Low-Cost, Environmentally Friendly Features
Here are some of the best features that made this house inexpensive and environmentally friendly to build and own:
- It is so well insulated, it has cost an average of less than $300 per year to heat with propane in the northeastern US for the last 14 years.
- Unlike conventional insulation, its insulation will not lose its effectiveness over time. (I'll explain later.)
- It used one fourth as much wood as a conventional structure of the same size, saving a lot of dollars and trees.
- Its roof requires no maintenance, sheds snow much better than a conventional roof, and should last 50+ years.
- The unique building system made it possible for me to do 100% of the work all by myself, without any help, other than advice. (It would have been easier and safer to have some help on a few specific project days.)
- The only power tools I needed were a circular saw, a drill, and a small jig saw. A reciprocating saw would have been handy, but only a few brief tasks really begged for one. I didn't need any expensive or unusual hand tools. I rented a big hand-held power auger for a few hours to dig the holes for the pole-building foundation posts and the mobile home's footings.
- The pole foundation minimizes disturbance of the land. There's much less digging, and any small creatures living in the house's footprint will have plenty of time to relocate once the house is placed.
- Reusing a mobile home keeps tons of material from ending up in a landfill.
- The more older mobile homes get converted by this type of construction, the fewer of them will be inhabited as-is, where they waste huge amounts of energy.
This type of construction does have some disadvantages:
- While a pole building itself is one of the easiest types of construction, fitting one tightly around an old mobile home creates some odd shapes that must be fitted with insulation. We'll see how to avoid this on the insulation page.
- Unless you take extra measures to seal off the crawlspace both above and below ground, creatures such as mice will enter the crawlspace, and they might find their way into your house.
- Other options for a low-cost green home may be more disaster-proof, better insulated, and greener. A few of the more exotic options may also be less expensive, if you can get a building permit for them and you do the extensive labor yourself.
Next:
Foundation