Most important features in a new prepper home

[oldboyscout]

Ideally I would want a spring located 100' above the house, but if I couldn't find that property I would love to have a hand pump to backup my well pump.

[ladyhk13]

I see these big big big home plans...we're going polar opposite. We want smaller, not bigger....under 1200 sq ft, 2 bedroom, 2 bath, great room/kitchen and a giant 12 x 12 pantry. The older I get...the less I want to clean a big house...and the older I get the harder it is to keep up with farming and a big house...which Lady you really need to think about unless you are going to have a maid...and retain that maid post shtf. Dabbling in gardening is one thing...living off your land is an entirely different thing I am not sure you understand the work involved...and here I have 1700 sq ft and it about kills me to keep up with it and 7 acres...you're talking about what was it 150 acres and a giant house...good luck with that...just being a voice of reason...don't shoot me.

I promise not to shoot you! We have over 3100 sq/ft right now (5bed 3 bath with 2 master suites) and I did think that this house was too big for just the 2 of us and wanted to downsize. Keeping it clean isn't a problem since we don't use all the rooms on a regular basis and have no children. The problem with this house is that it is laid out totally wrong and yes, would I build another 12x13 bathroom? No, we really don't need one that big. I will downsize there but would put that sq/ft into LTS for food or paper goods. Do I need 5 bedrooms with just us? Ok, no but then we need 2 for us and my mom...a guest suite, a craft room and then a reloading room so that still brings me up to "5" rooms even if I don't call them bedrooms. Yes we will need 3 bathrooms. Or at leas 2 1/2. I think I should get rid of carpets in all rooms except maybe the bedrooms. All other rooms should be hardwood or tile which makes it easier to clean as well. Luckily my DH is very good at helping with housework so I don't have to do it all myself either. Are we rich? Not really. Do we worry about money? Not really. We are blessed to be comfortable to pretty much do what we want within reason. We pay cash as much as possible and stay out of debt. We hope to build without borrowing for this.
Our acreage is 240+ acres so we have room for the animals to roam...they will be free range. The ones we are going to have are fairly low maintenance - no goats or pigs or rabbits so I don't think what we will be doing is as much as you (thank God).

A summer kitchen is a must and a root cellar as well. Now, where have you placed your summer kitchen? Near the house or garden? Where have you placed your root cellar? How big is your cellar? Is it dirt or concrete? Very interested in those designs.

We will be using hydropower and solar for our power and our heat will be radient in the floors

The only thing I will have as a luxury is a summer kitchen and a root cellar....both outside the house. We're doing solar/wind turbine at our new place...I don't totally understand how it all works but if your DH hit Big J up..he has it all sqaured away already.
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I am up with a goat, a first freshener who thinks she wants to go into labor a month early...they get braxton hicks like humans...anyhow..I reread this and I want to make my point clear.

I am not trying to be a snit...but my understanding from reading your posts was this was a permanent BOL come lifestyle change for you and your DH where you were going to start producing all your own food etc. I do that right now...minus grains, on 7 acres and have here for the past 4 years and previously on 5 acres for 6 years...and guess what...IT IS ALOT OF WORK. You have to Plant/Preserve/Provision all of that...guess what making even a loaf of bread from scratch takes time...if you are doing that for all of your food...thats alot of work....was my primary point. Couple that with 3 stories of cleaning and maintenance...for two people and an elderly woman...thats alot of work...unrealistic in my personal opinion....unless a couple of things 1) you are filthy rich and have a live in staff in which case LIVE IT UP, who cares disregard me...2) You intend on this being a BOL for multiple families in which case...then my question is: what is your governing strategy post and preshtf? And how do you plan on getting everyone there in even tof shtf? Those are two very interesting questions I'd love to hear more about for my own benefit as well.

We chose the location because my sister is very close by. We are over an hour away from her now which would be a challenge if something happened. I was really stressing over the past 2 years looking for land. I was really happy to find something so close to her. She has a little land and lots of animals and gardens and cans as well. She isn't a prepper in the traditional way but already lives the life. She has a very large support network already set up as well and the area is largely Amish. She will be able to help with my mom if needed and we can help each other with our animals and canning or whatever else so I'm looking forward to finally being close to her. My brother will probably move up to our area once he retires as well in a few years so I think we will have our family back together again very close by. That I why I need the big "family" space in my house because Chirstmas is always at my house...it's tradition and I can see that our home will be the central hub of family functions. I just need to locate the rooms right and really need the storage space done right. I also want the storage done so people don't know it's there. I appreciate your input and you can chime in if you come up with any more ideas or thoughts. I am open to everything.

[ladyhk13]

One of the main reason why i chose a completely underground home-shelter set up was the basic fact as i get older i can not afford to heat & cool a large home on my socalled retirement budget and my simple shotgun style round tube shelter set up works great for me .

Plus given the fact that if Full Scale NBC war happened or some other type of diaster i would be protected simplely by beening out of harm way under 16.ft of dirt and rock on top of me with a protected incomeing air supply system to keep me alive and kicking in the end

Some people can not live underground in a total buried house and not have sunlight to wake them up or the sounds of the night to help them sleep .One of my lady friends who i see can not spend the night in the place without having it drive her nuts or batty because of the lack of sound of the vehicles going down the highway or nights sounds it total quiet in the place .But for me it works because of the simple fact i sleep like a log with no sound or light to wake me up and that very inportant because of beening a night worker in my job .

