Our land and cob house, exterior

[blu3h0g]

interior ?

[singledad1234]

country single parent family LOOKING FOR A COMMUNITY to live and work in

we dont want to be homeless

or we can share the house we live in now

we pay 275 a month

[sbrebrown]

Wow, what an interesting house - and a great location!

[000Winter000]

Sorry if this is personal, but will you do if you decide to have a child some day (I'm assuming because you're a young married couple) and he or she wants friends to play with? The location doesn't look kid friendly at all..

[monkeyross]

amazing, thank you for showing.

I would love to do the same one day if I find a plot of land in the right area.

I don't like the idea of working all my life just for a house - if I can scrap enough to build my own cob house - I will!

cheers again.

[Brie217]

You should read the book "Humanure" and also put a tin roof on so that you could catch the rain water and harvest it. Nice though.

[calatis4u]

NOW YOU NEED walter veith TO HELP YOU DISCOVER TRUTH

[tisilto]

Beautiful channel and videos!! Thank you very much for posting...I was wondering about the cost and capability or the electric system you have...I am in the process of building my own house in the country but I wanna go rammed earth instead....Could you let me know how much the electric system was and how much output you get from it??....Thanks in advance for your kindness and good luck in building your bigger house...

[redlever]

@tisilto The electrical system was about $9,000 about 3 years ago. It is about 650W max output from the panels, and we probably get about 4 kilowatt hours / day depending on sunshine. It requires some awareness about how much juice we're using, but it is good for our needs.

[RCvolunteer1978]

you should plant more trees for more supply of wood later on in life

[redlever]

I like the word "austere" better. :-) This region is called the high desert plateau, and gets around 30cm of rainfall per year. But it does support life in many fascinating ways, and it can be painfully beautiful. Check this photo, for example: softmoth.com/18137-sunset-pano­rama.jpg

[Rhinoch8]

Man this is barren!

[TACOVAN]

Nice house and property.  I really like the look of those big buttresses. What led you to include them in the design?

[redlever]

@TACOVAN We were unsure of how strong our walls would be, so we just overbuilt. Originally we'd planned to have a simple gable roof running the other way, so the ridge pole would bear down on the buttress between the two larger windows in the south. A major drawback of the buttresses, as built, is they block a lot of sunshine and really reduce our solar gain. If doing it over, I'd probably plan to use wood or steel supports in the south to maximize window area.

[jmg1957]

peace

[VonLeachim]

marvellous, very warming to see what can be done .

[BoldDesigner]

Do you work remotely or live close to work? Is this a getaway home?

[redlever]

@BoldDesigner i work from home, and my wife works part time in town about 12 miles away

[brostomper]

nebraska?

[redlever]

@brostomper southwest colorado

[RETIREMESOON]

I wonder what freedom feels like ?? Suburbia were everyone feels they can tell you what to do :0(

I took years to build a complicated terrace garden for my wife as my neigbour yelled insults for 6 years. "Society your a crazy breed hope you won't be lonely without me"

I've decided to abandon our retirement dream home and look for land were we can do what you did.

[mokiedog67337]

That is a neat home and looks like a peaceful area. I have never seen a home like that, stumbled on your videos searching for house moving. I love the rock work sidewalk and retaining wall.

[redlever]

@mokiedog67337, thanks a lot! Yeah, the rock work is beautiful -- the rocks were collected mostly from road cuts and junk piles. My wife got "the bug" for laying rock, and would constantly scan the side of the road for good rocks.  LOTS of work, but beautiful end result....

[MasterVeggie]

very cool.. thanks for posting

[skeetorretard]

lol i love when you greenies use words like "urbanite" LOL.

[redlever]

@skeetorretard: right on. It really is a funny word -- not as funny as "humanure", which is what we call our excrement. :-)

[gaiagale]

thank you for posting a wonderful tour of your home. I wish you peace and tranquility in your top of the world location : )

would ♥ to see more ...when you have time of course : )

[redlever]

@gaiagale, thanks for the kind words! We're going to build a HUGE house next to this one, straw bale, probably 1000 sq. ft., so I should be posting some new videos of that process some time this fall.

[gaiagale]

Bravo! I would love to come and help you build your straw bale dream.

I played a small part in the process of a straw bale building in the Laurentian Mts north of Montreal years ago. It was built as a retreat @15 years ago.

I wish you wonderfilled success in every step of your straw bale process.

...thanks for seeing my comment and replying : )

[BensDiscountSupply]

Tank you so much for posting this video. I'm curious if you went with a DC fridge or if it runs on propane. Did'nt see a tank. Do you have enough juice with those panels? It looks like paradise.

[redlever]

@BensDiscountSupply, the fridge is propane (Dometic brand, from an RV). We just use a 100-pound tank tucked behind the house.

[dtmbcorp]

Did you have to get a permit and inspection?

[redlever]

@dtmbcorp: No, we're VERY fortunate to live in one of the few places in the USA where we don't have to worry about inspections. We do have septic, electric (if tied to the grid, which we're not), and plumbing inspections. We didn't borrow money, either, so that meant: NOBODY CAN TELL US WHAT TO DO. :-)

[MrNeosoul99]

This is good. Tell us how you built your home. Oregon? Up in Canada the weather is much colder. Could you build a cobhouse in northern climates? Precipitation? Earthbags? Car tires? What you use for insulation? blue jeans? or thermal mass? Looks great! I'm so jealous. Keep the videos coming.

