Think of it this way. If you buy a machine, you really shouldn’t be working it do death. These machines are meant to be run. If it’s a decent machine, makes good power after running it a while, tracks pretty decent and at least 50% of undercarriage is there, it’s just a gamble.
As BC said, it’s only way to get cheaper, is if it’s dead.
Personally though, I have built 2 houses for myself off rough land.
Both times, I hired out the majority of the land clearing and excavation and supplemented that by buying a backhoe and completing the stuff that I was comfortable with and had the time to do.
Like the driveway and the power and landscaping.
By hiring out the heavy work, that let me save enough money and allowed me to have leeway to pick and choose what I wanted to do.
This last house, the electrical would have been 80k.
I dug 1500’ of trench, bought my own pad, installed my own conduit and still had to pay 9k to have the wire pulled, up to the meter.
The driveway, would have been 35k, after it was roughed in.
If you are serious about building, find the areas you can save serious money and stay away from areas you can’t.
I tried to get pricing on wells, foundation, insulation, the whole gamut.
Originally, I was gonna to do a modular, until I found a builder that could get prices on these things, way cheaper that I could.
My well for instance, is 440’ down and I got quotes from people I had used in the past and their quotes were insane.
The builder I used had it done, by a company I had never head of, for 5k.
The foundation, I had quotes for 16 to 24k.
He had it done for 8k.
There are ways to save money and there are ways to lose it.
Just make sure and take a lot of pictures and have fun!
