[Cob] building codes

[Leslie Moyer]

I see building codes less about protecting the person building a home 
and more about protecting all the future inhabitants of the house.  For 
example, we finished out a basement in a home we owned in Iowa. My 
brother-in-law is not a licensed electrician, but he worked for one for 
years & knew what he was doing.  We never got a building permit for the 
add-on....if we had, it would have required a licensed electrician.  
When the house sold, the buyer was informed of this.  About 8 years 
after we moved away from there, the house burned.  Fire started in the 
basement.....no one was home at the time.....we read in the paper that 
it was an "electrical fire."  We HAVE wondered from time to time if it 
was the wiring downstairs.....?  I don't think, in this case, it was 
caused by our wiring, but in many cases it is.

Also, the vast, vast majority of the houses built in the US today aren't 
custom builds--they're built by a builder on speculation...i.e. before 
they've sold.  So, in that case, the building codes offer a *minimum* 
standard to which these _*solely*_-profit-driven homes are 
built....protecting the buyer.  Building codes ARE a minimum--every 
house built should exceed them--not just meet them!

When you buy an already-built house, a lot of the elements that 
determine how safe the house is, are already covered up (with drywall, 
shingles, plywood, concrete, etc.) & often impossible to check.  It's 
like if you bought a car while it was boxed up in a big box & all you 
could see is the box.

I'm fairly Libertarian-leaning in areas like this, but I think building 
codes serve an important purpose.  Having said that, we're living in a 
metal pole barn at the moment--without a building permit for this 
structure and it definitely doesn't meet code for houses.  We're pretty 
much holding our breath in the hopes that we get our "permanent" house 
built before we are discovered.  In our case, this is *clearly* a 
barn--no one would buy it thinking anything different.

--Leslie