Why a frame house?
It is difficult to imagine faster construction than frame construction. The construction of a house measuring 4x4 meters will be more like building a bathhouse, and if we talk about a house made of timber, then you will have to wait for shrinkage even for such a small structure. Building a house made of brick or foam block is associated with an increase in costs for the house itself and its foundation. We decided that our house would be cozy, but at the same time you would not cause significant damage to the family budget. In these conditions, frame house construction is the best choice. In addition, the availability of materials for this technology, ease of construction and undemanding requirements for special equipment and tools will allow you to carry out all the work yourself.
Excluding the costs of paying for the work of builders, we can build a 4x4 meter house in the shortest possible time and almost 2 times cheaper than a similar project implemented by construction companies.
Advantages
The first thing that attracts potential owners of a townhouse is its cost.
If we consider in detail the possibility when you need to build a townhouse from scratch, then the savings will consist of the following:
- The cost of developing an architectural project is divided among all participants, and everyone contributes their share, which is more beneficial for each individual family;
- Documentation and fees are also paid collectively;
- We carry out wholesale purchases of construction and finishing materials, pipes and wires.
Project of a three-story secret house for 4 families.
The savings are significant and can amount to up to 20% of the total cost of four separate cottage projects for each family; - Additionally, for a large volume of work on one project, the construction organization makes a significant discount on its services;
- Similarly, along with builders, the work of plumbers, electricians, and finishers will cost less.
One building designed for four families is much cheaper to build, since there are common walls between the living areas. In addition, four separate cottages will occupy a significantly larger area and will require more complex communications and opportunities for transport access.
A townhouse takes up less land per owner, providing the same opportunities as a separate cottage.
Detailed layout of a townhouse for 4 owners
A four-family home also has an advantage in operating costs. A properly organized air conditioning, ventilation, and heating system will help significantly save material costs.
Lovers of country life will also find a townhouse for four owners quite attractive, since such houses are located far from the city limits, providing almost the same conditions as a cottage. In areas available for this type of development, there is almost always clean air, silence, and sometimes beautiful nature with a forest, lake or river.
Construction of the foundation
For such a lightweight structure, it is not worth investing in a capital foundation. The best option would be a columnar foundation, and modern technologies have given us an excellent solution for a frame house - a foundation on screw piles. Each option has its own advantages and disadvantages.
A column foundation is the cheapest option. You can assemble wooden boxes yourself from scrap lumber or plywood, tie together the reinforcement and fill the resulting structure with concrete that you made yourself on site. After the concrete has hardened, you will receive ready-made piles, which will need to be installed in pre-dug holes. A sand cushion must be poured into the bottom of the holes under the concrete piles.
An even simpler option may be to purchase stubs of piles from the construction of multi-story buildings, where the piles are driven in and the excess length is cut down. You may even be allowed to pick up this construction waste for free. But in fact, these “stumps” will be even more durable than piles made independently.
It is very difficult to make homemade screw piles. But perhaps this is not such a big minus. Self-produced concrete piles may have geometric defects, or low-quality cement will affect the durability and reliability of the foundation. Factory screw piles do not have these disadvantages. The strict geometry of the pipe and the correct blades will allow you to screw the piles strictly vertically.
Sergey Yurievich
Construction of houses, extensions, terraces and verandas.
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A set of screw piles will cost you a little more, but the work of installing them is also quite affordable for you to do it yourself. Even attracting specialists will not become a “hole” in your budget. Screw piles are a godsend for prefabricated structures. You only need to mark the location of the piles and screw them in. All work is completed in 1 working day, if we are talking about a 4x4 m frame house.
Additional premises
Any extensions must be included in the building design. They require approval from local authorities, fire safety and sanitary and epidemiological stations. Without technical documentation, terraces and verandas are considered legally illegal extensions.
A solid foundation is required for residential and additional premises. This rule also applies to wooden and metal sheds. Otherwise, due to the deformation of materials during shrinkage or sudden changes in weather, a crack will appear between the buildings.
