Sachem East alums at Binghamton build their own house

The next time you want to complain about doing some work on your house, remember the story of Michael Zella and Ashley Haugstatter.

To save costs on housing, the SUNY Binghamton students and Sachem East alumni built their own home from the scratch not far from their university in Endicott, N.Y.

Recently featured during a news segment on the NBC affiliate in Binghamton, Zella, who graduated from East in 2010, said they found the property after searching on the Internet and spent about $35,000 to build the 345-square foot space in Broome County.

“Every day you wake up and there’s a whole new aspect of construction,” said Zella, whose father owns a construction company in New York City. “We rented the excavator, skidsteer and Bobcat for a week and in a week’s time we had 80 yards of dirt taken out of here, just the two of us working this equipment.”

Haugstatter, who graduated from Sachem East in 2011, said her parents were initially worried about her safety, but came around once they saw the house.

“They were in shock and awe,” she told NBC. “They didn’t know what to say.”

RELATED: Click here to see the NBC-Binghamton report

-Words by Chris R. Vaccaro