shoestring ceiling and wall surfaces?

Just use sheetrock..It is about 8-10 bucks a sheet and you can put it up yourself . When the time or money permits hire a taper to mud it "on the side"(moonlighting) even if it is one room at a time. A friend of mine did that and I taped it one room at a time on weekends over several years..Speaking of which he still owes me a couple of favors...LOL...Trading work for work(bartering) is how to get it done cheap....Good luck....

yep, single and old nuff to not giveashite bout what folks think. The place is priced damn near land value, so the shell house is a plus. Can fug it up and not decrease prop value. but I figgure a solid house with roof, well, and septic might be worth playing with. My scheme would to make the master br/bath livable (and confine heating/ac to that) and gradually work on the rest of the place.

stucco sounds cool. also seeking cheap wall surfaces for closets and small rooms. Gotta be somethin lower cost, in terms of material and labor, than sheetrock, taping, floating.

Typar and a few staples.....That cheap enough for ya.....If you don't give a s*it about it why bother with anything...Just throw your cardbox tent in the corner and you're good to go.....

If I were single in your position I might fancy stucco to look like rock. An uneven texture over old wood lath and broken pallet pieces with hidey holes, small shelves here and there. Indirect lighting. That's my bedroom.

In my bathroom, broken tile set in the stucco with pieces of broken glass and mirror parts, even bottles embeded in the wall. No sharp angles or corners exposed. Stained semi-smooth concrete finish on the floors of both rooms. Different colors dripped on while smoothing the concrete floors for a swirled pattern. Just enough texture to keep my butt from brusing the floor after a shower.

Something that can be cleaned with a WET mop and shop vac to suck up the fresh soup.

But, I'm not single and I like being married. It's not happening at our house.

Next!

To determine what's cheapest in your particular situation you need to put a price on your labor

Your scheme to make a living space "livable" and then finish the rest makes good sense in your situation depending on how you value your time & how you would normally spend your "free" time.

t rock,taping, floating.

"BobK207" wrote

Missed this the first go-round, thanks for quoting BobK!

Correct.

True and i can think of what I did, ages ago as a poor college student living in a semi-refurbished attic. The owners bought insulation but no more. Alone, I couldnt put up drywall on the ceiling. I'd have had to pay someone.

Instead, I got a big bolt of flame retardant dark blue solid cloth and used a staple gun to put it between the rafters covering the insulation I'd tacked up there. I left the beams showing as I liked the looks.

Fancy? No, but doable alone with no help and i must say, it actually looked alot nicer than it sounds.

I put 3 nails in a 'u' shape about where the rafters hit only a 3.5 foot 'ceiling' then used scrap wood of about .5x1 size set in the nail frames to hold it up, and used the nail gun to make 'curtin walls' with more fabric (this time a small flower pattern of blue flowers with green leaves on a dark cream colored background).

I guess you've never heard of a drywall lift...You can rent one cheap....

Local newspaper usually sells the old plates from the rotary presses at scrap metal prices. Thin enough to apply to the studs with a heavy-duty staple gun. I've seen chicken coops and garages lined with those. Actually looked pretty cool. Unless they have a backlog, may take several weeks of return visits to get enough sheets, though. Each one is only the size of a newspaper page. Best not to tell them it is for human space, though.

-- aem sends...

I've heard Frank Gehry lives in an old house in Chicago with no interior wall sheathing, just studs. Rich Komp's home in Maine has lots of indoor walls with drywall on one side and bookshelves on the other.

Nick

Is making a profit on your investment a consideration? Do you need to satisfy the building codes in your area? I would just stick to standard building practices and not try and go cheaper. Your biggest expense will be labor and if you can provide that yourself you will save a bundle. There are always day laborers around for when you need some muscle. Fortunately building materials are a little cheaper right now due to the economy. Take one room at a time and do it right even if it takes 10 years.

Greenhouse polyethylene film at 5 cents/ft^2 for now, with sheetrock later? It's fairly tough (6 mils) and comes in huge rolls, up to 50'x150'.

Nick

Not fire-safe. Burns real well, and produces nasty fumes, almost as bad as the sheet foam does. That is why both products have to be covered by sheetrock or solid wood for use in occupied space.

-- aem sends...

That's an individual choice :-)

Nick

thanks but did you read, " Looking for El cheapo substitue

I know sheetrock, lookin for outtathe box ideas, K?

that sounds a bit hostile, B.

Thanks for your reply, Bob. I've done the drywall bit many times thru the years. Hell, I can probably still blow white boogers from my 'sanding apprenticeship' as a kid helping my dad. Again I'm looking for something different. There's gotta be novel ways to skin this cat.

thanks for the 'non drywall' answer. that's the kinda ideas I'm looking for. Is Burlap available in a a flame retardant bolt? Yep, ceiling is more of a problem- how to support insulation?

yeah, bout forty bucks a day round here. And due to back problems I don't want to horse around drywall. May have to, but again, my original post was for nondrywall, K?

Well, I'll be dangnabbed, an original thinker who responded to the gist of my post. Good idea. what gauge are these plates? Might be an interesting wall cover.

thanks.