Our Mountain Cabin Custom Build
On April 20, 2021, Matt and I closed on an empty lot in Gatlinburg. Well, it wasn’t completely empty. It had remnants of a driveway and a cinderblock foundation wall that was holding up the previous cabin before it burnt completely in the 2016 Gatlinburg/PF fires. We started the process of looking for a Tennessee property on January 4 of 2021. I spent an entire drive back from our ski trip convincing Matt to invest in the area. My dream is to own a dreamy mountain cabin where we can escape and make family memories (white water rafting, mountain trail hiking, snow skiing, watching the leaves turn in the fall, etc). We studied the market for 2-3 days and immediately realized that we wanted to try something other than just making an offer for a cabin listed on MLS. We tried several different ideas, but the path that ended up working for us was to contact property owners that had burnt land from the fires. Shortly after we did that, we heard back from an owner that was very interested in selling and he gave us an offer we couldn’t refuse. I filmed a video detailing our process and it’s saved to my instagram highlights if you’re interested in that.
Since last April, we’ve spent months on the design, permitting, and build processes. We started immediately interviewing builders and designers once we got the property under contract. We were working with a builder for a few months, but after huge delays in getting our plans finalized, we shifted our plan. We had met another builder that had recently built a cabin next door, and he was very interested in building that same/similar plan again. I loved the huge wall of windows that he created and I wanted the same design so we could have those beautiful panoramic views of the mountains.
Finally, after months of engineering, design, and permitting delays, we got the build started early summer 2022. It has been a slow and steady process, but we’re hoping for an April 2023 completion date.
Our construction loan was projected to close this month (November 2022), but due to being so behind with the build, we had to extend the closing. We drove up to Gatlinburg last week to meet with our contractor and develop a detailed timeline plan to complete the cabin. Matt is going to be much more involved with the project management to help us get to the finish line. We hope you’ll follow along our build journey and help us as we make decisions (I like to put polls in stories) on finishing and getting her ready for vacationers! 🥳
Our final goal is to complete all three floors to have multiple sleeping spaces, 3.5 baths, a movie + a game room totaling 2700 sf and the whole cabin will be available for rental on AirBNB + VRBO. We’d love to host you and your family in the Smoky Mountains… soon! 🏔️
Thank you so much for being here! You can support SOTC by sharing Instagram posts + blog posts, saving, liking, and commenting 🤗 your support means the world to me 🥹😊
Click here for a current cabin tour
Much love,
