Has anyone built on an elevated lot of land before?

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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    mrbiron wrote: »
    A house between two streets!?!
    Can you do a curb cut and bring your driveway in on the backside of the house. Looks like the back street is higher.

    Why work with what you have? Find another lot. With all the money that you're going to spent on lot improvements, you'll never see any of that cme back when you sell the house.

    I'll be the first.......Texas is a big state. Keep looking.

    Trust me, I've tried. This is the neighborhood we like. The street in the back is only to another small neighborhood without future plans, it's not a large street, probably 100 cars in 24 hours. That's 1 car every 15 minutes. It's nothing.

    The street in the front, that's gotta be there since that's the way in.

    I could buy 5 acres 30 minutes out, but I aint doing that. We like it in our area, and I've grown accustomed to it. I just bought my parents a house 3 minutes away in the same community, so we aint moving... haha..

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  • F1nut
    F1nut Posts: 49,794
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    mrbigbluelight wrote: »
    F1nut wrote: »
    Joey, you need an architect from outside of flat Texas.

    Louisiana ? This ?

    082iy0cggce6.jpg

    That's a cool house!

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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    F1nut wrote: »
    NEVER.....EVER live anywhere that has an HOA.

    Yeah it's got pluses and minuses.

    Pluses - everyone is kept clean.

    Minuses - you bend to their rules.

    I'm cool with it, we've lived in the area for a few years now and I like it. I don't really want to move from here. I just found a lot for sale which is rare... atleast I get to build what I want because it's the only Custom section of the master planned community.

    So atleast that's a positive.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    mrbiron wrote: »
    A house between two streets!?!
    Can you do a curb cut and bring your driveway in on the backside of the house. Looks like the back street is higher.

    Why work with what you have? Find another lot. With all the money that you're going to spent on lot improvements, you'll never see any of that cme back when you sell the house.

    I'll be the first.......Texas is a big state. Keep looking.

    Regarding the rear -

    There are generally 2 choices around here.

    1. Either you live with the fact that you have a neighbor looking over you from the rear 100% of the time.
    2. You back up to a golf course (which is mucho premium and all those lots are gone).
    3. You back into a small road that is not a main street.

    For me, I'd rather back into a small street that gets used by a single neighborhood without through and through traffic.

    Also, keep in mind, the average lot size in this whole master planned community is 0.2-0.25 acre. I'm sitting on nearly 0.7 acre. I will have 30 feet to the one neighbor and I have a green belt to the right.

    Pluses to the lot:
    1. 0.7 acres (which in a master planned community is a lot)
    2. I won't be pigeon holed between 2 homes, the house to the left will be shielded by the garage and I will be atleast 30 feet from him.
    3. I have a green belt space on the right - perfect for Emma's little adventures...
    4. It's got TREES! I hate barren space with fake little trees that they plant after they plow down the entire lot.
    5. It's wide.. I can really flex the house out wide.

    Negatives:
    1. Not completely private, street in the back
    2. A hill, retaining walls will have to be built, costly
    3. Odd shape.. but that's where the architect comes in.
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  • recoveryone
    recoveryone Posts: 885
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    Seeing the lot size and shape, I would build your house to the front of the lot and bring the drive and garage from the rear, where your property is at grade level.

    Flip the build of the garage with the laundry room and build those bedrooms ontop of garage or to front of lot. having part of your structure below ground can become an issues down the road from water, weight of dirt against walls.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    recoveryone wrote: »
    Seeing the lot size and shape, I would build your house to the front of the lot and bring the drive and garage from the rear, where your property is at grade level.

    Flip the build of the garage with the laundry room and build those bedrooms ontop of garage or to front of lot. having part of your structure below ground can become an issues down the road from water, weight of dirt against walls.

    I agree with you. You see what I see.

    Flip the garage to the left, shield the property/backyard from the neighbors, you get true privacy.

    Move the bedrooms around, etc... make the house wide. Fit a media room somewhere.

    And where's that elevator dang it @txcoastal1 ?!
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  • mrbiron
    mrbiron Posts: 5,711
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    Once your builder starts with E&B, he's going to produce more fill that will need to be spread around your site increasing the height. Find out what the premium would be to cut the site by a couple of feet at the high spot. Maybe the costs are cheaper going this route versus retaining walls? Once you go over a couple if feet with retaining, it requires engineering further increasing costs.

    Just throwing out my 3,000mile-away opinion ;)

    From the photos, the bare area closets to your neighbor looks like the high spot?
    Where’s the KABOOM?!?! There’s supposed to be an Earth shattering KABOOM!!!
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  • mrbiron
    mrbiron Posts: 5,711
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    How about an underground home...geothermal, uber-privacy, increased yard size, being the only guy on the block with you.... :p
    Where’s the KABOOM?!?! There’s supposed to be an Earth shattering KABOOM!!!
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    mrbiron wrote: »
    How about an underground home...geothermal, uber-privacy, increased yard size, being the only guy on the block with you.... :p

    An underground home with a full yard up top... hahaha.... the assessors for the city would have a hard time figuring out my house's value for property tax!

