Here’s one way to own a home in Utah: Break out a hammer and build it yourself

Cache Valley • Cody and Melissa Olsen sat in their brand-new home, the smell of fresh paint and wood filling the air as they played with their 6-month-old daughter, Freya. Their dog, Chip, lay on the carpet they had recently installed, squeaking a toy.

Only a handful of weeks ago, the young couple were hanging drywall and installing siding in their new home in Hyrum. A few months earlier, they had framed the walls now surrounding them. Barely a year ago, they didn’t think they could afford a home in the valley where they grew up.

But a northern Utah nonprofit helping low-income families build their own homes alongside their neighbors — making it financially accessible — has now allowed them to live a life they once thought impossible. It’s not free, but it comes at a steep discount in Utah’s largely inaccessible housing market.

“We’re still in the process of realizing it,” Melissa said. “We lay in bed and look at the walls and we’re like, ‘I remember building that specific wall. It was a pain.’ Or I look at my kitchen, and I remember when these cabinets got put in. You don’t realize how worth it it is until you’re actually in your own house.”

For a year, the couple — who, according to Cody, had “negative-five construction experience” — devoted nearly every day, rain or shine, to building not just their own home but also eight of their neighbors’ houses. Together, they put in 35 hours a week, balancing the demanding schedule with their full-time jobs.

On most weekdays, they went directly from work to the construction site, and Saturdays were dedicated to working from dawn till dusk. Melissa helped build the home while carrying the couple’s daughter every step of the way — right up until going into labor on a sweltering Saturday in July.

“It was the only way,” Melissa said, “that we would have been able to ever get into a house.”

The Olsens are hardly alone. Cache Valley’s Neighborhood Nonprofit Housing Corp. has helped get hundreds of low-income families into homes in Cache and Box Elder counties through its mutual self-help housing program, funded by grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The experience left the couple with not only a home in which to raise their newborn, but also with a community, essential skills and the confidence to take on challenging endeavors, Cody said. He now feels he has upgraded to “level 2 construction skills.”

“Truly,” he said, “with sweat, blood and tears, you can accomplish some pretty awesome stuff, including homeownership, which is almost unfathomable for a lot of people right now.”

Build-it-yourself housing

Logan-based Neighborhood Nonprofit Housing Corp. was one of the pioneering organizations in Utah to operate the USDA’s mutual self-help housing program, which has been serving the state for nearly 30 years.

There are other organizations across the Beehive State that help families build their own homes in rural areas through USDA grants, including the Housing Authority of Southeastern Utah, the Moab Area Housing Task Force and the Toole County Housing Authority.

Since forming in 1996, the Logan organization has assisted more than 650 families in achieving homeownership, according to its executive director, Josh Runhaar.

The program, he said, isn’t about “building your own home.” It’s about “coming together to help build everyone’s home.”

Families are grouped into teams of about eight, each guided by a professional construction supervisor who leads them through the entire process. From there, they work together to build 65% of the homes, which range between 1,400 square feet and 1,700 square feet and include an unfinished basement. Professional crews then come in for tasks like pouring concrete and wiring electrical systems.

“It’s like Amish barn-raising,” Runhaar said. “We’re just doing eight of them at once. Everybody works, and nobody gets to move in until all of the homes are done.”

The market price for a brand-new home of the same size is about $500,000, according to Runhaar, and to even consider purchasing one, buyers need a substantial down payment along with a higher interest rate on a 30-year mortgage.

The self-help housing program doesn’t require a down payment, and, for the same type of home, mortgages through the program range from $385,000 to $400,000. The program also offers subsidized interest rates, as low as 1%, depending on income.

Beyond a more affordable mortgage, participating in the program allows families to build “sweat equity,” taking out a sizable chunk of the home’s price tag. The average equity earned in 2024 was nearly $70,000, Runhaar said.

The program also gives families the flexibility to adjust the length of their loan to better align with their desired monthly payment amount, he added. “We see a lot of our clients pay less for the home they build in our program than what they’re paying for their two-bedroom apartment.”

There are currently two Cache Valley plots where new neighborhoods are being developed — one in Smithfield and the other in Hyrum. The nonprofit has previously built homes in Box Elder County and owns land for more but is waiting for additional USDA funding.

“That’s the biggest problem right now, is federal loan funds,” Runhaar said. “Right now, we should be building about 80 homes a year, but due to lack of loan funds, we’re building 48 homes a year. So we’ve grown, but then we had to shrink because of the availability of funding.”

Building community, literally

People from all walks of life work together to build these neighborhoods, Runhaar said. Young single men who have just turned 18, single mothers striving to create homes for their children, immigrants starting fresh, older Utahns and young married couples — they all come together with one shared goal: to literally build their life.

This common purpose, Runhaar said, creates a strong sense of community among the families, who become neighbors once the process is complete.

It’s life-changing for participants, said Reese Wirick, the construction manager for the group currently building in Hyrum. It not only helps them become homeowners but also transforms them through the physically demanding work.

Construction managers ensure that participants have all the materials they need and guide them in developing building skills. Wirick shared that participants consistently show up eager to learn, which often leads to transformations. He has seen many enter the program with little confidence, only to leave with the drive to pursue their desired careers or tackle personal challenges.

“Every time a family moves in, you just see how proud they are, of what they overcame during this period to get to where they’re at,” Wirick said. “I feel like I’m doing a job that matters.”

Two people to take such pride were Sadie Jewkes and her husband, Ben.

Sadie said she’d never felt more empowered than when she stood in the trusses in the ceiling of the home she and Ben were building — in the middle of a Cache Valley snowstorm — nail gun in hand. She had never used a nail gun before, let alone taken on the challenge of building her own house.

“I had to push myself,” Sadie said. “It was uncomfortable. But for me, it really showed me what I was capable of and showed me that I could take on anything.”

For the couple, who finished building their Smithfield home this year, the program was the most fulfilling thing they have ever done — but also one of the hardest.

“There’s something psychological that happens when you own a home,” Sadie said. “We own this place. It’s ours, and now we get to take the next step into creating our life and building our family and all those things.”