Death and Taxes

Ah, the two certainties in life...sigh.

The plan for today (after injecting my parent's diabetic cats with insulin...no joke) has been to collect as much info as I can find on the cost of building permits, tax rates, by-laws, and so on. That way when my folks get back into town I can present the "case FOR cabin construction" in a fully thought-out way. I guess I should backtrack a bit...

My plan for the cabin has been to construct it on our family's current cottage land. Right now there is a super-nifty pioneer cabin on around 9 acres of land...a lot of it is unused woodland, and let's be honest, I'm in no position to buy property. But this means I need to clear all the construction with my folks, and that means figuring out the permit/tax/bylaw issues.

It's a little more complicated than I'd like, seeing as the land is located in a county, not a city, we are on a well-water & septic system...which means a lot of applications and digging may be in order...if they can happen at all...sigh.

Going on the closest town, it would cost $1125 for a building permit for a construction of 750 sq. feet. (roughly what I'm aiming for). This isn't TERRIBLE, but the filmmaker in me wants to ditch the permit fees and build guerrilla-style. A plan the 'rents will definitely NOT approve. Boo-urns. In the meantime, enjoy some pics of our current (and much-loved) cottage!