Editing Earth shelter (section)

====Financial cost====
Three main factors influence overall cost of home construction, namely, design complexity, materials used, and whether the owner(s) carries out some or all of the construction or pays others to do it.<ref name="mcconkey2011" /> Custom houses with complex designs tend to be more expensive and take longer to build than stock houses. Houses which use expensive materials will be more expensive than houses which use low cost materials. Owner labor can dramatically cut construction costs.<ref name="mcconkey2011" />

Both earth sheltered projects and construction of regular houses have significant variability in the design, materials and labor involved. As such it is difficult to make a precise comparison of cost between the two, however in general an earth shelter is much more expensive.<ref name="mcconkey2011" />

A small "underground home" built in the style of Oehler, as only a simple, non-waterproofed hole in ground with simple planks and a plastic sheet to a wall, despite using free labour (ignoring the [[opportunity cost]]s of not having time to go to work) and recycled materials, e.g. windows and planks for the wall, is estimated to be 30% cheaper to construct when compared to paying a contractor to build a regular house using new construction materials at standard prices,<ref name="mcconkey2011" /> although Oehler's design will quickly rot and collapse after a few years.

A particular factor that strongly influences the cost of an earth shelter is the amount of earth that covers it. The more earth covering the structure, the greater the expense is needed in having a structure capable of withstanding the load (see also: [[#Roof|Roof]]).<ref name="roy2006" /><ref name="mcconkey2011" /> Another important cost factor that tends to be unique to earth shelters is site excavation and backfilling.<ref name="roy2006" /> The amount of waterproofing is also more costly. On the other hand, earth shelters should have lower maintenance costs since they are mostly covered with little exposed exterior.<ref name="reddy2003" />

Many financial institutions outright exclude financing on earth-sheltered homes,<ref name="wampler2003">{{cite book |author1=L Wampler |title=Underground homes |date=2003 |publisher=Pelican Pub. Co. |isbn=9780882892733 |language=en|oclc=58835250 }}</ref> or require this type of property to be common for the area.{{citation needed|date=January 2019}}