Last February I looked up the cost to build my little house on this building cost site. Since then I have drawn up a smaller plan because I wanted something more affordable. Today I plugged in the numbers for my little cottage plan and was stunned. The price to build has practically doubled since February! Ahh! I can't even afford to build my cottage now. It would cost as much as the bigger house did 5 months ago. Of course, I could save here and there by doing some tasks myself and being my own contractor but it is still too much money. According to the calculator it would cost $100k just to build my cottage. 
So, what are my other options? If I am going to sell my RV because maintenance and repairs are so expensive and it is loosing value rapidly, I have 3 other options.
One, take out a mortgage to build a real house. I don't want to do that. I am tired of paying off large loans and I don't need a big house. I would have to continue working for 10 more years at least. Maybe later.
Two, buy a used manufactured home for $30k. This would require me to work for another 2 extra years, manufactured houses don't maintain their value very well around here, and I don't need that much room.
Or three, spend about $5k making my current mobile home livable with new wiring, paneling, patching the roof etc....
After seeing those building costs I am leaning towards option 3. If I am really going to be a snowbird and spend my summers somewhere else then I don't need a fancy home here. Plus the mobile home is here already. It's kind of a blank slate. I definitely couldn't do anything to depreciate the value any more. I think it is worth more as scrap metal than as a home.
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