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PaperclipPerfector  4mo ago (text post)   2983 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 29, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

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Homeowners of The Motte -- what would you differently if you could do it all over again?

I plan on building a house in the next 12 months on a lot about an hour away from the Gulf of Mexico America. It's going to be a two-story 5BR house with porches on the front and the back, built in a traditional Southern style.

I'm a bit overwhelmed as I don't even know what I don't know about building, and I want to avoid making costly mistakes that I'll have to pay to renovate later (or worse, be unable to fix at all). Happy to hear both from people who built and people who bought.

Not the same person, but:

(1) I'm paying mostly cash, since I have it and I generally dislike the idea of taking out gigantic loans just to have the bank second-guess everything. Of the 220-k$ price tag, I already have 110 k$ of investments, and my brother has agreed to lend 40 k$ to me. While construction is ongoing, I expect to make up the remaining 70 k$ with my salary and (if absolutely necessary) a 35-k$ unsecured loan and my two 10-k$ credit cards.

(2) I drew up a rough design on my own, and then hired an architect to double-check the suitability of a few lots that I found on Zillow. The builder's in-house architect then made some small changes.

(3) I like insulation and heat pumps, and dislike closets and non-flat roofs.

(4) I bought the lot in February. I expect to get a construction schedule in the next week or two.

(5) The permit process has not yet started, but I don't expect much hassle. This lot does not have any environmental entanglements (such as a floodplain), and I certainly don't need any variances.

(6) (not applicable in Pennsylvania)

Re. 2, how did you draw up your own plans?

My rough designs generally were drawn on paper, in GIMP (at 1.5 in or 6 in (3.8 cm or 15.2 cm) per pixel), in QCAD, or (for full 3D) in OpenSCAD.

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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