    I love it!!!
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
    edited July 2016
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    mrbiron wrote: »
    Once your builder starts with E&B, he's going to produce more fill that will need to be spread around your site increasing the height. Find out what the premium would be to cut the site by a couple of feet at the high spot. Maybe the costs are cheaper going this route versus retaining walls? Once you go over a couple if feet with retaining, it requires engineering further increasing costs.

    Just throwing out my 3,000mile-away opinion ;)

    From the photos, the bare area closets to your neighbor looks like the high spot?

    The lot is about 20 feet high from front to back. Street level to street level.

    The left has less of a grade than the right.

    The right side will not be feasibly buildable for a driveway for 2 reasons:
    1. You cut right into it rather than build on it. I will have to build retaining wall there which will cost money.
    2. I place the garage on the wrong side, which exposes me to the neighbors to the left.

    The left is better (we think... at this time) because of:
    1. There is less grade. The neighbor is lower so that means HE BUILDS the retaining wall (it is already built).
    2. I can hide my yard from him if I build there.

    The plan by my builder is this (cost is approximately 50-60K):
    1. Place the house pad approximately 10 feet above street level.
    2. Driveway to the left, garage has to be to the rear otherwise the slope of the driveway will be too much. Approximate driveway length will be 60 feet from street, giving us a 6:1 slope (10 feet height over 60 feet length). If we put garage in front, that's 10 feet in 25 feet giving us a slope of 2.5:1 which is impossible.
    3. Shield the yard from the neighbors to the left. Utilize the trees and natural space on the right and rear, right being the greenspace.
    4. Retaining walls will have to be built but will utilize as much natural grading as possible and we will hide it with greens, or other things like planter boxes, etc.

    Retaining walls:
    1. FRONT: 4ft wall right off the side walk. 18" around the front perimeter that acts as a flower box/bed. That gives us approximately 6 feet leg up, so if the house is 10 feet above street, we only need 10-6 = 4 ft of grading over the course of approximately 20-25 feet... which makes it a 5:1 slope.

    2. REAR: We will need to cover 10 feet of height. We will need a slope of perhaps 1-2 feet. We will still need 10-2 = 8ft to cover. We will need TWO 4 ft retaining walls. I will have them split it and have steps on the first wall, to allow for a plant/flower bed towards the rear. THe builder wants to incorporate a pool early in the build process to cut down on costs...

    Somethign like this in the rear.

    A98BBADC-2590-0B38-16D66E03F5F68C51.jpg

    By the way, slopes such as 3:1 means for every 3 feet horizontal distance, it goes up 1 foot.

    6:1 is every 6 feet horizontal distance, it goes up vertically 1 foot.

    3:1 is max allowable slope.

    5:1 or less is preferred.





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  • Emlyn
    Emlyn Posts: 4,367
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    Would make more sense to me to buy an existing house on a good lot and reconfigure it if necessary. The photos of the plot of land, at least to me, look like less than prime real estate. If it was prime, someone else would have put up a house there right?
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
    edited July 2016
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    Emlyn wrote: »
    Would make more sense to me to buy an existing house on a good lot and reconfigure it if necessary. The photos of the plot of land, at least to me, look like less than prime real estate. If it was prime, someone else would have put up a house there right?

    The guy who bought it was about to build on it, but financial issues happened and could not fund it. Also a family health tragedy happened.

    All the lots have been bought out. There's I think 4 open lots left and I don't know who owns them, probably similar to me, hold on to it until ready to build.

    I won't be building for 3-5 years, I just wanted to make sure I have a spot saved.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    Plus, we are really picky and there's a specific floor plan we like.

    That's the biggest problem.
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  • recoveryone
    recoveryone Posts: 885
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    To give you a visual example get on google earth and look up these coordinates

    34.0906.56 N 117.1816.90 W

    The home is about 30-45 feet above grade and the driveway is on the eastside.

    you can tell from the tier setup in the front yard and steps how steep the grade is from the street. Now for your property I would put the driveway in the rear (not just flipping the garage, but 180 reversal) you can create large backyard patio setup.
    as a NPDES inspector one of the biggest issue we see are erosion problems and by a tier setup in the front with small retaining walls at each level. This will help in erosion control and aid in keeping compaction during the build.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    recoveryone wrote: »
    To give you a visual example get on google earth and look up these coordinates

    34.0906.56 N 117.1816.90 W

    The home is about 30-45 feet above grade and the driveway is on the eastside.

    you can tell from the tier setup in the front yard and steps how steep the grade is from the street. Now for your property I would put the driveway in the rear (not just flipping the garage, but 180 reversal) you can create large backyard patio setup.
    as a NPDES inspector one of the biggest issue we see are erosion problems and by a tier setup in the front with small retaining walls at each level. This will help in erosion control and aid in keeping compaction during the build.

