Budget Breakdown: A Maine Family Build Their First Home With $500K—and Plenty of Helping Hands

Back in August 2020, Josh Pritchard put down a chain saw after doing some clear-cutting on land he had bought for $101,000 earlier that year in rural New Gloucester, Maine. He felt defeated. How was he going to manage what he and his wife, Natalie, envisioned: a cozy home for themselves and their five children where they could host friends and family? Even though Josh was president and partner of a successful design and marketing firm with clients that ranged from restaurants to credit unions to glove manufacturers, the sky was decidedly not the limit.