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Hobbit Home - Coolest $4000 home you'll ever see

by Kurt
17 replies
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I love this home. It's very cool and a great example of how homes can be built for less money while using more nature-friendly materials, and still be good looking.

http://www.simondale.net/house/

The guy says it took about $4500 US, plus about 1000-1500 man-hours in labor, plus a little help from friends once in a while.

I don't care for the "bush hippy" communial thing and wish this type of living would compromise with some of the conveniences of modern life.

Here's taking the concept a little further and being more modern:


And here's Dennis Weaver's Earthship mansion, showing these homes can be as luxurious as any:

This is a very simple hobbit house made from cob...This home will last for 100's of years, if not longer.
  • Profile picture of the author TLTheLiberator
    Very interesting!


    TL
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  • Profile picture of the author sarahberra
    Cool! I want an earth ship. It looks like you can have a large home that doesn't cost much at all. WOW!! I live in AZ and this would be great out here. I paid $1000 total in electric costs from June until September. I live in Tucson AZ. We are moving back to Oregon in the 14th though. No more huge summer electric bills for us. I am going to look into this whole earth ship thing down the road. We can't afford a home yet, but we will get there.
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    • Profile picture of the author Karen Blundell
      I love it! I totally could live in an earthship or even the modern day hobbit house.

      Thanks for posting this, Kurt
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  • Profile picture of the author Kurt
    Hey TL, Sarah and Karen...

    These types of homes solve so many problems like building costs, less trash in land fills, energy and water, and they don't lower our standard of living at all. I actually think they are much more aesthetically appealing than "regular" homes and have so much more character.

    It's just a matter of thinking in a different way and we don't have to make any real sacrifices other than changing the way we think.

    Below is a video how Earthships are being built in Haiti to help people there. The architect is the same as in the first earthship video above. They use old cardboard and styrofoam packed into rice bags for insulation and "fill".

    I believe we can use all sorts of plastics we throw away to fill wall space instead of tossing them in land fills and our oceans. IMO, just wasting all these plastic bottles is not only physically lazy, it's intellectually lazy as well.

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  • Profile picture of the author thunderbird
    That is great! I once actually had a dream about arriving on a boat to a city made of trash. I hardly ever remember my dreams, so it seemed really freaky to me, but now I realize it is not so far-fetched after all.
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    • Profile picture of the author Kay King
      I would love living in any of those homes - including the hobbit home.

      I've been a proponent for berm homes ever since I worked with an architect who designed an underground home that blew away all my stereotypical thinking about that type of housing.

      We keep building the same people boxes and it's not sustainable...plus it's boring!

      kay
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  • Profile picture of the author fastm0ney
    pretty cool stuff, from the subject i thought this was frodo's home though
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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    Ah -- I've finally found my dream home. That top hobbit house is the most awesome thing I've seen -- the aesthetics are magnificent. I'm with you, though, Kurt - need running hot water, electricity, and flushing toilet -- if those can be made then put the system in to do it and I'll live there.

    As far as plastic, though. I sure would want a house built out of that nasty toxic crap. I don't like plastic even IN my house. We created a mess when we started plastic manufacture. Japan right now has developed a flexible plastic made of water and it's totally biodegradable. They are working on making harder plastics and when they achieve that we may be able to free ourselves of that toxic, disease causing, enviroment ruining crap.

    I'm all for growing and using Bamboo and hemp for construction again, too - fast growing, sustainable, non-toxic, edible and nutritious.

    We need to get back to sustainability as in two decades ago.
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    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by HeySal View Post

      Ah -- I've finally found my dream home. That top hobbit house is the most awesome thing I've seen -- the aesthetics are magnificent. I'm with you, though, Kurt - need running hot water, electricity, and flushing toilet -- if those can be made then put the system in to do it and I'll live there.

      As far as plastic, though. I sure would want a house built out of that nasty toxic crap. I don't like plastic even IN my house. We created a mess when we started plastic manufacture. Japan right now has developed a flexible plastic made of water and it's totally biodegradable. They are working on making harder plastics and when they achieve that we may be able to free ourselves of that toxic, disease causing, enviroment ruining crap.

      I'm all for growing and using Bamboo and hemp for construction again, too - fast growing, sustainable, non-toxic, edible and nutritious.

      We need to get back to sustainability as in two decades ago.
      Water, glyceron and gelatin will make rigid bioplastics:


      Q&A: Home-made bioplastic sword!

      Combine 3.0 grams (1/2 tsp) glycerol and 12.0 g gelatin (4 tsp) with 60 ml (1/4 cup) hot water.

      Depending on how large the sword is, you may need to increase these amounts. Just remember to keep them in the same proportions (i.e. either double everything, or quadruple everything, etc).

      Mix all of the ingredients together in the amounts above, and stir. Keep mixing until there are no clumps and it is as dispersed as it's going to get. Then heat the mixture to 95 C or to when it starts to froth (whichever comes first).

      Stir the mixture while you are heating it, and once it is at the right temperature (or starts to froth), remove the heat and keep stirring. Scoop out excess froth with a spoon, and make sure there are no clumps.



      ...and below is a video for a recipe for flexible bioplastic:

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    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by HeySal View Post

      Ah -- I've finally found my dream home. That top hobbit house is the most awesome thing I've seen -- the aesthetics are magnificent. I'm with you, though, Kurt - need running hot water, electricity, and flushing toilet -- if those can be made then put the system in to do it and I'll live there.

      ...

