When Kara Brookins’ abusive second marriage ended, she was emotionally devastated. He recovered by building his own house, which he learned through YouTube videos.
The mother of four began looking for a new home in 2007 when she had to sell her home in Bryant, Arkansas.
But at that time, the amount a computer programmer analyst could pay was very low. Brookins also had to do something to keep his family together. “But,” he admitted. “I didn’t know what it was.”
As a result, Brookins planned to build his own house from the ground up. “That’s what anyone would do if they were in our position,” Brookins, 45, said.
“No one had ever seen it and looking back, I realized it looked crazy.”
Brookins paid $20,000 for the one-acre lot and took out a construction loan of about $150,000.
I then started watching YouTube videos to learn construction techniques like laying foundations, building walls, laying gas pipes, installing pipes, etc.
His children, ages 2 to 17, helped him build the 3,500-square-foot home over nine months. Drew, then 15, helped Brookins make plans.
With no running water on site, 11-year-old Jada used a bucket to take water from a neighbor’s pond and mixed it with an 80-pound bag of concrete to create the foundation mortar.
Brookins, who worked while her children were in school, recalls, “It always seemed impossible.
After school, Brookins took his family to a construction site five miles away and worked late into the night on their new home.
At the time, YouTube videos were vague and offered multiple ways to accomplish a task.
For some of the heavy lifting, Brookins hired part-time firefighters with construction experience at $25 an hour. “He was one step ahead of us in terms of education,” he recalls.
Brookins and her children moved into the five-bedroom home on March 31, 2009. He named it Inkwell Manor in honor of his ambition to become a writer.
Brookins published Coming Up: How a House Build a Family, a collection of novels and memoirs for middle grades and young adults,
on January 24. Brookins was able to escape his difficulties by building a house.
“We were surprised that building our own shelter was the best option,” Brookins said. “It was not something to be proud of.” It turned out to be the most useful for me.
“If I, a 110-pound computer programmer, can build a whole house, you can do anything you put your mind to,” he says.
“Make a goal and stick to it. Find the big thing you want to do, take baby steps toward it, and bring others who need healing along that journey. There’s a lot of power in that.”