OSE Freehouse Programs

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Introducing Freehouse — Your Volunteer Hours Build Your Debt-Free Home

At Open Source Ecology, we’re cutting through the mortgage trap. With Freehouse, you can trade your volunteer hours for a high-quality, expandable eco-home — and pay only for materials.

Here’s the deal:

Your Hours Build Your House

• Volunteer and log 800–3,000 hours in our Time Bank — and OSE will build your house for you.
• 800 hours = 800 sq ft shell starter home, ready for occupancy (you finish interior at your own pace).
• 1,600 hours = Finished 800 sq ft starter home.
• More hours = Larger home or premium features.
• All homes are high-quality, durable, and expandable — never flimsy mobile homes.

Why Freehouse Works

• You pay only for materials — as little as $25k for a solid, expandable starter home.
• In today’s market, materials are only ~11% of the real house cost once mortgages, contractor markups, and profit are added.
• By cutting out 150%+ in markups and mortgage interest, you save 5–10x compared to buying a house the traditional way.
• You get Builder Crash Course training so you contribute effectively and benefit from OSE’s years of optimized building techniques.

The Math of Freedom

• Volunteer 8 hours/week → Debt-free starter home in just 2 years = 800 volunteer hours.
• Affordable land options exist in rural areas, redevelopment zones, or via city ADU programs.
• Your effort becomes your equity.
• No mortgage. No 30-year debt sentence.

How to Qualify

• Take the Builder Crash Course once (pay admission or volunteer for work exchange).
• Simply email us to join the next Saturday build day at our facility in the Kansas City area, or sign up for the next Builder Crash Course (offered every 2 months).
• Use the Freehouse log, start logging hours, and watch your Time Bank grow.

Bottom Line

The housing market is designed to drain you. Freehouse flips the script — pay only for materials, put in the time, and OSE will build your home. No debt. No inflated costs. No compromise.

📲 Start today. Your Freehouse is waiting.

About

• Volunteer with OSE. Your hours count towards us building a house for you for free. You pay for materials. We build a house for you once you reach 800-3000 hours of volunteer time. Size and finish of house that we build for you depends on your hours. Expect 800 hours for a shell starter home ready for occupancy, which you move into and do finish detail on your own schedule. We guarantee access to optimized build techniques via our Builder Crash Course. 1600 hours gets you a finished starter home. And up from there in size and feature, but quality remains high from the very start. We are not talking about poorly built mobile homes - but high quality expandable eco-homes that grow with you as your needs grow.
• Get the app, and start doing your hours
• If you volunteer 8 hours per week - we will build a starter home for you for free in just 2 years.
• Start today.
• Requirements - take Builder Crash Course once to qualify. Pay admission, or do work exchange to participate for free.

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Introducing Treehouse. We build a house for you for free. You just pay for materials. How about as little as $25k for an expandable starter home - vs saddling on a $400k mortgage? Start logging hours with us today. To begin, attend our Builder crash course - which you can even do for free if you volunteer with us

Think of it as a skill exchange. If you are inexperienced and building your house, you can work with us as we rlyeach you. You redeem your effort by having us build a house for you. You save countless hours by benefitting from years of our build optimization work.

Or if you are not building a house and have no skills - volunteer with us and start picking up skills. In this case, you will contribute to us, and we halp you by building your home for free - you pay only foraterials.

Freehouse Concept

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Facts and Figures

• 50% real cost increase over home cost when borrowing money - with mortgage [2]
• Cost of a house: 25% land, 25% labor, 25% materials, 25% profit, realtor, legal [3]
• Materials are 20-30% of house cost [4]
• Materials are 40-50% of build. Not true. Typical sub markup is 120%, and general contractor fixed rate is 20-30% markup
• Sub markup is 100-140% [5] Early in thread. Say 120% +25% for GC. On average 150% markup. In case of 140% and 30% for fixed vs cost Plus - 187% markup. But actual cost - from 100 to 280 to 370 - almost 4x. With 120% you are at 240, and 25% GC you are at 300k. 3x materials. Thus, materials are really 1/3 build cost after GC. Verified. In high cases, closer to 4x.
• Therefore, the more realistic version of 25% labor 25% materials is 17% materials and 34% labor.
• Thus, overall materials cost is only 1/6 of house cost!
• If you add mortgage, then materials are only 17% of 150% - or about 11% of the real house cost when mortgage is involved. This is absolutely right - $60k materials, $600k real house cost of $400k market cost - if mortgage is included.
• Land can be purchased inexpensively in rural areas or redevelopment zones in cities (Detroit, etc), and sometimes Accessory Dwelling Units make land access feasible in cities.

Bottom Line

• With real costs considered - materials are typically only 11% of what a person pays for a house. Therefore, if one can pay for materials - and put time in the time bank to build a house - then they effectively have secured their home at 5-10 lower cost than the standard.

Links

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