An alternative to verandas is wooden gazebos. They require less material consumption. Their layout is simple. This is a canopy supported by columns.
Attic
Before starting work on a project with an attic, you need to choose the shape and angle of the roof. The usable area of the room will depend on them. Common types of roofing for houses with a 4 by 4 attic:
- Gable. It is a standard attic converted into living rooms. The optimal height of the ridge is 3.6 m, with an inclination angle of 60°. The useful area of the attic is 7 m2.
- Broken gable roof. Construction and design will be more expensive, but the design provides a larger usable area with a lower ridge height.
When arranging an attic, care should be taken to have reliable thermal insulation. The rafter leg must have a width of at least 150 mm in order to place the insulation inside it.
Veranda
There are two types of veranda:
- Open. Designed to decorate a building. The floor is located at the level of the first floor, the platform is fenced with railings. A canopy is necessary to protect wooden elements from precipitation.
- Closed. The space under the roof has continuous glazing or partitions.
A closed veranda increases the total area of the home and looks like part of it. The extension makes the layout more convenient.
Interior finishing should be done with frost- and moisture-resistant materials. Their quality will affect the durability of the structure. When planning the veranda, you should take into account the dimensions of the necessary furniture. So, to accommodate benches and a table, its width should not be less than 2 meters.
Garage
Adding a garage has a number of advantages:
- Using one wall for two buildings;
- The ability to get into the car without going outside;
- Saving site area.
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The main disadvantage of this solution is the difficulty of organically connecting buildings with different dimensions. The minimum garage size for one car is 3x6. Next to a 4 x 4 apartment, the building will look ridiculous.
To add a garage, you need a solid foundation. At the planning stage, care should be taken to strengthen the roof so that an avalanche of snow from a residential building does not damage it.
Construction of walls
It is necessary to decide on the technology for constructing a frame house, but this is not as easy as it seems. There are many variations for such construction: frame, panel house, SIP structure, houses made of double or mini-timber. It is very likely that your home will only be designed for spring and summer occupancy. It is difficult to imagine that on an area of 4x4 meters (even in the case of construction with an attic) it is possible to design a heating system, a bathroom and plumbing. There is simply no need for this. Most likely, your house will consist of, at most, two rooms with a couple of windows and an entrance door.
So the choice of technology depends only on your preferences or on the availability of materials in your region. Let's consider these technologies in order of their versatility and availability.
Frame house
The most unpretentious technology in terms of materials. For construction, you will need lumber for arranging the frame, insulation, construction films and materials for external and internal cladding. The upper and lower trim are made of 100x150 mm timber. The frame is assembled onto metal corners from timber 50x100 or 50x150 mm, depending on the specified insulation thickness and the final load. The frames for installing doors and windows are immediately installed. In accordance with the technology, a vapor-permeable membrane, a vapor barrier contour and insulation are laid. In the case of building a cold house, only a windproof film is installed, which protects the house from blowing. All joints of the beams are sealed with jute or tow. For external cladding, lining, imitation timber, blockhouse, siding (vinyl or metal), OSB are usually used.
Panel house
It is the “little brother” of frame construction. If in a frame house the frame is first assembled and only then the cladding is made, then in a panel building the entire wall is completely assembled on the ground. That is, the entire “pie” of a frame wall with prepared openings for windows and doors is assembled on site or in production. In this case, logs are laid on the foundation and then finished walls are installed, which are fixed to the foundation and to each other.
Bedroom furniture
Having decided in which areas of the house the bedrooms will take place, it is worth starting the process of thinking about the internal layout of each of the spaces. Of course, each owner of a four-bedroom house will determine the style, design and lighting methods independently. In order not to miss anything important, it is worth understanding what furniture must be present in the sleeping room.
Bed
As a rule, the bed in the bedroom takes up the bulk of the space. Most often, for comfort and decent space equipment, preference is given to a double bed.
An exception is the children's bedroom, in which you should pay attention to a single crib, a folding sofa or a bunk bed if there are two children in the family and they share one bedroom.