      We need to get back to sustainability as in two decades ago.
      I really like the first home too..Here's some more pics of it:
      High resolution images - Click the links on the page to get big pictures.


      I need the basic modern luxuries too...Solar hot water heaters are very simple and effective and can be made in many ways. A 100ft black water hose encased in a box with a glass top and angled at the Sun will work...Store the hot water in a cob enclosure for insulation and you should have hot water.

      Israel has made solar water heaters a requirement in new homes and it's saving them a lot of money that they would have spent importing oil from potential enemies.

      Add some solar panels and/or wind turbines and it should have plenty of juice, since the home won't need much energy for heating. If you can solder your own panels, you can get juice for about a $1 per watt...And this price is coming down fast.
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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    Kurt - what's a watt cost via conventional utility companies? I'm not sure exactly how impressive a buck a watt is.

    As far as the plastics - I don't think the Japanese are using ANY petroleum in theirs - which is what glycerin is.

    I love the house more with the pics. I wonder where I'm going to build mine.
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    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by HeySal View Post

      Kurt - what's a watt cost via conventional utility companies? I'm not sure exactly how impressive a buck a watt is.

      As far as the plastics - I don't think the Japanese are using ANY petroleum in theirs - which is what glycerin is.

      I love the house more with the pics. I wonder where I'm going to build mine.
      Use vegetable glycerin:
      Amazon.com: Now Foods Vegetable Glycerine, 16 fl...Amazon.com: Now Foods Vegetable Glycerine, 16 fl...

      I'm not sure about the cost per watt for electricity. I'm sure it's online somewhere.

      However, the average US home uses about 3k watt "hours" per day. So to entirely power the average home would cost about $3000. It will probably be higher for things like batteries and other needed stuff. But these solar panels would power a home for 20 years before wearing out.

      It's pretty time consuming to solder all the cells together, but it's actually easy. The hard part is really if you're trying to tie into the grid to sell electricity back. But if you're off grid, it isn't that difficult, although I'd have a qualified electrician check out the wiring, even if not required in the locality. Poorly wired solar panels cause a lot of fires.

      But, a hobbit home or earthship wouldn't need nearly as much power as an average home because of the way they are built and solar heaters and solar water heaters are very cheap and effective. I think $3 grand would cover a hobbit home in solar panels, casing and batteries, but again, it will take some time and depend on how well you can "scalvage" things like glass and casings. If you buy solar panels, it will likely be 5x the cost.

      Another thing is the cost of batteries...

      Nickel Iron Batteries - These were perfected by Thomas Edison about 100 years ago. While they cost about 3x the amount of acid batteries, they can last just about forever, there's one in the Smithsonian that's been working for 99 years, and they don't reach their maximum power output for about 4 years.

      Because of the longevity, big industry got them taken off the market in the 1970s in a classic case of planned obsolescence.

      However, some inventors have joined together to bring the technology back and offering their research as "open source", which means anyone can use their info, but you can't patent any invention based on their research so others can build in any resulting progress.

      So nickle iron batteries will cost more upfront, but cost much less in the long term, since there's a very good chance they will outlive either of us, as well as the next people to live in the home.
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  • Profile picture of the author dbarnum
    Like a glorified soddy today Neat!
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  • Profile picture of the author joetann
    About 10k sales away from building my own I guess. I wish!.. Very awesome find.
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  • Profile picture of the author Dennis Gaskill
    I could definitely live in some of the earthships. Some are a little too primitive for me, but I've seen some dandies. I've been following their evolution, although not that closely, for quite a few years. I understand it can be tricky getting building permits in some places.

    If you don't want to build your own, here are some earthships for sale:

    Earthships For Sale - Earthship Biotecture
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    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by Dennis Gaskill View Post

      I could definitely live in some of the earthships. Some are a little too primitive for me, but I've seen some dandies. I've been following their evolution, although not that closely, for quite a few years. I understand it can be tricky getting building permits in some places.

      If you don't want to build your own, here are some earthships for sale:

      Earthships For Sale - Earthship Biotecture

      And this is a good point...But the good news is, there are earthship homes in all US 50 states, as well as Canada.
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  • Profile picture of the author Kurt
    For those interested, here's just one concept of a simple solar hot water heater. This uses a flexible acrylic mirror to create a "solar trough" that simply focuses the Sun's energy on a black pipe, which absorbs the reflected infrared heat. It heats the water to over 180 degrees, which is much hotter than a typical home hot water heater.

    There's many different designs and options, but this will give a quick idea of how simple and easy it really is:

    Here's a simple solar furnace...Many folks are making them out of pop cans (beer cans if you live in Canada), but even that is too "complex". Anything that will conduct heat and trap it inside will work. This design uses aluminum gutter "downspouts" and I don't "think" he needs to stuff them with cans, but even that isn't that hard.

    BTW, in his tests, it's about 45 degrees outside and after an hour, the furnace is creating air that's 210 degrees, all from parts most of us can find in our nearest recycling center.


    Of course, neither will work at night and they need sunlight during the day, but they can supplement other heating methods and give free heat and hot water.

    And, you can add reflective materials to the outside to direct more of the Sun's energy into the solar heater, as well as use some inexpensive fresnel lenses to direct more energy on the downspouts. These "fresnel lenses" are nothing more than those cheap plastic page magnifiers you can get at Office Depot for a few bucks.

    If you really want to increase the effectiveness of the solar heaters, make the box into a vacuum, as vacuums don't transfer heat. The easiest way to create a vacuum is to light a couple of candles, place them in the box, then seal it. The candles will burn the oxygen and create a bit of a vacuum.
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