Budget: How much does it cost to improve land?

February 3, 2022

Yes, I'm a crazy finance lady and track every penny that's spent. This is the first post of a series we will be doing on our budget and how much it is costing us to build. We will break down our budgets and will also be posting on how we are financing the project. This post will focus on improving land. We will break down our costs and offer some suggestions we found helpful.

First a quick recap of where we are and where we came from.

August 2019: We bought our property (10 acres) of heavily treed land

July of 2020: we hired an architect and started logging/thinning the property. It was heavily treed and parts of the property had dead/unhealthy trees that posed a huge fire risk. We cut in the road during the thinning process as well as installed a culvert for a stream crossing.

October 2021: we ran power to the back of the property and placed a meter base.

March 2021: We laid down road fabric and had decomposed granite brought in.

April 2021: Our well was dug.

September 2021: We worked with the county and a wetland biologist to address wetlands on the property.

November 2021: We recieved the finalized plans and the building permit was approved. We starting our foundation the end of November.

December 2021- February 2022: We are currently framing.

Spring 2022: We will be putting in about 170 different trees and shrubs in the spring of 2022 as part of mitigation that was needed due to placement of the homesite. Our completion date is set for October 2022.

A couple of quick notes. We built on the back half of the property. Our property is a very narrow long rectangle. The driveway is approximately 900 feet. This significantly added to our cost to run the power and do the driveway. For us the additional cost was completely worth having the seclusion and privacy of being on the back of the property. The nearest neighbor is over 1200 ft away. You can always remodel a house, but you can't move it!

Check out the sections on building the road, placing the electrical meter and planting trees for some money saving suggestions.

Budget:

10 acres of land in 2019: - $ 65,000

Money earned from lumber: + $ 4922.49

Rock for culvert - $ 1556.64

Taxes on Lumber: - $ 211.91

Burn Permit for slash piles - $ 105.50

Permit to run power/meter - $ 126.30

Installation of electrical meter base -$ 1191.08

Avista: Bury power and run 900 ft: - $ 9911.90

Road Fabric for 900 ft: - $ 1663.64

Decomposed Granite: - $ 2334.96

Well (includes pressure system/meter) -$ 12,207.73

Septic Designer/Engineer: - $1,100.00

Septic Perc holes (excavation) - $ 350.00

Septic Permit: - $ 740.00

Septic Installation/materials: - $ 14,000.00

Architect and Structural Engineer: -$ 14,630.00

Staples charge to print plans - $ 127.39

Bulldozer to level site -$ 600.00

Wetland Biologist, Silk Fence, trees/shrubs:

- $ 4534.95

Building Permit: - $ 2530.22

Total Cost prior to breaking ground: $127,999.73

1. Thinning the property, cutting in the road and installing the culvert: + $3153,94

-- We earned $4922.49 on the sale of the lumber

--We spent $1556.64 on rock to build the area up around the culvert

--We paid $211.91 for WA tree taxes.

We hired a forester who helped with the thinning process. We thinned the property to DNR forestry standards and had a culvert installed. This involved filing a Forestry Practice Application with the DNR to get approval for the project. The property was significantly overgrown and posed a large fire danger to us and our neighbors. Forest fires are a big problem in Eastern WA and we wanted to help mitigate that danger. Also, in many areas the trees were diseased from overgrowth and lack of sunlight. We love this property and our beautiful trees and our goal is to keep this property as natural, healthy and beautiful as possible. The forester and the owner/operator who did the project cut in the road and installed the culvert for us.

2. Running power to the home site. $9911.90

Avista was able to bury the power underneath the driveway. They ended up having to run it approximately 900 feet. This significantly added to the cost but was well worth it due to the privacy we get at the back of the property.

3. Installing the electrical Panel: $1317.38

--Electrical Permit $126.30

--Electrical panel and supplies to install: $1191.08

David is pretty good at working with electricity. He is a licensed HVAC electrician and has installed all of our breaker panels/wiring on all of our previous projects. The panel he actually ordered from Amazon...go figure they sell everything. He poured the posts and installed the panels and breakers. The panel was inspected and approved and AVISTA hooked it up at no additional charge. We saved a ton by doing this ourselves. It wasn't too complicated. The most complicated part is making sure that you know and understand WA state code.

4. Burn Permit: $105.50

There were a couple of large slash piles after the thinning. The burn permit was good for 1 year. Last spring we burned the large pile where the house is going and then burned the other piles this fall.

