Here’s how you can go about your building of a diy hunting cabin. Many hunters are also home handyman, do it yourself types. So when it comes time to buy or build a hunting cabin, they choose to build it themselves, because of the cost. Also, if the cabin is just used for hunting, sometimes there isn’t really a need to have it look quite as polished as the home they have for their primary residence. There are a lot of ways to make a diy hunting cabin that are both inexpensive and easy to build.

Hunting Cabin Plans

One option is to purchase a set of hunting cabin plans. A web search for the phrase hunting cabin plan returns hundreds of entries. There are places online to buy these. Also, refer to any cabin plan book for plans, they don’t need to have anything to do with hunting. One good source of plans can be the home improvement and repair stores, such as Lowes and Home Depot. They often have off-the-shelf cabin plans for sale from $5 to $15. You can also buy your materials there, and often they deliver.

Prefab Hunting Cabins

Another option is to go with a prefab building. These range everywhere from a small 8 X 10 shell to a full-fledged mobile home, and everything in between. Generally these are built similar, but lower quality than a manufactured home that’s designed for living, they are built more like a camper. Typically they have windows and one or two doors. Generally you will find the prefab cabins sized 8 X 20 or 8 X 40, with other sizes available. These are the kind of buildings you see at construction sites used as offices. The bar-bones models are just open shells. One step up includes a small bathroom on one end. The best units are usually divided into rooms. Many of these are modular and can be connected together.

Cabin Foundations

It’s a rare cabin that has a basement under it. Often the water table is too high, or there is just no reason to go through the cost of excavation. Most cabins are built on concrete slabs or just framed with a wood floor on footings. Make sure you check local building codes for the construction and footing requirements. In northern areas they may require frost footings, that go so many inches below the frost line. Call the local city hall and ask for the building department, or building inspector for this information. If you are building your hunting cabin in a rural area, there may not be building codes. If you want a high-quality cabin, built to top standards, just call the inspector in any town nearby, and use their standards. This isn’t a legal requirement, but is a good guide to high quality. Don’t forget for footings you can generally buy footing tubes at the home improvement stores.

Hunting Cabin Design

Obviously this will be determined somewhat by the size of the cabin you decide to build. As mentioned above, the step up from bare-bones is having a bathroom on one end. Keep in mind your particular needs when you make your hunting cabin design. Do you often hunt with many others? Are you interested more in functionality, comfort or cost? Your usage determines how to design your hunting cabin.

Hunting Cabin For Sale

Check with the real estate agencies in the towns near the area you want your hunting cabin. Also, check the local newspapers in small towns, because hunting cabins are often sold through “want-ads” and not listed as real estate. This is common for a cabin that is not permanently attached to the land. Also, look at the land for sale section. Typically, the value is in the property you are buying, and the fact that there is a pre built hunting cabin on it is an afterthought. Especially for lakeshore property. If you have a $500 hunting cabin sitting on $100,000 worth of land, it will definitely be in the land section, not the “homes for sale”.

Using a garage as a hunting cabin

I had a cousin that bought a nice chunk of land in Northern Wisconsin. He couldn’t afford to build a big cabin at the time, so he built a large garage. As I recall, this was larger than the typical 22 or 24 foot square garage. It would have been something like 24 X 32. It served as his family cabin for many years. Buying building materials, insulation and sheetrock for a structure like this is pretty cheap. And you can heat it with a wood-burning stove, or other inexpensive heat method. The main advantages of building a garage to use as a hunting cabin are the cost and the strength of construction. These are normally much cheaper and stronger than a prefab building of the same size. Also, if you are planning on building a larger structure on your land at some point, you already have your garage!

Hunting Cabin Kits

I haven’t seen any hunting cabin kits for sale. The kits I’ve seen are all just cabin kits, nothing specific for hunting. So do your search for cabin kits, and you will find them that way. Typically the kits contain all the necessary building materials, including windows, doors, hardware and fasteners. They also have somewhat easy step-by-step cabin building plans to follow. Make sure you check out the specifications of the kit before you buy. Often, you will get a better deal if you do not buy a kit, but just buy all the materials yourself. Basically, you are paying the kit company for the labor required to put all the pieces together. Call a local lumber company, and you will find out they will normally package all the materials you order on skids and deliver it to you. No point in paying someone else just to put materials in one package. Most diy hunting cabin plans come with complete bill of materials.

Customizing Your Cabin For Hunting

So is your hunting shack going to just be the shell? You may want to consider a few things to make your life easier. You should have a gun safe. The quality would depend on whether it is used for temporary storage, or if you leave guns there in your absence. Stealing guns out of cabins is an easy thing to do, especially in deer hunting areas, and where the cabin is close enough to the road for an intruder to see it and determine nobody is there. Other customizations you might want include closets and storage areas for extra clothes. Don’t forget non-perishable food that can be kept there in your absence. A real convenience is a small mud-room type area, next to the front door and near the bathroom. It will provide you with a place to remove wet or dirty clothes, and hop right into the shower.

Whatever option you choose, we hope you get many years out of the hunting cabin you build. Happy building and happy hunting!