Hatch - Practical yurts : building and living in a low cost alternative structure

PRACTICAL

YURTS

Building and Living in a Low Cost

Alternative Structure

STEVEN W. HATCH

Copyright 2014 By Steven W. Hatch
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 1496089995
ISBN 13: 9781496089991
Library of Congress Control Number: 2014904066
CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
North Charleston, South Carolina

CHAPTER 1

MY SITUATION

My name is Steve Hatch. I am 60 years old. Now living in a yurt in Portage, Utah. This book is about my journey into my yurt. I thought this book would be useful to others because I had many questions and finding the answers was not easy. This resulted in a lot of anxiety and frustration. Hopefully, you will find the answers to these questions helpful and you can see your pathway into a yurt of your dreams.

Yurts can be the answer to some people who are having a housing crisis. They offer a less expensive way to get into a house and have the independence that we often desire. A mortgage can be a strict taskmaster, one with little forgiveness.

My journey started on April Fools Day, of all days. Maybe this was an omen, who knows. After working at my job for 36 years, I was laid off and suddenly found myself without a job. This was a real challenge for me as my job had been a good one and had supplied me with everything I neededplus a bit more than I needed honestly. I was not too stressed by money. For 36 years, every two weeks, a deposit was made into my account and I could mostly do what I wanted and the money was there within reason. I was not wealthy, but I was also not poor. I was comfortable.

Then my situation changed. It all started a couple of years before when I was divorced and lost my big house on the hill. I was one of those who bought when the price of homes was high, and sold when the price of homes was low. I bought in 2006 at the height of the housing bubble and sold in 2011. Without my wifes income, I couldnt make the payments on the mortgage. This cost me a lot and left me renting an apartment.

Fast forward to 2013, and I was living in this apartment when I found myself unemployed. Rent was expensive and I knew that I needed to make some changes. I couldnt go on financially. I was seeking a job, but not having any luck.

I had been looking at land for sale for some time on the online classifieds, hoping to find some land to move onto because I wanted to move out of the apartment. It was a nice apartment, but apartment living was not what I wanted long term. Now, the pressure to move mounted. Rent and insurance! These were the big items that needed attention. Cobra coverage was expensive and there was nothing I could do about that.

So, that left the rent. I had signed a rental agreement that was due on October 1stI would either have to renew for another year, or move out! That gave me six months to find some land and build a new home. That or find a home on the market that I could afford.

I looked at the real estate ads for homes for sale. The price of homes was well out of reach of the amount of money that I could muster. I was old, out of work, and getting a mortgage was out of the question. With all my calculations, I figured the most I could afford was $60,000. This had to buy a place for me to live and a place for my horse. I needed a place in the country. I looked at lots of property, maybe as many as 75-100 different offerings. It was a trying time and I finally found a piece of property here in Portage for $18,000.

It was one acre with animal rights. It had an old barn and corral for my horse and was connected to the city water system. That really solved one of my big problems, which was how to get water on my property. Many other properties would have required me to dig a well. As you know that is not cheap and also a bureaucratic mess to get the well permit, unless someone had already gone through the hassle of getting it before you bought the property. Here in the desert, water is a big issue.

After getting the water and property settled it was early June and I was hoping to get right on it! I had $42,000 left in my budget. I was now committed to moving out of the apartment before October 1st. As it turned out, I would actually move out on October 16th, and I did not have my yurt up yet. It actually wouldnt be up until November 6th.

While all the paperwork was getting prepared and in order, I built a small, 10 ft. diameter yurt, mainly to understand how to build yurts. I ended up living in it for over a month. It was surprisingly easy to live in and I learned a lot about yurts in the process. It is now used as a small storage shed, but for a while it was home. In this picture, you can see my lot, the small yurt under construction, and my horse trailer.

Winter came early and cold this year. It was down in the 0 to 10 degree temperatures at night late in October and into November. The little yurt was heated with a 1500 watt electric heater. I slept on a cot with a sleeping bag and a wool blanket on top. I was able to be snug as a bug in a rug in that little yurt. The only hard thing was going out to the outhouse to use the bathroom in the middle of the night when it was so cold.

I had a one of those water coolers that you put the 5 gallon jug of water on top. It had both hot and cold water, so I was able to have hot water for a cup of Pero and Cup of Noodle soup. I was also able to have a nice cold drink when I wanted to quench my thirst.

I had put in some shelves and had a pantry with canned goods, and stuff, as well as a place for my luggage, where I stored my clothes. I put my dutch oven and dutch oven cooker outside the door, so I was able to cook meals. It is possible to really shrink your living space and get along ok. I spent $700 on the small yurt.

Now, onto why I chose a yurt.

CHAPTER 2

WHY I CHOSE A YURT

You have a total of $42,000 to buy a house. What are you going to do? What are the options you have available?

There are other options I am sure, but these are the 4 options I looked into. So, starting with the stick built home. Most of the homes that contractors were building and selling were over $200,000. The low end homes were in the $150,000 range and it went on up from there.

My previous home, a 4500 square foot home was built for $345,000. This included the price of the lot. Lots in town were selling for a minimum of about $50,000 for a half acre lot in town with no animal rights. Most lots were selling for around $75,000. These lots are in a subdivision where the water and electricity are available in the street. The developer had put in curb and gutter, sidewalk, and the roadway. The lots around me at the big house were asking $120,000.

So lots like this were not going to be affordable. Now that I had made up my mind that I couldnt buy a lot like this and build on it, I needed another way. I looked at properties up in the mountains, where some lots were in the $35,000 range, but the water issue would have taken a lot of money. It would cost around $45 per foot to drill a well, and in addition I would have to buy the pump, the down pipe, and storage tank at the surface. Sometimes well permits are hard to get if the neighbors protest the welloften fearing another well would lower the water table and make their well go dry.

My son and I sat down and planned out a 24 x 24 stick built house and what it would cost. We estimated that if we did the work ourselves and just had the material costs, we could maybe get it into the $40,000 range. We were looking at things very optimistically. If anything didnt go per plan, we would go over budget. Also, it was a very plain box structure. I was concerned that it was too plain and it didnt express my personality. Also, looking at the estimates we made and what it did end up costing me to put in the yurt, we were very optimistic. For example, the septic tank cost twice what we estimated.