    Impossible to put a driveway from rear as that's a street and not part of the neighborhood.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    Also 40 foot above street is very high... I will look at that photo
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
    edited July 2016
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    recoveryone wrote: »
    To give you a visual example get on google earth and look up these coordinates

    34.0906.56 N 117.1816.90 W

    The home is about 30-45 feet above grade and the driveway is on the eastside.

    you can tell from the tier setup in the front yard and steps how steep the grade is from the street. Now for your property I would put the driveway in the rear (not just flipping the garage, but 180 reversal) you can create large backyard patio setup.
    as a NPDES inspector one of the biggest issue we see are erosion problems and by a tier setup in the front with small retaining walls at each level. This will help in erosion control and aid in keeping compaction during the build.

    Do you recommend a tiered front?

    Do you see anything wrong with my plan above with regards to retaining walls?

    Looking to at splitting difference between front yard and back yard, 10ft a piece.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    recoveryone wrote: »
    To give you a visual example get on google earth and look up these coordinates

    34.0906.56 N 117.1816.90 W

    Tried to find that address, and for some reason I cant.
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  • txcoastal1
    txcoastal1 Posts: 13,132
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    http://www.gps-coordinates.net/
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  • txcoastal1
    txcoastal1 Posts: 13,132
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    It's in Cali
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    I went to China
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  • HzTweaker
    HzTweaker Posts: 725
    edited August 2016
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    ^^ I looked the coordinates up and it took me to Kansas.
    .
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  • tonyb
    tonyb Posts: 32,906
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    F1nut wrote: »
    NEVER.....EVER live anywhere that has an HOA.

    This ^^^ Spot on.

    Is there a reason for this neighborhood ? Reason I ask is, with streets in front and behind you, on an elevated lot, means lots of road noise. Also means since you have a little one, a tad safer lot, with some room too, should be at the top of the priority list.
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  • Mike Reeter
    Mike Reeter Posts: 4,314
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    Joey, There's a reason that is the last lot left, not trying to knock the property, but it's not ideal.

    Be patient and buy an existing home in the neighborhood and reno it to your liking.

    You will be much better off in the long run.
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  • JPete
    JPete Posts: 295
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    My house is about 40 ft, maybe a little more, above street level. I've done things on a riding mower that most probably wouldn't attempt. Not tiered yet, so it's a pain in the A to mow. Have to do part with push mower, part weedeater, and whatever I can on the rider without flipping it. Other complaint is taking the garbage and recycling cans down and back up... Driveway is about 250ft long with a steep slope. Other than that, it's pretty nice towering over everyone and entertaining watching the FedEx and UPS guys earning their money delivering heavy electronics.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    tonyb wrote: »
    F1nut wrote: »
    NEVER.....EVER live anywhere that has an HOA.

    This ^^^ Spot on.

    Is there a reason for this neighborhood ? Reason I ask is, with streets in front and behind you, on an elevated lot, means lots of road noise. Also means since you have a little one, a tad safer lot, with some room too, should be at the top of the priority list.

    Street is quiet behind maybe 100 cars in 24h. That's 1 every 15min.

    I thought about toddler safety, we ain't building for 4 years.

    The backyard will be where most will happen and this lot is huge for our area.

    There ain't no other lots.
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    Mike Reeter wrote: »
    Joey, There's a reason that is the last lot left, not trying to knock the property, but it's not ideal.

    Be patient and buy an existing home in the neighborhood and reno it to your liking.

    You will be much better off in the long run.

    Agreed as well...
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  • Joey_V
    Joey_V Posts: 8,519
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    JPete wrote: »
    My house is about 40 ft, maybe a little more, above street level. I've done things on a riding mower that most probably wouldn't attempt. Not tiered yet, so it's a pain in the A to mow. Have to do part with push mower, part weedeater, and whatever I can on the rider without flipping it. Other complaint is taking the garbage and recycling cans down and back up... Driveway is about 250ft long with a steep slope. Other than that, it's pretty nice towering over everyone and entertaining watching the FedEx and UPS guys earning their money delivering heavy electronics.

    I look forward to making the ups guy work.... Hahaha

    Your lot is twice as high... Holy cow.

    I think my house will be 10ft off street
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  • F1nut
    F1nut Posts: 49,794
    edited August 2016
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    Quit dicking around, buy the 5 acres. You'll be a lot happier in the long run.
    Post edited by F1nut on
    Political Correctness'.........defined

    "A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."

    President of Club Polk

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  • tonyb
    tonyb Posts: 32,906
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    Agreed.....buy land, lots of it. That way you can add along the way, put in a pool and outdoor kitchen.....have lots of room for the kid or future kids.....couple dogs to watch over her. They also make great alarm systems.
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