People ask me this more than anything else: how did we build our own home? The short answer — we planned to GC it ourselves from day one. The longer answer is two full-time jobs, spreadsheets after dinner, and a few years living with my parents to make it happen. Here's what it really looked like.

Finding land is the hardest part of DIY building — and no one warns you. We got ours through pure luck: a farmer selling acreage off-market, after 3 months in my parents' basement with zero luck elsewhere. My husband saw it once, we made an offer, and 20 acres became ours. Here's our story, plus exactly where to look, what questions to ask before you buy, and why you need to be ready to drop everything and drive the second a lead comes in.

What It Actually Cost to Build a House And the Budget Mistakes We Wish We’d Avoided.

One of the things that surprised me most during our home-building journey was how much had to happen before construction could actually begin. Here's everything you need to know before you break ground.

This is your one stop shop to learn about the steps necessary to getting electric on your rural land.

Before starting this process, I honestly never gave much thought to where water comes from. You turn on the faucet and water comes out. That’s about as far as my knowledge went. 😂 Here is all we learned along the way!

Buying land is exciting… until people start throwing around words like perc test, elevation, compaction, and grading plan like you’re supposed to know what any of that means. Here's everything you need to know to start the process confidently.

We had a starter home. Stability. Predictability. And we were talking about walking away from all of it… without a clear plan. We either take the risk now, or we keep talking about it forever.

Not sure if you’re ready to build a house? Here’s how we decided to move forward with our custom home—even when the timing felt risky.

We didn’t build our house the “right” way—but it worked. Here’s how we managed a custom home build while working full time and doing things differently.

Saving money during a build doesn’t always mean doing everything yourself . It means being intentional. Here is how we saved money while building our dream home.

From unexpected flooring costs to skipping extra square footage, here’s how we built a 2,201 sq ft farmhouse we could actually sustain — without stretching beyond our means.

Instead of answering the same things one-by-one, I wanted to put everything in one place — so here are my most-asked questions, answered honestly and in one spot.

I had big visions for our house. Not “Pinterest-everything” big, but intentional big. I knew exactly how I wanted certain spaces to feel and how our budget walked hand in hand with it.

How we proved to manage the risk for a bank considering us for a construction loan to build our modern farmhouse.

When you’re building a home, you want to prepare for everything. You want to be ahead of every possible curveball. But the honest truth? Some things are going to happen no matter how prepared you are.

If I could go back and give my past self one thing during our custom home build, it wouldn’t be a bigger budget or a faster timeline. It would be this tool.

Things I Didn’t Think Of (But You Should) When Building Your Custom Home

I get messages about building a home almost daily. Some version of: Where do I even start? Do I need a GC? How long does this actually take? What order does everything happen in? And every time, I think the same thing — there is no way a DM can do this topic justice. So instead of half-answers and voice notes sent at midnight, I sat down and worked weewy weewy hawd (iykyk) to put everything into one simple, no-fluff Google Doc you can actually use. This isn’t something I’m

Funny, honest take on the rollercoaster of decision fatigue, delays, and compromises.