By Skyler Chappell
Lebanon Local
On July 17, 2023, a home built by high schoolers sold for $433,000. It was one of the many homes Eric Frazier and his construction students hope to keep creating and selling.
Frazier started building houses 32 years ago when he started Frazier Construction Company. Not long after, the Lebanon High School construction position became open. Frazier took this opportunity.
Originally, the position was not a “house building” position, but as Frazier puts it, “It was a woodshop / we-have-a-house kinda goal, and we can finish it in two or three years.” Although the class was supported in the 1990’s, the Lebanon School District began to cut funding for it in the early 2000’s. After funding was cut for the program, Frazier and his students worked on Habitat for Humanity houses in the area. This allowed them to stay busy until the program was eventually re-funded in 2009-2010.
All the funding went directly into building a house on Vine Street. The three-bedroom, two-bathroom home sold for $262,500 and the profits were put back into their program to build a duplex on Second Street. After that duplex sold for $529,000 in February of 2021, Lebanon City Council approved the annexation of a 0.92 acre lot on Kees Street to be used by Frazier and his class. The approval also included the reestablishment of the parcel as a residential mixed density zone and a 12-lot subdivision for residential purposes.
Along with Frazier’s previous knowledge of house construction, having built over 100 houses, Frazier made the goal of finishing at least one house every year. Next year, however, he and his class plan on building two.
Currently, Frazier and his class are working on a 2,454 sq. ft. home with two stories.
“We try to do both two-story and single-story houses like you would in the real world. We are trying to make this education as real world as possible, so that we can get them real world skills that they can then feed themselves and a family,” he said.
Frazier’s projects are turning into school-wide collaborations.
“The high school drafting class draws up all these plans,” he said. “The ag department comes and does all the landscaping, the welding department welds up a lot of our gussets and hold downs, and things we need to be decorative. We try to include as many programs as we can.”
All of this, as Frazier puts it, would not be possible without the support from the school district.
“I get a tremendous amount of support; the admin that we have at the high school and the district office are 100% on board,” Frazier said. “We do sell these, and we do make a profit.”