Hello again!
Thank you for the good advice with my last problem a few month ago!

Today I come with a different question, resulting from the fact that I need to refinance and owner financed property, where I meanwhile built my house on.

The house is a 2 story (open loft, first floor outside walls except south side: fill in straw bale).
I built everything all by myself and used many used material, although you can't tell.
I am about 90% and ran out of money.
I have the property (10 acres) owner financed and everything is well. I would not have to worry about this, but need probably another $5k since it never goes as smooth as anticipated.

Status of the house (viewable at facebook: Jack Reppin, Alto, NM):
• Walls are up, but no final siding yet.
• Roof is up, but only 'titanium' roofing material, no shingles yet (have them already sitting here though; paid for)
• Interior walls are up and all insulation is in, as well as R38 in the roof
• All electric is wired and running
• Wood stove and backup gas furnace as well as (hot) water is up and running
• Gas is installed and tested and running
• All doors and windows are in

I moved in and live very comfortable in it and keep working as time and money allows, but see a tight spot coming up soon.
Now the mortgage companies I talked to ensured me, that a refinancing is no problem at all, as soon the house is declared 'habitable'.
Any ideas, how to define this? Does the plaster have to be on the straw bales? ...the tiles laid? ...the tv running?

My code enforcement inspector who is without doubt not a fan of straw bale construction and hard to work with, abandoned me probably 3 month ago, telling me 'just to keep going', which I did. :)
I tried to get a hold of him, to get an answer to this question, but he doesn't return my calls and is never available and I am running out of time....
Anyone with a good answer for my dilemma?
One more time: At what point should a house be pronounced 'habitable'? At what point can I demand the final inspection, since all others got skipped (which I will work out the one or the other way, since it was not MY fault...it's a small community here, if you know what I mean...)
Thank you for your input and feel free to look up my pge on facebook, if interested

Jack

In the end it will be up to the County to issue the certificate of occupancy. They are the ones who will tell you whether or not it meets their criteria of being habitable. If you can't get them to cooperate you will have to find the next in charge or whoever the supervisor is of the county official you are having problems with.

With that being said, the siding has to be on the home and a roof membrane that will protect the interior from water intrusion. Without those 2 things, I doubt they will allow you a certificate of occupancy. Also with a straw bale home, you will have to have an interior fire barrier (drywall or something similar).



I don't want to get off topic but if your home is in a rural area with Deer Mice, make sure you seal it up very tight and I assume that a straw bale home has some type of rodent deterrent put into the straw to prevent them from nesting inside the walls. I had an acquaintance who got the HantaVirus out in New Mexico and almost died.  CDC New Mexico

Lbear,

I have never heard of any chemical being added to staw bales to deter critters.  What I do see is that the staw bales are covered with stucco.

Thanks for the caring thought about the critters in the walls. My previous house (built in 1993) was a 2-story straw bale as well and the walls have been plastered. I never had any issues with critters, bugs or aliens, living in the walls I sure will pass on the chemicals hint. Defeats the purpose of an healthy house climate anyways... My previous house withstood even the first day of a major forest fire and it was like a furnace up here. I am pretty sure that back burning of the fire department finally burned it down or even more likely, railroad ties I used in the landscaping. They burned for days after the fire. Will never use THEM again. They are banned in Germany since the 80s anyways because of the toxic creosote.
So you guys think I need to have the final siding on the walls to get the approval from the Building inspector?

Posted By Alton on 11 May 2013 12:19 PM
Lbear,

I have never heard of any chemical being added to staw bales to deter critters.  What I do see is that the staw bales are covered with stucco.

In a previous rural home I lived in out in Colorado I had deer mice nesting in the wall insulation (cellulose). It was next to impossible to get them out. A neighbor down the road had the same problem on his home and he contracted the HantaVirus and died. That really scared me and I had to set poison traps to keep the deer mouse population down. For a time there I was worried I might have contracted it (takes 2-4 weeks after exposure to develop symptoms). The other guy I knew was out in New Mexico and was camping, he contracted it from deer mice while outdoors in his tent. He almost died but survived after being placed on life support. He unfortunately ended up being paralyzed from the waist down. HantaVirus is rare but deadly. They say on average for every 6 out of 10 mice the CDC captures in areas of Colorado and New Mexico, 6 of those mice test positive for HantaVirus.

