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Mississippi-Delta House: Introduction From "Be Your Own Contractor: Vacation Homes" episode DBCV-104

	An elevated house built in the Mississippi delta, just about a half mile from the mighty river.
	Homeowners Tim and Meri Tenhet.

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In each episode of DIY's Be Your Own Contractor: Vacation Homes viewers meet dreamers and do-it-yourselfers who oversaw the building of their own vacation home and hear about the challenges that they faced.

In this episode we meet homeowners Meri and Tim Tenhet who acted as their own contractors when they built their vacation home -- elevated on pine timbers -- deep in the Mississippi delta, just a half-mile from the Mississippi River.

We hear why Tenhets chose to act as their own contractors and how Meri really took the lead on the project starting with drawing the preliminary sketches of the house. The couple tells about the area where they built their weekend getaway and why they needed to elevate the house more than 16 feet off the ground. They also talk about the process of clearing the land in a conservation-conscious manner, a building practice that contributes to the protection of this unspoiled river-bottom.

Meri discusses the detailed planning she did for the kitchen -- an important factor for this culinary-school-trained cook. She also describes the planning that went into the electrical work and lighting design. Viewers also hear about the building of the wraparound deck and screened porch, and the safety precautions that wer necessary because of the height of the structure. Finally, Meri and Tim provide some firsthand insights on what it takes to be your contractor.

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Owning a Piece of the Delta

Tim Tenhet is director of sales and marketing for farm-equipment manufacturer. Meri is a culinary-school trained chef and now runs the school cafeteria at the elementary school where her daughter is enrolled.

For Tenhet family, a vacation home mean being able to enjoy the outdoors. Tim is a sportsman and enjoys hunting and fishing, and Meri enjoys horseback riding. But building their own special place, by necessity, also meant doing so on a relatively tight budget.

According to conventional wisdom, in most circumstances people building a home can save about 20 percent on the total cost of building by acting as their own contractors. Even more can be saved by those who do a sizable portion of the actual work themselves. But cost savings weren't the only reasons for the Tenhets taking on the job themselves. "I wanted this to be a piece of us," says Mari, "not just something that someone else had put down on paper. I felt that if it was to be our home, we need to be part of [building] it. That was important to us."

Neither Tim nor Meri had any prior experience with building or construction. Though both were involved with the project, Tim acknowledges that Meri was the one who took on the bulk of the workload. "I just wrote the checks," he laughs.

Meri worked initially with an architect on designing the layout of the house, and also did the lion's share in coordinating the activities of the subcontractors. After seeing and admiring a cabin built by friends at another hunting club, Meri made some original sketches and took them to their friend, architect Brian Brown. Brian was able to help them develop their plans without significantly altering their basic ideas. The couple worked together with Brian to come up with a good floor-plan that would work well for them.

During the construction process, in order to make all phases of construction go smoothly, Meri made the half-hour drive from the couple's home practically every day to be onsite. "It was a big part of my life, and it took its toll for a while," she says, "but it's all been very much worth it." She stresses the importance of keeping constant communications open with sub-contractors to ensure that their execution is in keeping with the plans and custom features of the home. "Even though they were skilled professionals," she says, "we still had a lot of 'back-and-forth' as to what I wanted done versus what they were accustomed to doing and if there was something different. We had to keep communications lines open constantly."

Tim's brother was also a partner in the house and played a part in some of the decision making, and having a second family involved in a partnership helped spread out the financial burden of building. "Having a partner helped us deal with the stress of building," says Meri. "This being a two-family home made it so much more affordable for both of us, and it made some decisions a little easier."

Building Above Flood-Stage

One decision that was very easy -- mandatory in fact -- was that of elevating the house. This was because, by the very nature of the low-lying bottom lands of the Mississippi (figure A), there are times when the area will flood. The land on which the house sits may, at times, be 10 feet or more underwater. "Being in the floodplain of the Mississippi River, the federal government requires us to elevate a structure one foot above the 100-year base flood elevation," says Tim, "which, on this property and this particular site, happens to be sixteen-and-a-half feet off the ground." Building in that specific location left no choice but to raise the house (figure B), but they did have a choice in the material that they used.

Figure A

Figure B

Possibilities for raising the structure included concrete pilings or wood piers and columns. The settled on 12x12 timbers (figures C and D) from the indigenous pine forests of east Mississippi. The supports are actually whole trees that were cut into 22-foot lengths. Each column is buried 6 feet into the ground to ensure solid foundation and sturdy structure, even in the event of flooding. "When this property goes ten or twelve feet underwater," says Tim, "I want to be able to come back afterwards and find it here, and not down in New Orleans somewhere."

Figure C

Figure D

	Tim Tenhet
	Meri Tenhet
	The Tenhets worked with their friend, architect Brian Brown, to develop their floor plans.

In the segment that follows, the do-it-yourselfers discuss the natural location where they decided to build and some of the steps they had to take in order to prepare the site for building in this remote location.

RESOURCES :

Resources for Be Your Own Contractor: Vacation Homes episode 104: Mississippi-Delta House

Majesty of the Mississippi Delta
To order this book from Amazon.com, click here.

My Mississippi
by Willie Morris, David Rae Morris
To order this book from Amazon.com, click here.

Square Books
Oxford, Mississippi
Website: www.squarebooks.com

Federal Emergency Management Administration
Website: www.fema.gov