In this vlog, host Victor (Speaker A) visits the Holler family—Ben, Meg, and Rebecca—who are two months into converting a former mobile home into a functional homestead in the Piedmont region of North Carolina. The episode documents a hands‑on demolition session where the team removes deteriorated siding, addresses water‑damaged framing, and strips interior walls with sledgehammers and crowbars. They discuss immediate priorities such as installing a moisture barrier, replacing wiring, and repairing structural elements like the footer and windows that were originally installed without flashing. The family also shares progress on ancillary projects: building a DIY chicken coop from reclaimed wood, planning a greenhouse for citrus trees, and envisioning a deck and garden area. Throughout the walkthrough, the participants express a mix of frustration, optimism, and camaraderie, highlighting how physical labor serves as a stress outlet while they navigate unexpected setbacks (rotted walls, broken windows, storm weather). The vlog concludes with a look ahead to future work—more framing, finishing, and expanding the homestead—while encouraging viewers to follow the Holler Homestead channel for regular updates.
Chapters
Today we are at the Hollers. They are 2 months into a brand new homestead— well, new to them homestead. We're going to show you guys how they've progressed in this 2 months, and we're going to see what we can do to help them out. I believe it's going to involve sledgehammers. What do you think, Rebecca?
I think so.
What, what are we up to today, guys?
So we are getting started on reciting Yes. So we're ripping the walls off to keep the structure from getting kind of squirrely.
Yeah.
We're putting strapping up, just piece of lumber just to keep everything diagonally tight.
And the goal is to between today and tomorrow, we have a work crew coming tomorrow, take the siding off and totally replace it. Yep.
If we can at least get the siding off and get the place wrapped with the moisture barrier.
We woke up laughing this morning. It was sprinkling this morning.
Of course.
We have people coming over to work and pull off lighting.
Yeah, we have to—
because there is, uh, wiring already in the place, it doesn't really matter if it gets rained on. We're gonna replace most of it anyways, but I would rather not damage and cause the potential of rot or stuff like that.
So we're gonna try to get it sealed back up ASAP.
Yeah.
How happy are you gonna be to have these walls back up?
It means we can start finishing and do the interior. We can do the interior. We can replace the floor. Basically, we're just gonna do room by room.
That way—
I will be so happy.
Yeah.
I will be so happy because it means progress.
Done with demo.
Yes.
Beginning the construction. Yes, exactly.
That's my favorite part.
Yes.
Okay, good. My grandmother is in town.
They came from California. And she brought me citrus! So I'm super excited about this. So, trying to keep them alive.
Cool.
Will citrus grow here in the, uh, are we in the Piedmont in North Carolina?
Yeah, we're in the Piedmont. It will, we're gonna have to greenhouse it or bring them inside part of the year.
Uh-huh.
So they don't freeze. But since we're planning on building a greenhouse, it all works out.
Okay.
Hey, turn around.
You're such a dork.
Is this how y'all stay cool?
It is right now. We have a pool, but—
Fight the heat.
We've, uh, we drained it.
Clean it out and then they haven't filled it up yet.
So there's stuff like this, I'm gonna have to rip this off.
Okay.
And I don't feel like climbing up a wall to get in. So I think what we'll do is we'll just work down on this side.
Okay.
And start just popping off the wall.
Start kicking.
Oh, there we go. Grab the nail.
That's the unfortunate part, huh?
Because you want it to come off in one piece. Once the siding comes off, where do you want it to go? Because I could be out there hauling.
Um, okay, I didn't want to shred it into itty-bitty pieces so we don't have to pick up tons and tons.
Yes.
If we can get it in big pieces, I can use a lot of it to board up the farmhouse.
Okay.
Um, and it just makes it easier to haul off.
And if we have a crowbar, like, I could—
So you want me to pile it nicely right there or something? Meg's in there sledgehammering. I'm gonna be out here and get the pieces that are knocked down, and I guess I'll pile them neatly right there. Is this going as well as you'd hoped, Meg?
Does demo ever go as well as you hope? It's going alright.
Well, you kind of go into it hoping you can just bang it.
Yeah.
Bang it out.
I think for some of it will, but some of it's so rotted that It's flaking off, which when you want to pull it off in pieces, it's hard.
Is it going about as good as you'd hoped?
Uh, no.
I was hoping it would come off in nice big pieces, but it's not.
We got one side stripped down. Gonna go at the upper part next. The ladies are somewhere on that other side. They want me to kick this. Which one? This one? This one? Well, I don't know if Ben wants to tear it up too much.
There, it's working.
Oh!
How high can I kick, Ben?
Yeah, I noticed.
All right, I can't go any higher and still look cool.
You just spent 24 hours as a chicken and you weren't happy.
Oh, I gave up cool looks. I gave up cool looks about 24 hours ago, huh?
Hey, it's gonna drop.
Dropping.
Hey, we kept it whole, Ben.
Sweet.
We're going on the back side now. We've gotten one whole side completely off. Yay, Ben.
Yay.
3 o'clock. A couple more hours to go at this. I think we might get near the end of that over there.
Probably finish this side.
Ben's got us working in the shade. We're gonna let the people coming tomorrow work in the sun. Yeah, on the other side. There we go. So just banging this out. There's a light going right there.
Wow, broken light.
This wall It's tough for some reason. You got one ready to be kicked? Bangin's good. But I don't know if it's as good as kicking. Take a break from throwing out walls and move this glass. So what's it going to be like when you walk through those doors for the first time? Where are these doors going? Right there?