Posted By Ruidosian on 11 May 2013 02:56 PM
Thanks for the caring thought about the critters in the walls. My previous house (built in 1993) was a 2-story straw bale as well and the walls have been plastered. I never had any issues with critters, bugs or aliens, living in the walls I sure will pass on the chemicals hint. Defeats the purpose of an healthy house climate anyways... My previous house withstood even the first day of a major forest fire and it was like a furnace up here. I am pretty sure that back burning of the fire department finally burned it down or even more likely, railroad ties I used in the landscaping. They burned for days after the fire. Will never use THEM again. They are banned in Germany since the 80s anyways because of the toxic creosote.
So you guys think I need to have the final siding on the walls to get the approval from the Building inspector?

A healthy home climate means that it is FREE from rodents, insects, mold, bacteria, radon and other things which all come from nature itself and are not man-made. Some things in nature are more deadlier than the chemicals (borate, etc) they put in insulation. Rodents carry more diseases & health risks (some of which will kill you) than a wall treated with man-made pesticide. More people suffer from indoor home mold issues inside walls than they do with borates. So not all chemicals or treatments are bad, some are necessary in creating a healthier indoor living environment.

As far as the certificate of occupancy goes. In my opinion you will NOT get a certificate without the final exterior siding. If you currently have exposed straw bale showing on the outside, there is NO WAY they will approve that. I've seen them deny occupancy because the finished floor material was not yet installed (in this case carpet).

This may not be the case in NM, but in most states you can get a provisional certificate of occupancy without having the house completely finished. In Pa, it takes a bedroom, a bathroom and a kitchen, hvac, outlets and switches installed or covered, and the full monte on safety: drywall, railings, and so on. Much of this is judgment call, of course, so you need to mend some fences with your building inspector.

Lenders may not accept a provisional CO. Most are reluctant to lend to owner/builders in the first place, and very reluctant to do so once the project is underway. The official reason is fear of liens by unpaid contractors whose claims would be superior to the bank's.

The vector for hantavirus is airborne dust containing mouse feces or urine, and the major risks are cleaning a heavily contaminated structure or disturbing a nest in the wild. The notion that Lbear's friend contracted it in a clean tent is silly.

Jack, after viewing your facebook photos, I would say the only thing you need to complete for a "habitable " building is to cover the wood members inside. I appears as though there are bare studs uncovered?

As LBear pointed out the building dept has total jurisdiction.Usually all open permits must be signed off and the building needs to be finalized.With that being said, ask for a temporary certificate of occupancy.This can buy you several months and sometimes even up to a year to complete on going construction.

Posted By toddm on 12 May 2013 07:26 AM
The vector for hantavirus is airborne dust containing mouse feces or urine, and the major risks are cleaning a heavily contaminated structure or disturbing a nest in the wild. The notion that Lbear's friend contracted it in a clean tent is silly.

Nothing is silly about it because he almost died and ended up paralyzed. I don't joke around with things like this. It was determined by the CDC in New Mexico that he contracted it while in his outdoor tent campsite. The CDC went out to the site and caught deer mice (which tested positive) and the area where the tent was placed was covered with deer mice droppings & urine. The CDC concluded that the outdoor area was infested with HantaVirus positive deer mice and the tent was placed on soil which contained the mouse feces and urine. At some point he breathed in the ground dust and became infected.

The guy who lived down from me in Colorado contracted it and died. The CDC did their investigation and found that he contracted it while working on his vehicles inside his garage. The garage floor was dusty and the Colorado CDC found deer mouse droppings and deer mice that tested positive for HantaVirus inside of his garage.

Again, I am not saying the HantaVirus is a pandemic and my experience with it was strange because of the 2 cases that I personally knew about. I had Deer Mice inside of a brand new home and they were getting in and nesting within the cellulose. I had crews out there trying to find where they tunneled in but it was futile because the home was a wood frame home. How many hundreds of gaps could there have been plus they can gnaw through wood and tunnel into the wall cavity.

Remember last year when people in Yosemite were getting infected with the HantaVirus and they closed down the cabins? 10 people were infected and 3 died. They determined the cabins were getting deer mice. These tents were raised 2 feet off the ground and had solid floors in them. That shows you how a clean tent in the outdoors is a silly notion because a mouse can easily get into a tent. CDC Yosemite

So your friend disturbed nests at his campsite. He could have been there chopping wood or picking huckleberries and got exposed just as easily. The Yosemite exposure happened in tent CABINS -- permanent structures. Exposure to mice isn't the problem. The problem is exposure to detritus accumulating in long-term mouse nesting areas. Ordinary pest control and housekeeping is adequate protection. From 1993 through 2011, the CDC collected 587 reports of hantavirus. Statistically, that's like getting struck by lighting while collecting your lottery winnings check.