[redlever]

Colorado, at 7000 ft. above sea-level; walls have no added insulation, just lots of thermal mass. Ceiling insulation is denim/wool (we got tired of processing wool and bought denim for 2nd half of the house).

Not much precipitation, although it's not a problem if you have OK roof & stem wall.

Earthbag was used for the stem wall, filled with earth & lime.

[odin422]

your my home-building idol

[redlever]

thanks :-)

[angie4josh]

hi i want to build a rock house on our acreage just wondering what materials have you put into your house i am a little behind in the knowledge of any of this, but wanting to build an environmentally friendly homestead.

[redlever]

Hi, Angie. Here's some buzzwords you can research: rubble trench foundation, urbanite and earthbag with lime stabilized earth stem wall, cob (clay, sand, straw) walls, adobe floor, litema interior plaster, lime exterior plaster, home-made casein paint, recycled cotton insulation, Eco-Shake roofing, grey water, humanure bucket toilet, off-grid solar.

[takebackyourfreedom]

I liked the rock work, very nice, the path should be wider for people like my friend in a wheelchair should someone like that visit, people tend to forget about things like that.. your place is very nice, thanks for sharing.

[redlever]

Yeah, accessibility of the path could be improved, thanks for bringing it up. Hard to make it *any* wider than absolutely necessary when you're moving all those rocks, but for the long-term investment it would be worth it.

[stracinsrt4]

Was just wondering if you went to a workshop for cob or read up on it yourself.

[redlever]

We didn't do any workshops. Might have been helpful in learning how to be more efficient, but I don't know. We just did it from books.

[Namdor2012]

Great combination , brilliant..

What state of the USA is the location?

Have you researched Earthships?

Again great effort..~

[redlever]

@Namdor2012: Thanks! We are in Colorado, close to the Mesa Verde National Park. Yes, we did look into earthships, and have friends with them. It seems that they're more work than cob (ramming tires with earth is WORK), but I'm always impressed with the final results. One nice thing about the earthship is that you have a whole system (and can buy construction plans) that's been implemented many, many times. We were drawn to cob for its easy sculpting and the utter simplicity of the materials

[Namdor2012]

Lol, yes the tire pounding.

Also many people have bad backs or shoulder problems which makes that option unviable, and really it needs a crew approach or a Clean fuel Neumatic method..

That's also why I like Cob and earth bag combinations for the practicality.

~Again great little home Bravo..

[redlever]

@Everyone, thanks for all the nice comments. Haven't had any problems with scorpions or snakes; tarantulas occasionally make it inside in the autumn, but they're not a problem!

[Damis101]

Nice work, you two. It must be very cozy inside. Question: did you have to keep your "footprint" under a certain square footage in order to get around permit laws, or are alternative building allowed where you live. I remember reading Ianto Evan and Linda Smiley's advice for those who have those legal obstacles to deal with. I live in Oregon and I'm not sure what is or isn't allowed, but i would like to try something like this. Suggestions?

[redlever]

@Damis101: We're in a county (one of the last) with no building codes whatsoever. We have septic inspection & electrical (if tied to the grid, which we're not) which must meet code, but nothing else. The small footprint was mainly to reduce the size of the job. We didn't know what we were doing, and even with a relatively small house, it took 2 full years to finish.

[fyrefox4289]

This place would probably meet code anyway, if any authority took the time to consider cob seriously. The fire rating, I bet, would surpass that of an educational facility or someplace that needs a two hour rating.

Unfortunately US construction is VERY slow to adapt to things other places have used for thousands of years because you can't prefab a cob wall like stud walls or easily build it off site.

[Damis101]

That's good. Too bad the permit codes are so strict in Oregon--limit 120 sq ft footprint! Yes, it's a bit of a joke...I know of tents bigger than that ; ) speaking of which, I hear there are now tent cities springing up in many places. Let's hope this horrible economic disaster will awaken the humanitarian side of aw-makers and finally allow the real sustainable homes, i.e. cob, etc. to be built!

2 years to build, but hopefully a lifetime to enjoy it! Very nice!

[redlever]

We had LOTS to learn. We read books and stories, and thought we could finish it in 4 months or so. Not true, at least in our circumstances. Maybe with a LOT of help from work parties, and some very different design decisions. So we're very glad that we started small. Our plan is to build another larger house right next to this one, which will become an office / studio / guest house. We won't do cob; too time consuming for a larger place.

[MerryChicky]

You have a beautiful home. I love the organic look, especially the roof. Very nice!

[dtmbcorp]

Absolutely inspiring! I can't wait to build mine. Please post more videos!

[saacbe]

very nice, but you must have like 5 million scorpions in those stone walls, right?

[NancyToday]

Lovely! we have juniper bushes, but not trees.

I'll have to look up cob houses. We have strawbale houses here. You've done a wonderful job of making yourselves a spot on the planet! Congrats. Lovely stone work!

[thejesters1975]

Cool!

[H0LL0WBELLY]

cool-i love cob houses-we have plenty of them here where I live,in devon,England.