IF the house is going to take 3 years to build I wouldn't think you would be out of it for 3 years would you? Can you schedule and plan the build so that you can move in sooner and then do the finishing touches once you move in?

Congratulations on the sale of your house! My advice is to rent something with a room you won't need to be using and use that room for storage.

When we had to go Into temporary housing years ago, we rented a townhouse that had 4 bedrooms. We packed one of those bedrooms with everything that didn't fit in the rooms we were using. We kept the door to that room closed at all times. Only one time did we need something stored in the our dark hole. We had a young son, he remembers how we sent him through the maze of boxes to find whatever it was that we needed. Eighteen months later, unpacking that room was like Christmas morning.

Blf, no DH is adamant that we don't do that. He thinks we'll move in and get lazy with finishing things. He has a good point based on previous projects we've done.

Maddie, that's exactly what we were thinking. The only problem is that it's hard to find a decent house with four bedroom under 2k/sf. We need at least three bedrooms - or two and an office.

We have moved many times and have done what you are doing. Before we could afford to purchase a house while building one, we would rent as well, We had furniture stored everywhere in the rentals, they were small and we had a lot of stuff. It took us approx l year to build our homes. It goes by pretty fast when you are busy like that. I really enjoyed the process. Good luck.

Our contractor had promised we would be in this house by the start of the school year; when he wasn't he "paid for" us to rent a furnished home for 6 mo.s, and our old house was still on the market so our furnishings all stayed there.

Do you have any relatives who can store some of your stuff? You don't want to feel like you are in a storage unit for 3yrs. Can you put a pod on the land for a while? (dont know what that would cost). Can you build the garage first? And store stuff there?

Congrats on the big first step toward your build. I remember the cool floor plan! I will miss your old foyer though; gorgeous job you did with it.

Thanks, Mtn. There's a lot I'm going to miss about this house, but it's just too much for us now.

We're building a 1200sf metal barn that will be the first thing we get done. The plan is to store building materials in the barn. I would like to store furniture, but I'm concern with dust and too much exposure. If I can figure out a way to protect it well, that would be an option.

The floor plan! Well, it's changed dramatically. The plan was to do a barndominium and a house later. After lots of consideration and advice, we've decided to just go for the farmhouse. It's laid out very much like the barndo, but larger and one story (with a loft). I'm going to post the new plans pretty soon.

cant wait to see!

Have never done that but three years seems like a long time to live in a space overstuffed with too much furniture, etc. Hopefully you can find a big enough space that falls within your budget. I'd rather live in a smaller place with the minimum necessities and put the rest of the 3600 square feet of stuff in storage if you really feel you must keep all of it. Do you "need" three bedrooms? If money were no object you could have everything you want but it sounds like that may not be the case.

Congrats Magda! Exciting things coming your way. Glad we get to follow along.

3katz - I think she said she needs 2 bedrooms and an office (so 3 bedrooms).

When we built, we rented a SMALL house with 2 brs and 1 bath! 1 br was filled with stuff. We did have a storage unit, but our housing/rental costs are much lower here. We also had a large eat-in area off the kitchen and I can still remember when we had (boxed) toilets, etc. sitting in that area! LOL We didn't have a garage on the rental house - had a carport, but the owners had a concrete block storage building (this was a house on a family farm) that they kindly let us store our boat in! As stressful as that time was, I have fond memories of the very kind couple we rented from - and their wonderful garden - which they shared. The man has passed away, but we still keep in touch with the wife - 20 years later.

I would consider finding your rental and the. Only saving the furniture you will be using. Chances are once your brand new home is done, your stored furniture will not look so good and you will be itching to replace anyway. The money you save by needing a smaller place X 36 months should about balance out

Several years ago, then-DH and I were building a house and went this route for 6 months. Extra furniture was in long-term storage, and we had a $40 month smaller storage unit for out of season clothing, etc. We rented a 2 bedroom apartment, using one bedroom as an office for both of us. I found it liberating not to have so much stuff and so much house to deal with.

But 3 years is a long time to do this kind of thing.