Uh, in between, basically right here.
Okay, that's gonna be weird. You can come over here and walk through these doors out to your—
this will be the deck—
your garden area. Nice.
It'll be nice.
Ben wants to kick this one. Get that frustration out, Ben.
Oh, there it is.
Okay, who's the most likely to feel better after sledgehammering stuff?
Ben or Meg?
Feel better?
Who's got pent-up frustration?
Both of us!
He claimed it. He said he would.
Probably.
Depends on the day. Uh-huh.
He's more likely to get like really, really into it.
I see him warming up to it there a little bit. If it wasn't for all these wires, he might really get into it right now.
Dude.
You have window holding duty.
I have window holding duty to make sure this does not go crashing to the ground.
You don't hold it, it's gonna come out.
I know, I'm holding it.
Do you need a better duty?
No, I'm good. Got it?
Yep.
It's top heavy.
Don't lose the window.
Are you gonna reuse that window?
Yes, we will reuse this one.
This one's a new window.
Well, the one on the other side that's hiding behind that.
They didn't put any flashing, nothing.
Yeah, that explains all of this water damage gunk.
That's all right, this is all getting reframed.
Yes.
Going a little better for you now, Ben?
This is going way faster than I thought it was going to go.
Yeah, the back side though, much easier.
Much easier, and we're in the shade.
I like it.
She likes this feel.
How can we just put plexiglass?
Just windows.
All windows. I can see the garden, the fire pit. It's all good.
I know. Slinging harder than him.
She's put me in shame. Heads up.
This, this is what happens when you don't do a window properly. There was no flashing.
Well, the window wasn't even attached. Window was not installed properly.
Uh, yes, this is a problem. This is the floor that we are replacing anyways. All of this is framing they did themselves.
Um, we're going to have to re—
but we're going to have to replace the footer, which we kind of had a feeling, but we were really hoping that it wasn't the whole thing. You could get mad about it. You could be, you know, throw your hands up in defeat, but this is what it is. We knew what we were getting into. Yeah, so we'll just roll with it.
Maybe we didn't know the extent.
You never do.
No, that's right. Anybody who's ever done construction knows.
So you've been here 2 months and Did you imagine it would be this much work?
Yeah, I think we did.
We knew.
Well, you know, like, this sucks, but like, you guys have fruit trees. Yeah, right? Like, there's so many, many positives. Yeah, I mean, like, there's sucky things, but then there's also really great things. Yeah. Oh look, there you go.
Very important job.
It is a very important job.
Magnet.
Thank you, Munchie.
Channel my inner frustration. Okay guys, we're about halfway, a little over halfway into the working time and almost halfway done. That's crazy.
Hallelujah.
You think we'd get that far? First we've been getting the bottom trim piece off and then this can come off pretty easy.
What?
It is really stuck around this window, so I'm actually going to just break it right off the window. So I broke it.
I don't like to break it, but what happened to you guys?
We played in their dugout.
You're orange.
We're Oompa Loompas.
You thought I was— I had my hair, I had all of—
yeah, I had my feet and my arms.
Come on.
Oh yeah, does it come off, Brett?
Uh, sometimes, sometimes not. What?
Are those lightning strikes?
There was supposed to be no storm today.
This is the craziest weather. I'm feeling rain way back in here and even some coming in right there, unfortunately. Look at that. Fortunately, a storm like that is going to go away as quickly as it came. 10 by 10. I'm glad we didn't seek shelter in that.
This is going to be some sort of nice little hidden area down here. Look at this, this is so peaceful down here.
Clean this bank off nice.
Looks like the water's falling away supposed to.
Nice.
So cold, the water was starting to wash down the driveway.
You have a road here too?
Yeah.
You got your pod in. That wasn't here last time. What's been so nice about that?
All the, all the projects that I've come to, and it's like, man, it'd really be nice if I had my tools. Oh wait, they're here now.
Nice. And you just go down to the pod and get it out?
Yeah, a lot of it I've moved to the barn.
Let's go over here, I'll show you that chainsaw.
I got this on Amazon.
It's Amazon.
Amazon, $15.
What's it called?
Uh, it's a Forester. You just have to look for it in the brand.
And you attach it to your string trimmer? Yep. Look at this, these guys are growing up fast for you. They weathered the storm nice.
There's even a dry spot in there, so they're— if they're wet, that's because they were out in the storm.
I was here last time, these chickens were just little itty-bitty. They just had them in a cage outside, just some woven wire and just a little door. I think it was a door over there.
Yeah.
And now you've done built this out of just the wood you had around from the remodel.
Yeah.
And you got $30 into this. Yeah. And that was basically the hardware cost.
Hinges the hinges even came. Like, everything came out of that mobile home. And this, this was the roll that we had sitting out in the yard. I just picked it up and put it on this.
And how long did it take you to build it?
Oh, all together, maybe like 2 and a half hours.
Oh my gosh, cool. You even gave him a little perch, some wood going from one into the other.
They seem to like it.
So what will be here in a month when I come back?
Hopefully a way better, drier mobile home. Uh, I think we're probably gonna get a few more chicks. I'd like to do meat birds, but I don't know if we're gonna have time this season.
Uh, yeah, so, okay, I look forward to it, buddy.
Awesome.
And people can follow your journey at Holler Homestead on YouTube. Yep. And watch you guys 3 times a week, usually.
Yeah, unless we're feeling froggy and we'll do an extra one.
And we're fans, we're watching, we're liking to see the changes. It's an amazing story. Well, thank you. Keep it up.