I also have what is called SAD lights that makes the socalled fake sunlight and have a star mural over the bed to help with the socalled lack of sun or night inside the place .I use the sad light to wake up to in the evening to set my body alarm clock to get up and use the other sad light in the living room area of the place to light up the place when i'm getting ready for work .By the time i leave the house at 8.30.pm i'm wide wake and ready to start work at 10.pm for my night shift

You spend only about 10.hours a day inside your home when not working your socalled work hours and when i'm off i'm out doing something like cleaning up the outside area of where i'm liveing or going into town for supplies or going to the movies or doing laundry at a my cross the road friend home .She got my brand new washer & dryer from kenmore when i moved back home and we made a deal where i use it anytime i need in the garage area .So it work's for me in the long run .

Our property (well, where we are thinking of locating the house right now) isn't right for an underground house although I have looked at designs for them. I wouldn't be able to get the southern facing light that I need....underground would be awesome in many ways but just not in this location. If we end up changing locations then we may reconsider the idea.
I also really wanted to look at straw bale homes but can't get the DH onboard with it. I love them but he's just not into them.

[ravensgrove]

Just one little note...free range doesn't mean maintenance free animal care....LOL.

[ravensgrove]

In all seriousness...have you lived on that big of acreage before? 240 is alot of acres...you're talking endless fencing....snag maintenance, water maintenance...yada, yada...if you're land ranging your cattle, you have to go out to them daily to assess how they are...etc. My Grandfather to this day lives on 200 acres and at 92 he still working 12 hours a day fixing fences and taking feed out to hell and tarnation...when he actually had any real number of head he had to employ a 5 man crew most of the year, and I am just being the cautious voice of reason...and cleaning a large multi story house gets harder the older you get...maybe a larger house all on one level makes more sense...or like I said, myabe its time ot think abut seriously downsizing...the maintenance on anything over 2000 sq ft just becomes a real chore as you get older.

Summer Kitchen..you're probably thinking an actual seperate building. I am building a 10 x 10 roofed pole barn basically near the kitchen out the pantry door on the north dark side of the house. In the past we have dug out root cellars, but recently Sparrow gave me a good idea for a concrete one using a septic tank...we might go that route depending on what we can find one for price wise.

[ladyhk13]

We thought about the single story route but our area is supposed to be one of the highest concret cost areas in the country so the footers would kill us especially add the cost of a full basement. I originally only wanted half of what we have now which would have brought us in around 1500 sq/ft but I just can't seem to fit in all the stuff I want inside that space. Either the rooms are too small or I don't get the rooms I need. Are you considering your basement space into your sq/ft?
Yes, the summer kitchen would be a seperate building...north side, most excellent idea! That would keep it cooler. I was wondering about concrete for the root cellar. It would keep things cleaner and drier. Probably good idea to make it seperate from the house as well so it doesn't take away from the useable sq/ft? Maybe under the summer kitchen?

[ravensgrove]

Ther eis no basement in our plan at all...where we are moving you basically almost have to do a daylight basement...because the solid bedrock being just barely below the surface and the water table, the property sits right off Lake Ontario...a daylight basement...ain't in my budget. The entire house plan is right at 1200 sq ft. under the roof and then a seperate root cellar and summer kitchen outside the house.

[ladyhk13]

Ideally I would want a spring located 100' above the house, but if I couldn't find that property I would love to have a hand pump to backup my well pump.

That would be perfect for sure! Our creek and waterfall is just below where I want the house, there are a lot of other springs and creeks everywhere and DH wants it deeper in the property and create ponds with them but I am worried about cost of a driveway and the steepness of a part of the driveway but the ponds would give us more head for our Hydropower.

BTW Welcome to the site!

[ladyhk13]

Ther eis no basement in our plan at all...where we are moving you basically almost have to do a daylight basement...because the solid bedrock being just barely below the surface and the water table, the property sits right off Lake Ontario...a daylight basement...ain't in my budget. The entire house plan is right at 1200 sq ft. under the roof and then a seperate root cellar and summer kitchen outside the house.

Summers are going to be beautiful!!!!!!!!! I lived in upstate NY until I was 12...from there to FL, talk about a shock. 10' show drifts to 10' waves! LOL!
So if you had a basement you would have 2400 sq/ft which maybe I could get to if I planned really well since I am able to have a basement and maybe use the 3rd floor (attic - finished) as storage. I wouldn't have to really clean the 3rd floor since it was storage or if I could put a ton of southern facing windows I could use a good part of it for winter starts? I wanted a solarium but maybe if I put it up there I could use that space and not take it out of my living space downstairs....

[hank2222]

Our property (well, where we are thinking of locating the house right now) isn't right for an underground house although I have looked at designs for them. I wouldn't be able to get the southern facing light that I need....underground would be awesome in many ways but just not in this location. If we end up changing locations then we may reconsider the idea.
I also really wanted to look at straw bale homes but can't get the DH onboard with it. I love them but he's just not into them.

The biggest problem people have is there thinking on the whole underground home is the following areas

-1- getting the bank to loan out money to build it .That why i went into my personal 401k & job retirement fund and took money out of it for the project and the basic reason why i do not have to worry about paying for it when i'm old

-2-is getting there head wrap around the fact that you are underground and living in the place that has limited exprouse to the daytime sunlight .Most people can not or will not fuction well in this type of living conditions .that why i say it take's a special person to live in one .

It was pure dumb crazy luck that i found a tank in the middle of Kansas that a company there had made for someone else who did not pick it up from them for a year and they where saling it for the cost of building it and little more .

I do have a simple verison of the mud room set up with a small bult in metal brench with coat hooks on the wall and a rack for shoes .I have a set of indoor shoes that i wear inside the place and i use my socalled outdoor shoes when i leave the place .