In some states you still need the inspector to come and insure you've built to code, but it's not a block to you building it yourself, and many don't even require that.

In almost all US states you are going to need a permit to build an occupied structure, and in order to get a permit you need plans stamped by a registered PE.

[Ripster42]

Assuming you live in the USA, no you can not. In order to do any kind of legal construction you need a permit, and in order to get a permit you will need plans stamped by a professional civil engineer.

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In almost all US states you are going to need a permit to build an occupied structure, and in order to get a permit you need plans stamped by a registered PE.

Those are generally issued on a more local level, and not required in all cases. Which is why I included in my original text: "Depends on where the house is built," and still often doesn't require you to have a license to actually do the construction, which is the point I was addressing. Context is important.

[Frolk]

Does one need any formal education to build their own house? Anyone built their own house?

Can i just purchase materials, land and go watch youtube videos on construction lol?

Thanks.

Watch some minecraft videos and ur good to go, whats the worse that could happen?

[glo]

Be prepared to pay the local cable, water, electric and gas company obscene amounts of money to lay infrastructure to your house. Those costs alone can easily break 150k.

[Rasulis]

The previous poster is correct. If you have to ask, you probably should not do it. We did built our own house. As in I did the design, structural, mechanical/electrical/plumbing plans, permitting and construction management. Here is a short summary of the process.

The first thing you want to think about is the house placement and orientation. Our house for example is north facing. We have several large coastal oak and pine trees up front which keeps the house cool during the summer. During winter, the sun shines on the back of the house pretty much the whole day which help kept the heating cost down.

The right design is the difference between a house and a home. Proportion, flow, window and door placements. They all make a difference. A good architect also takes into account ergonomic. You can really tell the difference between an ergonomically vs. haphazardly designed kitchen. In our case, we bought a plan which I then modified. My wife is a real estate agent and her knowledge helped a lot with the details of the plans.

Don’t forget landscaping.

Then comes the structural details. An architect should be able to handle most of the standard calcs (dead & live, wind, seismic loads). He should be able to do the plans for the electrical, plumbing, mechanical and comm lines. If your architect is risk averse, he may ask you to hire a geotechnical engineer to do the foundation design.

Next comes the most unpleasant part of the whole process. Permitting. You could do an addition without permit. In her business my wife has seen plenty of those. However, a new house may be a tough one to pull without a permit. Although, if the area is remote enough, it is possible. For example, the building for the California Wolf Center in Julian was constructed without a permit. Nobody knew about it, until they decided to seek non-profit status. That was when the County of San Diego found out that they don’t have a permit on file for that building. The center had to hire architects and engineers to permit the structure after the fact.

Typically you need to get a building permit from the local jurisdiction with authority over your area. From experience, I can tell you that most building departments are very conservative. Unless you have the signature and stamp of a licensed architect or engineer, they probably won’t accept your permit application. Then you have to get permits for all your hook ups (power, water, gas & sewer), or drill a well.

For the house construction itself, I did the scheduling (can be surprisingly tricky) and hired subs to do the work. I made sure that they were licensed and bonded, and they had the appropriate general liability and workmans comp. Trust me these are important stuffs. If something happened because of the subs’ fault, you want to make sure that their insurance will cover the repair. The same with if somebody get hurt on your project. You don’t want them suing you. Also, most utility companies will only let licensed and bonded contractors do the connection to their system.

I did order most of the materials myself including the solar panels. SDG&E provided free consultation with the design of the solar system. All the roof trusses came prefabricated from a local company 15 minutes away. When I was ordering the trusses, he asked if I want to use prefabricated frames also. After reviewing his cost estimate, I ended up doing that. The house frames came assembled with the plywood already attached on one side. Since he did the take off based on the construction plans, if there was any mistakes, he was responsible. There were several minor issues which he took care without charging extra.

From the planning stage to when we moved in, it took about a year and a half.