Skyrim:Build Your Own Home

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Construct a house for yourself. Location(s): Heljarchen Hall, Lakeview Manor, or Windstad Manor Reward: None ID: BYOHHouseFalkreath BYOHHousePale BYOHHouseHjaalmarch

A plot of land is available for sale

Quick Walkthrough

1. Obtain permission to purchase land from the steward/jarl of Hjaalmarch, Falkreath Hold, or the Pale.
2. Purchase the land from the steward.
3. Visit your new property, and use the drafting table to begin building your house.
4. Use the carpenter's workbench to build the foundation of your house. Continue building your home to your liking.

Detailed Walkthrough

Laying the foundations

Once you've obtained the favor of the Jarl of Falkreath Hold, Hjaalmarch, or the Pale, usually by doing quests for them, you will be given the right to purchase a piece of land in the hold. In Morthal, you will need to see the steward about obtaining permission; in Falkreath and Dawnstar, it is the jarl who grants permission. After receiving permission, you may purchase the land from the relevant steward for 5,000 gold. The plot will then be marked on your map.

Upon arriving at your new property, you will be instructed to use the drafting table to begin building your house. Your only option will be the Small House Layout. After selecting the plans, you will be instructed to use the carpenter's workbench to build the foundation of your house. This requires one sawn log and ten quarried stone. There will be a stone quarry somewhere on the site, so you won't need to go far to find some.

Having done this, the quest concludes. However, there are many more construction and furnishing options to choose from. See the construction article for more information.

Achievements

Two achievements are unlocked while completing the three versions of this quest:

• Landowner^HF (10 points/Bronze) — Buy a plot of land
• Land Baron^HF (10 points/Bronze) — Buy three plots of land

Notes

• If you reach level 9, and have not yet started the quest, one of the jarls will send you a letter by courier. If you're friends with the jarl of Falkreath or Hjaalmarch, the steward will send you this letter; for the Pale, it will instead be this letter, straight from the jarl. If you haven't made friends with any of them yet, this letter will be sent to you from the current Jarl of Falkreath. Regardless of who sends which letter, reading it will give you the objective to speak to the jarl and advance the quest.
• If not yet friends with any jarl, and Rare Gifts is still in your journal when the courier sets out to find you, it will be failed and removed from your journal in favor of this quest.
• It is advisable to purchase the land for Lakeview Manor in Falkreath hold before completing Contract: Kill Helvard, as you may not be able to regain Siddgeir's favor afterwards.
  • If you use the console, you can click on Siddgeir and use setrelationshiprank player 1 to fix this.
  • Alternatively if you side with the Stormcloaks and take Falkreath, Dengeir of Stuhn replaces Siddgeir as the Jarl, bypassing this issue.

Bugs

• Once you are eligible to start this quest in one of the other two holds by having befriended their jarl, Siddgeir will not offer Rare Gifts or Kill the Bandit Leader, which will make the house unavailable in Falkreath.
  • Once you are level 9 or above and are certain that the courier isn't coming, enter Siddgeir's Longhouse and then use the following console commands. This should start the bandit quest, allowing this quest to proceed normally afterwards.
    

    prid 19822
    setrelationshiprank player 1
    setstage Favor154 10

    
    ^{[verification needed — Fix doesn't seem to work]}
• If you've started but not completed this quest, you cannot initiate Thane quests in other holds.
• Quest becomes impossible to start either after having started the Kill Helvard quest or after becoming thane.
  • After (but also possibly before) becoming thane the quest can be force started with:
    

    setstage BYOHHouseFalkreath 30

• If you did not talk to Farengar Secret-Fire during the Bleak Falls Barrow quest yet, you will not get the option to ask the jarl for any jobs, nor will you be able to tell him you got his letter. This will block you from becoming a thane and thus accessing the house until you progress the main quest. If you want to evade starting Dragon Rising to avoid enabling dragons in Skyrim but still want to access to Lakeview Manor, you can progress the Bleak Falls Barrow quest to the point where you need to give Farengar the tablet and stop there. This will make Siddgeir talk to you about "tasks" or the letter but won't enable dragons. ^?

Quest Stages

Build Your Own Home (ID of quests varies according to location)
Stage	Finishes Quest	Journal Entry
Build Your Own Home (BYOHHouseFalkreath)
15		Objective 15: Speak to the Jarl of Falkreath
17		Objective 17: Speak to the Jarl of Falkreath (Via Letter from courier)
30		Objective 30: Speak to the Steward of Falkreath about the land for sale (if not already done)
100		(Achievement is awarded): Landowner Objective 100: Visit your new property in Falkreath hold
		(Achievement is awarded, if already bought other two plots of land): Land Baron
110		Objective 110: Use the Drafting Table to begin building your house
120		Objective 120: Use the Carpenter's Workbench to build the foundation of your house
Build Your Own Home (BYOHHouseHjaalmarch)
30		Objective 30: Speak to the Steward of Morthal about the land for sale (if not already done)
100		(Achievement is awarded): Landowner Objective 100: Visit your new property in Hjaalmarch hold
		(Achievement is awarded, if already bought other two plots of land): Land Baron
110		Objective 110: Use the Drafting Table to begin building your house
120		Objective 120: Use the Carpenter's Workbench to build the foundation of your house
Build Your Own Home (BYOHHousePale)
30		Objective 30: Speak to the Jarl of Dawnstar about the land for sale (if not already done)
100		(Achievement is awarded): Landowner Objective 100: Visit your new property in The Pale hold
		(Achievement is awarded, if already bought other two plots of land): Land Baron
110		Objective 110: Use the Drafting Table to begin building your house
120		Objective 120: Use the Carpenter's Workbench to build the foundation of your house

• The following empty quest stages were omitted from the table:
  • BYOHHouseFalkreath: 10, 12, 20, 50, 130, 1010, 1020, 1030, 1040, 1050, 1060, 1070, 1080, 1090, 1100, 1110, 1120.
  • BYOHHouseHjaalmarch: 10, 15, 20, 50, 130, 1010, 1020, 1030, 1040, 1050, 1060, 1070, 1080, 1090, 1100, 1110, 1120.
  • BYOHHousePale: 10, 15, 20, 50, 130, 1010, 1020, 1030, 1040, 1050, 1060, 1070, 1080, 1090, 1100, 1110, 1120.

Notes

• Any text displayed in angle brackets (e.g., <Alias=LocationHold>) is dynamically set by the Radiant Quest system, and will be filled in with the appropriate word(s) when seen in game.
• Not all Journal Entries may appear in your journal; which entries appear and which entries do not depends on the manner in which the quest is done.
• Stages are not always in order of progress. This is usually the case with quests that have multiple possible outcomes or quests where certain tasks may be done in any order. Some stages may therefore repeat objectives seen in other stages.
• If an entry is marked as "Finishes Quest" it means the quest disappears from the Active Quest list, but you may still receive new entries for that quest.
• On the PC, it is possible to use the console to advance through the quest by entering setstage BYOHHouseFalkreath
BYOHHousePale
BYOHHouseHjaalmarch stage, where stage is the number of the stage you wish to complete. It is not possible to un-complete (i.e. go back) quest stages, but it is possible to clear all stages of the quest using resetquest BYOHHouseFalkreath
BYOHHousePale
BYOHHouseHjaalmarch.