We are about to start building our poured earth home in the Adelaide Hills. It's a fair sized project with an uncomplicated design which when completed will have 575 sqm of roof space, half of that area being the actual house.
What we are building and the explanation of the layout can be found here:
http://ayresrocks.com/blog/floorplan/Quick timeline of progress so far:
December 08 - we sell our house and move in "rent free" to a relatives house, rent being exchanged for labour and materials renovating the place while we live here.
January 09 - we find a block in small town out the back of the Adelaide Hills called Tungkillo. The price is not quite right and we start that negotiating dance with the agent and vendor.
March 09 - after 2 months of back and forth on this block, which at 45 minutes is close enough to Adelaide but "far enough" away from the rat race we come to a mutually agreeable price range. After speaking with council and doing other due diligence we make an unconditional cash offer at the lower end of that range which is accepted.
April 09 - settlement occurs on the block. We now own a susbstantial grazing property with undulating landscape covered in moss rocks with 2 winter creeks, one with permanent waterholes. Deal struck with neighbouring farmer to keep his animals on the block in exchange for his knowledge and machinery when needed.
June 09 - after having spent the better part of 6 months exploring and getting to know our piece of land we identify the most likely of housing sites. Once we had this pegged out we sit down and go through our scrapbook of plans to nut out just what it is we want to build and how we can fit it in this envelope.
We hire our draftsman who has considerable green/alternative/sustainable building design experience. He visits the site, offers ideas based on our plan and comes up with an intial drawing which we approve.
July 09 - engineer engaged and a site survey and soil samples for slab engineering and waste treatment take place.
August 09 - final plans are drawn for the planning application and engineers to do their math on the building and slab specs.
September 09 - all paperwork is submitted to council. Council raises 11 points of clarification within 3 days of getting the application.
November 09 - all clarifications are satisfied and we are granted planning approval for the development.
December 09 - engineering is completed and we can now start chasing all of the individual components that the engineers leave to the supplier to specify.
January 10 - tender packs are sent out to 3 plumbers, 3 concretors and quotes are sought from 3 frame supply companies, 3 steel suppliers and 3 verandah/pergola specialist suppliers. 2 plumber, 2 concretors, 2 framers, 2 steel and no verandah/pergola companies reply after much chasing and reminding. This process unbelievably takes us until June 10 to sort out. Certifying engineer is consulted and he gives us a list of things he needs to make the building consents approval.
Generous member of this forum is able to supply me with CSIRO Bulletin 5 which negates the need for any sample testing to be done of the walling materials.
June 10 - winning tenders are notified and engineering is sought from and supplied by frame suppliers.
July 10 - early in July we submit a box of papers to the certifier. He contacts me with 15 clarifications to the paper work we have. July 1st in South Australia brought in a raft of changes to the building code which a lot of our engineering now does not comply with. Engineers are contacted and they begin reworking to comply with the new codes.
August 10 - late in August the certifier calls to tell me his work is complete. Essentially we now only have to give council the paperwork for them to rubberstamp. When I submit the paperwork the Council Officer explains they simply check the planning approval matches what we are seeking building consents for.
September 10 - Approval is granted by council. I approach the plumber and concretor to have them requote the jobs to be sure we are not going to have an unexpected blow out in costs.
October 10 - farming neighbour cuts the house site and finds huge rock. He calls in a favour and the rock is smashed out at mates rates. 95% of the full cut depth to the site is achieved with around 110 cubic metres of dirt and rock being moved.
November 10 - a functional access driveway is made to the house site. Concretor begins a week earlier than agreed and the plumber follows soon after.
A lot of dominoes have been falling our way in the past month and things are happening quicker and cheaper than anticipated so far. It's been a long journey but we are finally getting real progress with the slab being poured this week.
I've been keeping a blog of the journey which you can read here -
http://www.ayresrocks.com/blog/ and a flickr account with progress of various bits and pieces which can be found here -
http://www.flickr.com/photos/39679376@N08/