Bedside tables
This piece of furniture adds comfort to the space. Various small things are usually stored on bedside tables, such as a telephone, cosmetics, personal hygiene items, and an alarm clock. You can also install lamps on the bedside tables, which will allow you to comfortably enjoy your favorite book or magazine before bed.
Houses made of SIP panels
The same panel house, but the walls are made using special technology in production. They are a sandwich of outer and inner cladding with insulation based on polystyrene foam. Installation is carried out identically to the construction of a panel house. The main disadvantage is the limited availability of SIP panels. Not in every region you can find a manufacturer of this material, although technology is developing very quickly.
Houses made of mini-timber or double timber. The technology is more reminiscent of construction from profiled timber. However, its Scandinavian origins made this technology closer to frame technology. This is another rarely used technology: it is difficult to find a supplier, it is not easy to build walls correctly without additional knowledge.
Construction of ceiling and roof
Whatever wall construction technology you choose, the ceiling is mounted in the same way:
- a strictly horizontal harness is assembled,
- floor beams are laid,
- insulation is carried out in accordance with technology,
- Sheathing is carried out with rough or finishing materials.
The roof for a 4x4 m frame house, as for most square houses, is chosen to be hip or hip. This is advantageously emphasized by the geometry of the house, but if you have insufficient construction experience, you can get by with the simplest option - constructing a gable roof. The most common roofing material option for economy class frame houses is corrugated sheet or metal tiles.
I would especially like to note the 4x4 frame house with an attic. This project will not differ in construction technology. Is it possible that in arranging the rafter system, only 1 option is available to you - a sloping roof, since installing an attic with a gable roof with a high ridge will not give you much additional living space, but a sloping roof will almost double the area. A small area for creativity appears. The attic is usually used for sleeping places, and the first floor becomes a spacious room for receiving guests.
We have analyzed the main stages of constructing a 4x4 frame house with our own hands. But what to do if there is absolutely no time for construction, but you still want to equip your dacha?
Flaws
If consideration of a four-family house as a single architectural complex shows an impressive list of positive features, then analysis from the position of an individual owner reveals negative ones.
The short list looks like this:
- It is difficult to make changes to an already completed project. Redevelopment of any kind affects all families living in the house;
- Even if a townhouse is being built to house relatives or close friends, the rules of conduct are much stricter than in an apartment building. Common territory, partly communications, close living and the need for communication are factors that impose certain requirements on neighbors;
- The absence of one family on their part of the area, especially in winter, is dangerous. Accidents, freezing of pipes, the need for maintenance, possibly access to utilities - these are the difficulties that other residents of the housing may face;
Original project of a townhouse for 4 families with a swimming pool - There is also collective responsibility for the condition of the house - decoration, roof, ceilings, and so on.
Therefore, if you plan to build a house for four families or want to buy part of a townhouse for living, you need to take into account rules similar to those in a communal apartment.
The project should be selected based on the separation of technical components: individual communications with separate meters, heating system, possibility of redevelopment.
Frame house 4x4 from the developer
Unlike the construction of large residential buildings, a huge number of construction companies and private teams of carpenters are engaged in the construction of low-budget frame country houses. How not to be deceived? How to choose a reliable construction team or company?
First of all, you should not chase the lowest price. The best option would be to take the advice of relatives or friends who have already encountered the construction of a house. Subjective opinion can tell you a lot. If there are no advisors in your close circle, start studying reviews on the Internet. Any self-respecting builder should have a set of proposals and a portfolio of finished projects. It’s great if the developer invites you to visit current or completed projects. Even if your country house does not cost too much money, you should still require the preparation of an agreement describing all the structures and the guarantee for them. Even a country house will be covered by a warranty of at least 1 year, and load-bearing structures – up to 3 years.
A 4x4 frame house is not difficult to design, but working with such an object is no different from constructing a larger structure: you will encounter the same operations and difficulties, you will need the same materials and tools. Such houses can become for you a training ground for the construction of a more serious building, and maybe even a spacious residential cottage based on frame technology.
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