Hi Hippie Family - A friend gave me some land in Southern Colorado, and I want to build an earth ship - does anyone know anyone who knows how to do this without a ton of $??? I am not in construction but I am going to learn everything I can about it, and build my strength, so that next spring I can be ready to start... I need resources besides what you can find online. I would like to meet actual people who have done it and visit some actual places... I want to make this place available for people I know and in case we need to leave the city... Eyes
First thing to do is check and see if it's legal to build one on your land. Not all locations allow for that type of construction.
If he owns the land, who is to say what can be built but him? I have friends who bought land to build their own house, but there were houses within a few miles of it, so maybe that is different.
no one actually "owns" land we just rent it for the time being... and most places have building permit laws and bylaws to make sure crazy people dont build death traps
That is true. No one owns the land, they technically own the air above the land only. It gets into the whole sovereign citizen issue. Unless you can trace ownership back 100's of years you own nothing and even then the government will try to take it from you.
Hey, eyes! Do you have water access? Know the zoning? A LOT of the Valley is zoned Ag, but usually, even permanent trailers are allowed, if there is septic. Over to the west, land use regs get really weird, especially as you get close to federal land. Earth ships can be simple. They can look like any other house, if you drive into Ned on 119, as you pass the end of Baker Res and the post office, look up on the hill. That nice house, that happens to be for sale, is an earthship. I watched most of the building, starting in 99. I recall several good articles in Mother Earth News, with references and a fair number of photos. They have the archives on their site. I've been wondering where cob and tire construction can intersect well.
With plenty of help and time I built one on rural property in the Ozark mountains of Missouri for family. Think labor intensive but affordable if you have the place and the sticktoitiveness and lots of gracious friends willing to pitch in. Not to mention a good supply of tires of relative same size and the fill dirt needed to pack them. The potential to build with reclaimed/salvaged/bartered items is excellent but only in direct relation to the "good grace" of your area's building codes, covenants, and neighborhood curmudgeons. I really love the large south facing windows used to create extra open space to put in planters. Or how is this for a bathroom (not my creation): During the early to mid 2000s before the housing crisis we had a vision to create a community of them but the location did not seem to connect with the type of people needed to make it happen. Oh yeah, meth heads stole the solar panels :sad: They are pretty sweet, not sure I would utilize the tires for my dream home due to labor intensiveness but I am sold on some sort of south facing earth bermed home.
