How To Choose And Equip A Plot For A Summer Residence

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

How to choose a plot for a summer residence and equip it

Life in the city is boring and monotonous. In the morning you wake up to the roar of cars and the clatter of tram wheels. During the day, you see and hear all this on the way to work and on the way from work, and in the evening…. In the evening - terrible traffic jams, a stuffy apartment, "beloved" neighbors from above and below. Vaska from the 131st apartment is making repairs - a puncher hammers like a woodpecker. And I want peace, quiet, comfort.

The conclusion is unambiguous - your home outside the city, and that there are flowers, trees and a pond.

And you don't need to walk with the dog. I let her out into the street - and that's it; and let the cat walk by itself. Children - okay, let them visit sometimes on weekends.

But the task (provided that the money is already there) is where to build a house? There are a lot of plots now offered. There is with a house, there is without it. What to choose?

So, let's begin.

The first question is in which area. Of course, the journey from home to work shouldn't take more than one hour. And better minutes - 15-20. True, if you can work at home - you have a computer, a modem, a telephone - then everything is easier. The radius expands. It is possible to go to the Karelian Isthmus, or to the Luga. What kind of landscape the soul strives for more. Broad-leaved forest and pine trees on calcareous soils, slow bends of rivulets, spring two weeks earlier - it is Gatchina, Luga, Tosno. Hunting, fishing, mushrooms - mixed forests - the shores of Lake Ladoga. Sun, lakes, stones, pine trees, skiing from the mountains - the Karelian Isthmus.

Well, we have decided on the direction. Next is the next problem to be solved - where? Here, too, there are options: in the countryside, in gardening, in a summer cottage, on newly allocated land.

Each of them has its own "pros" and "cons" - which and how many neighbors, whether or not there is electricity, gas, water, roads, shops. Everyone chooses according to their mind, pocket and soul call.

Finally, the site is selected. It turns out that the old house must be demolished, the forest must be cut down, or a house must be erected on the former collective farm field.

Where to begin? Household problems - invite an architect or choose a project from a standard catalog; on the site - to invite a landscape worker or instruct his wife (she will still do this).

The most reasonable option is to consult with a landscape firm prior to purchasing a plot. Only an experienced and competent specialist will be able to tell what is happening on your site, where the embedding zones are, where what soil is located, what hydrological features of the site, what the wind rose is, and what, on average, costs you will incur at the stage of putting the site in order.

Do not discard your first impression of the site - like it or not. Then you need to ask yourself the question - what you liked and what did not.

Site location

You need to pay attention to which slope it is located on. The southern and western, and preferably the southwestern, warm well, and there is more sun on it.

East, southeast are also good, but more suitable for those people who wake up early. As a rule, houses are placed in the sun, and the early sun wakes up. With the northern slope, everything is somewhat more complicated. There is earlier soil freezing in winter, later thawing of soil in spring. And in this regard, a spring conflict between the crown of the tree and its roots is possible. The crown has woken up, sap flow has begun, and the roots still cannot provide the tree with adequate nutrition. This means that you will then have to more carefully select plants and better organize planting holes for them.

Plants on the site

It is very important, when getting to know the place for a future summer residence, to carefully look at an untouched piece of land. Native vegetation is visible there. Note - where drought-resistant plants grow, and where moisture-loving ones.

• Woodlice indicates acidified but fertile soil.
• Nettle is a good fertile land.
• Horsetails are acidic moist soil. Probably thick loams with a ferrous form of iron. This indicates a fairly serious work on deoxidation, drainage of the soil.
• Quinoa - grows only on well-fertilized fertile soils.
• Cereals - with an even good vegetation cover - fairly good soil, with hummockiness - increased acidity. Deoxidation is required.
• Sedge is a swampy place. Drainage work will be required, raising the land on the site.
• Ivan tea, Ivan da Marya - alkaline soils, rich in humus.

An additional, more thorough analysis of the site by plants will be better done by a specialist.

Location of underground tracks, power lines and other communications

All these indicators will be very necessary for you later, when designing a landscape. If there are no communications, then it is necessary to consider the following questions: can you connect to electricity cheaply enough, and how to lay wires or cables? And also - where and how will your water supply, well, water main or water storage tanks be organized?

Gas. If there are highways, then it is important to determine the shortest path to the house, if not, where can you install cylinders or a tank? Nowadays it has become quite fashionable and convenient. A cistern for 2-4 tons is capable of providing a cottage for almost a year.

Sewerage. With a centralized sewage system, many problems disappear immediately, but rather, you will have to install septic tanks. It is necessary to arrange them so that the drains flow there by gravity. You need a place for the filtration field and the entrance of the machine for pumping out the sludge residue from the septic tank.

If all these factors were able to form a clear picture - start bargaining for the site. By the way! If you suddenly see on the site the remains of any military equipment, funnels, as well as heaps of construction and household waste, do not be too lazy to make a full analysis of the land, including the presence of heavy metals. In our conditions, you will not find anything in the earth, but you need to live in an ecologically clean place.

Vertical layout

The profiles of your site can be horizontal, with a slope, hilly.

Is it good or bad? It all depends on what you would like to see in the end. Of course, it is easier to put a house on a horizontal plot, lay roads, make a lawn, but if the plot is small in size, it will have to be artificially "broken". Only a landscape with variable heights can visually expand the boundaries of your site.

The septic tank will require the installation of a pumping station, you will need to take care of the drainage system (we will talk more about this later).

On a site with elevation differences of up to two meters, you can show wild imagination. Small terraces, retaining walls, small architectural additions in the form of bridges, dry streams, ampelous plants. But such a site will need a serious study of surface drainage, or more simply - drainage of water after rain, so that the earth does not erode.

On a site with a large elevation difference, it is necessary to carry out terracing work with a serious strengthening of the slope. Which in the end will lead to serious financial costs, but then everything can look very, very cool. It is a pleasure for a true landscape painter to blend into the hilly terrain.

Then there is a very serious question about "beloved neighbors" - they are everywhere.

Estonians say: “When you see the roof of your neighbor’s farm it’s good. But when you don’t see it at all, it’s even better.” But we are not in Estonia, and we have to reckon with this.

You need to figure out what kind of fence to put: a grid, a wooden one on a light foundation, a wooden one on a strong foundation, a forged lattice or a reinforced concrete wall of increased reliability (it is possible without machine-gun loopholes).

In connection with the choice of a fence, you need to decide on the light regime of the site, how the wind rose will change, how the security systems will work. There are many options for creating coziness on the site: hedges from deciduous and evergreen crops, pergolas with vines, creating closed areas for barbecues, for walks, for children's games, etc.

These are just a few of the questions that you will have to answer when choosing a site. Further, we still recommend contacting a specialized construction company to build a house and at the same time to landscape workers to design the site.

In this way, in the future, you can seriously save money and nerves during the construction and arrangement of the site.