Here is a thought: for roughly $2K - one month's rent - you could buy a used shipping
container, put it on your property, and store your stuff in it. Then you sell the container when you are done with it.

This is an excellent idea. My brother did this exactly, I had forgotten.

"Here is a thought: for roughly $2K - one month's rent - you could buy a used shipping container, put it on your property, and store your stuff in it. Then you sell the container when you are done with it."

Magdalene we are doing it right now - living in a rental while GCing our build and DH is the chief hammer swinger as well. Of course it will take longer than had we hired a builder. We had the same criteria as you - it's a cash build, we didn't want to sink a lot into rent and renting storage space is not where we want to put our $$. We also moved to another state s- we sold a lot, even things I hesitated about because there was just no way to know what would work in a new house - at that point we had no house plans and actually thought we'd be buying and remodeling.

We could have rented a smaller less expensive house for just the 2 of us but decided we'd rather have all our stuff with us under one roof. And we have friends and family who are in and out constantly so wanted some level of comfort for them although there are boxes in every closet, under every bed, in the basement/crawl and we can't get even one car into the 2 car garage.

I jokingly call it glorified camping although obviously a 3br 2ba 12 year old house is quite comfortable. We haven't hung a picture anywhere, the only thing we did was hang a mirror in the front entry. There's actually a sense of freedom in not caring about the paint color or the wallpaper that's not my taste or whether my comforter goes with the carpet - who care!!!

We are approaching our 18 month mark at the end of May, fingers crossed we will be out of here at or before the 24 month mark. You can absolutely do this. My one suggestion is to negotiate a longer lease than one year going in since you anticipate 3 years - at least go for 2 with stable rent and then work out an option for month to month after that in the contract.

Think long and hard about storing your things in something that's not climate controlled. That's a big reason we opted for the house as climate controlled storage is quite a bit more expensive than not.

Been there doing that. I could have written your OP Magdalena!

The only difference is we moved into our own rental. We bought a small farmette, we have horses, with a tiny farmhouse and did a gut remodel on that to bring it to a small three BR, about 1500 SF. I have a barn on that farmette and we bought a new storage shed, prebuilt, 12X20 ft long and put a ton of stuff in that including furniture. It has been fine. Not climate controlled but the furniture that's in there is not heirloom. Of course in retrospect I should have had an auction...

Our build, on our other farm, about five miles away, from planning to move in took 4.5 years. We also chose to GC and not do a mortgage. We subbed out the majors but it has really mostly been from my brain to my DH hands. Of course there is that full time job in there too. It would have been a quicker project but we had a death in the family, which all but stopped us for about a year. Various other unforeseen glitches plus a building inspector from hell who cost us about 10 months and a near lawsuit.

Find a place that you can have a life in while you are doing your project. Closeness to your new build is most important. If I had to do it all over again I would have put a mobile home on the land with a barn and septic/well first. We only lived five miles away but that was to far when we had issues with nosey people.

We have close friends who moved to land and did the barn first with bath and kitchen then moved a luxury travel trailer into the barn, before they did the house. They also had horses and other pets to consider. Their build was much quicker than ours maybe 2-3 years total but they had a builder for the house.

Good luck and have fun.

We did a major reno on our lake house and rented a storage container to store everything(furn, clothing, linens, household stuff.. really everything!). The unheated storage container sat in a corner of our property for a full year. We are in the northeast, so cold snowy winter. I have to say that everything came out of that container in perfect condition. I had stored most of the clothing and linens in those plastic bags where you suck out the air. Everything was fine.. so I wouldn't worry about it if you go that route.

Congratulations on your sale!

I moved on July 9 last summer--into a neighbor's house until October 6. Then, I lived among my stored things and renovation/addition construction until mid-February. (My house was supposed to have been ready by Thanksgiving).

Before moving/downsizing, I truly thought I had minimized what I brought to store. I now wonder why I brought as much as I did. After not having access to things from July until February, I learned to live without them. I didn't miss those things! Yours will be stored for 3 years. You may also learn to live without.

My situation was different because my husband's death was the reason I moved, so I was going through rough times. I found that living among boxes stacked in every room was really depressing. But, I also had ongoing construction with workmen here all the time. No kitchen.

