The Amish have expanded from barn raisings to home building:
About 600 Amish contractors or subcontractors work in at least a dozen states, a rapid increase over the past decade, says Donald B. Kraybill, who has written more than a dozen books on the conservative Christian sect. Not only do some of them specialize in the timber-frame construction method that doesn’t use nails, they often can erect a house faster and for less money than traditional contractors, customers say.Yet working with an Amish builder brings special challenges. Imagine trying to keep in touch with a contractor who doesn’t own a phone — most are forbidden to have one at home. They also aren’t allowed to drive, so they need a driver or other means to get to the job site. Few use computers, have insurance or will sign a detailed construction contract.
Amish contractors find ways around the sect’s restrictions:
Many can’t own power tools — but they can rent or borrow them. They aren’t allowed to drive — but they can use a car with a hired driver. Use of phones is banned at home — but many are permitted to use cellphones for business or if someone else owns the phone, like the non-Amish driver.“There’s no question it is harder to get in touch with me,” says Mr. Schwartz, the Amish builder who erected Mr. Heitland’s lake house. Though Mr. Schwartz works out of El Dorado Springs, Mo., he has built houses as far away as Colorado and Montana. He says he has a driver but has also used taxis and gets rides from clients. Though computers are taboo, he hires non-Amish to do three-dimensional pictures of his hand drawings. In his shop, his tools are driven by horsepower using a contraption that resembles a merry-go-round, allowing up to four horses to turn steel shafts that are geared to saws and planers. But in the field he uses a non-Amish person’s power tools.
Some Amish use non-Amish as conduits for their construction businesses. Cindy Shepherd, a real-estate agent at Mike Thomas Associates/ F.C.Tucker in Fort Wayne, Ind., agreed to develop a Web site and handle open houses and referrals for an Amish-owned builder of both spec and custom homes.
Deanna Vickery turned to Amish Timber Framers in Doylestown, Ohio, when she bought her grandparents’ farm in nearby Dover, Ohio, and wanted to put an addition on the 100-year-old barn. Although the Amish generally aren’t allowed to watch TV, if they happen to be in a room where the TV is on, they don’t have to leave. As a result, she would be asked to show up at lunchtime to turn on football games for the workers. Mrs. Vickery says she quickly became friends with the crew, inviting them and their families to her annual pig roast.
Why are the Amish diversifying outside of farming? It’s pretty simple, really:
About 20 years ago, the Amish started to diversify out of farming when it became clear that subdividing a farm among sons wasn’t sustainable as their population grew and land costs made buying new property prohibitive. The Amish population has about doubled since then to an estimated 231,000 nationwide, says Mr. Kraybill, the author, who also is a senior fellow at Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, Pa. Many became entrepreneurs, carpenters, factory hands and artisans. Now, more than 70% of Amish household heads pursue nonfarm lines of work, Mr. Kraybill says. Typical Amish thinking views work as an overwhelmingly positive and even formative element of life, says Erik Wesner, a scholar who studies the Amish and runs a blog about them.