Built a 14x32 little house... Next the saltbox??

[Spyke]

It has been a while since I have been here, so for those of you who don't know me, I built a little house about 3 years ago. It was a ton of work but well worth it. Actually I am still wrappin up a few loose ends like decks and things. It has all to comforts of home including a full bath, electric, central air and DirecTV.

I am really, really sick of paying a mortgage on my main house. Plus all the BS that goes with living in the burbs. I am really thinking about grabbing another piece of land out in the country and building John's saltbox house. I have learned so much from the little house and it just seems like such a waste to not use all this "new" knowledge.

So these are my questions about the saltbox.

I need a full basement. How can I do this with these plans?

How hard would it be to make the foot print a bit larger?

How do you guys think it would look as a log house? I was thinking of using half logs outside as siding and half logs and wood siding inside with very little drywall.

Just wanted to bounce these ideas off you guys!

[jraabe]

Welcome back Spyke.

Converting the crawlspace plan into a basement would be quite easy. It already has 8" walls and a place for the stairs to wrap right around and head down from the Kitchen/Dining area. Your foundation guy can probably do it without a redrawn plan unless you have a big daylight window wall or something.

Changing the footprint is more problematic and would involve redrawing and re-engineering much of the plans — especially with the saltbox roof coming down the back and having to line up correctly with the back wall.

The log siding and wood interior would be no problem.