3katz4me - Yes, we do need three bedrooms. Especially for so long. A bedroom for us, a bedroom for me (snoring DH) and an office since I work from home.

Aok27502 - There's a young family, first time buyer neighborhood with lots of rentals within about 20 minutes of our property. I think that's about as close as we can get.

Tinam61 - Thanks Tina! I'm pretty excited about having a new adventure. We seem to get the itch every 10 years so I hope this next move will be the last. Your rental situation sounds ideal!

Kippy - I love my furniture too much and a lot of it is quality or custom made, so no plans to ditch it anytime soon!

Graywings123 & Maddie - I'm concerned about a shipping container or Pods - something left outside. I'm in Central Texas and the summer temps can stay in the 100s for week's at a time. Stuff could really get messed up under those conditions.

DLM2000 - I know, I've been following your build! I really do prefer to have everything with us, even if it's stacked all over the place. We decluttered and put stuff in storage before going on the market. The storage unit is a conditioned 10x10 space for $100/month. I think that's kind of expensive for such a small space. I'm so looking forward to that freedom! Good luck DLM, sounds like you're moving along smoothly with your build.

Missymoo12 - Farmette, love that word! "My brain to my DH hands" is exactly how we are doing it. Luckily, he likes my ideas and I like his hammer swinging. We'll also sub out the major stuff and one of DH's best friends is an electrician - he'll come in handy! I wish we could do a mobile home, but there are restrictions against them in the area.

Czarinalex - As I said to Gray and Maddie, we are in Central TX and I'm afraid it's just too hot here. I still might look into Pods, maybe they're insulated?

Dyhgarden - We are still under contract and anything can happen, but thank you! You moved on my birthday! We had a huge garage sale (made $1800!) last year and we've purged as much as we can.

Another option is the barn. Our plan is to do this in phases. First a well & septic, then a 1500sf metal barn, then house, then finishing out the barn. DH wants to add an office, music studio, storage room, bathroom and kitchenette to the barn. His idea is to use the conditioned space for living while building. It's about 600sf of conditioned spaced. It would be roughing it. No stove/oven (would have to use a grill outside!) and the washer/dryer would have to be rigged. I'm still thinking about that.

" Maddie, we are in Central TX and I'm afraid it's just too hot here."

It's not the heat that hurts stored items, it's dampness. Maybe my brother was lucky, none of their stuff was damaged after being stored for over 4 years (central Florida). Good luck whatever you decide.

I have friends who have done things similar to what has been mentioned here. A friend recently moved back here from DC into a rental house while looking for a house to buy (she is single but with a lot of nice furniture, including some antiques). She rented a 4 BR house & basically used 2 bedrooms for storage and part of her dining room and lived in the rest for about 18 months.

Another young couple built their garage with an apartment above it and then later connected their house to it via a sunroom. The apartment became more of a guest quarters/kids play area when the house was completed and 2 kids came along. Not exactly your situation but it worked for them.

We rented an pod for about 4 weeks when we were doing some hardwood installation work in our master bedroom. Best decision we made as we weren't tripping over stuff in the house, but I wouldn't recommend it for 3 years in non-climate controlled conditions for furniture.

When we built our house in the country we were about 20 minutes away. It wasn't so bad. We had sold our house also and were living at my parents lake house, storing our furniture in their vacant house which was a true blessing being empty, climate controlled & not on the market at the time.

I think the barn is a great idea, especially if you want to 'camp out' occasionally as the work progresses. It could deter potential visitors to your build site as well knowing people are actually around the property.

Would recommend installing a camera somewhere once you start putting building materials around since you'll be the GC unless you'll be able to secure them in the barn. Even then would put motion lights and a camera (where no one can see it) aimed at the main entrances.

congrats on the sale!

i've only lived in a rental once for several months, but didn't have worries re: storage, etc because it was a co relo. but, i don't think i would like living in a rental for 3 years- that seems like a looong time to live like that...

Have you thought about a mobile home that you could buy cheaply, put on your property, and live there while you're building your house? It would probably be a lot cheaper and you would be on your own property, probably help to get the house built sooner.