5. Road Construction: $3998.60

--Road Fabric $1663.64

--Decomposed Granite $2334.96

We have a couple of helpful tips here. First of all our ground eats gravel. If you don't put down road fabric you will end up re-graveling your driveway every few years. It hurts in the short-term

but is well worth it over the long haul. Gravel is expensive, to get 6 inches deep, 20 feet wide for a driveway 900 feet long we were looking at approximately 450 tons of gravel. At $20.00 a ton not including delivery you are looking at around $9000.00 in gravel cost alone. A good driveway should have at least a 6 inch base (bare minimum), ideally closer to 8-12 inches is better. We were struggling with this cost initially. We decided to go with decomposed granite. It is significantly cheaper but it packs together nicely, drains well and makes a good hard base. This cost difference is extreme. We paid $2334.96 including costs for delivery and we ended up with about a 4 inch base. We have been using this for

the last year and it has held up great. We have had concrete trucks, lumber trucks, well trucks, and a lot of traffic driving over it and it still looks really good. It compacted nicely and drained nicely. Potholes have been minimal. We will eventually add another 6-8 inches of gravel over the top once the house is finished but for a construction driveway it is doing the trick and doing it well. Both David and I would recommend using the stuff again. FYI it looks like dirt when its delivered. I was horrified that David and I had paid over 2k for a bunch of dirt, but it worked out nicely and I'm glad we did it.

6. Well Cost: $12,207.73

We hit water at 60 feet which helped keep the cost down on this one. Always be sure to check well reports in the area before you buy land. A 60 foot well is cheap, a 500 ft well is a whole different story. We are getting 15 gallons per minute, and we are pretty happy with that. We went with some newer technology which allows the pump and casing to act as your pressure tank so no above ground pressure tank is needed. We were able to hook the well up to a generator and use it immediately after placement. We have been really happy with it so far.

7. Septic:

--Designer/engineer (required by county): $1100.00

--Perc hole excavation: $350.00

--County Permit: $740.00

--Installation (including tank, labor and materials): $14,000.00

Our county requires that the system be designed by an engineer. David has toyed with the idea of installing the system himself but in an effort to finish the project by October of 2022 we decided to subcontract this out.

8. Architect, Structural Engineering and Printed Plans: $14,777.49

--Architect and Structural Engineer: $14, 650.00

--Staples print order to print plans: $127.39

We hired an architect to design a custom home and shop/ADU. We wanted the whole custom experience. With the help of our architect and structural engineer we designed this home from the ground up. You can however purchase plans online or find a set of plans that you like and a drafter can make minor adjustments for a fraction of the cost above.

9. Bulldozer --$600.00

We rented a bulldozer for a day and a half to grade, level and smooth the building site. Slash piles never burn completely and many large stumps remained. We talked my Dad into helping us with the bulldozing. He is great with heavy equipment. He was able to smooth and level the ground, smooth out what was left of the large slash pile we burned, and disperse the ash. This was a messy terrible job. He then put the left-over stumps in a low spot and then buried them (hugelkultur right?). We owe him big time.

10. Wetland Biologist, Silk Fence and Trees/shrubs: $4534.95

We were required to have a wetland report done by a wetland biologist prior to getting approval for the building permit. We do have a wetland on our property. It is located around a small swamp/stream that is on the property. The wetland itself runs about 20 feet on either side of the stream bank. The county requires that this wetland have a 190 foot buffer zone on either side of it. One corner of our house sits slightly inside of the 190 foot buffer zone. Due to buffer zone encroachment we are doing some mitigation with the county. For every 1 sq foot of buffer zone affected, we are doing 2 square feet of mitigation. Mitigation essentially involves planting a variety of native trees and shrubs around the buffer zone. The process involves a lot of mapping and paperwork and is pretty spendy. We were able to get a really good deal on trees and shrubs through our local county conservation district tree and plant sale. I highly recommend these sales. Trees and shrubs are generally around $1-2 each. The plants are generally regionally specific and when I have made orders from them in the past I have been happy with the results. The trees are 6-12" bare root plugs. Depending on the variety you get they can grow quickly. A few years ago I bought some mock orange and maples from the sale and within 2 years they were over 5 feet tall. If you are willing to wait a couple of years it is a great way to add trees, vegetation and/or landscaping for a pretty good price.

11. Building Permit: - $2530.22

The only thing I can recommend here is find out ahead of time what exactly is going to be required for your permit. We were unaware that we needed a wetland report done on the property and this ended up causing a lot of stress and delaying the permit. We worked through it, but I would definitely call your county building department and make sure that you are aware of every possible thing that might be required so your permit doesn't get hung up.

I will be putting together another few posts on the budget for the project, construction loans and how we are financing the build. Be sure to subscribe and we will send you an email when we make a new post.