01 / Lead, South Dakota · 44.35° N, 103.77° W · Elev. 5,280 ft
Custom homes and timber frames built for the Black Hills.
Horstmann Homes is a family owned builder in Lead. We design and build houses that hold up to a mile high winter, and we remodel the ones that have already stood through a hundred of them.
On site · Lawrence County, South Dakota
New construction · Timber framing · Custom design · Remodeling
02 / The practice
Almost every house we've built came from a neighbor's recommendation. We'd like the next one to come the same way.
Horstmann Homes is a family owned, locally owned new construction and remodeling company based in Lead, South Dakota. We work with homeowners across the northern Black Hills on custom home design, timber framing, ground up builds, and remodels.
We're small on purpose. You'll know the people on your site, you'll get a straight answer when you call, and the parts nobody ever sees again, flashing, framing, the way water leaves a building, get the same attention as the parts everybody does.
Family owned
Locally owned
Insured
Built on referrals
03 / Site conditions
What a house up here has to answer to.
Lead sits a mile above sea level on the side of a mountain, and that changes nearly every decision on a build. Most of them get made before the backfill goes in, which is the last time you'll ever see them.
Winter build · Lawrence County, South Dakota
Snow doesn't land evenly up here.
Roofs in the northern Hills carry real weight, and the drift never sits where the drawing says it will. We frame and pitch for the load that actually shows up on your ridge, then detail the valleys, eaves, and roof to wall transitions so meltwater leaves the building instead of finding a way back into it.
Framing · Pitch · Valley and eave detailing
Footings go below frost. No exceptions.
On a mountain lot that often means stepped footings and a good deal more excavation than a flat lot in town. It's the least glamorous line on the estimate and the one that decides whether things stay square and level a decade from now.
Excavation · Stepped footings · Foundation
Almost every lot around Lead is on grade.
Cut and fill, walkout levels, retaining, and drainage all get designed together, because water moving downhill is the single thing most likely to shorten the life of a hillside house. We'd rather spend a day on grading than a season chasing a wet basement.
Cut and fill · Retaining · Site drainage
A north slope holds snow into spring.
An exposed ridge takes wind all winter, and a south facing wall of glass behaves very differently in January than it does in July. Siting, glazing, roof orientation, and where the front door faces are all worth arguing about before anyone draws a line.
Siting · Glazing · Orientation
04 / Index of work
Four ways we build.
01
Custom home design
Plans drawn around your land, your view, and the way your family actually moves through a house.
We start on the lot, not on paper. Where the sun lands, where the snow piles, where a driveway can realistically go in February. Then we draw. You'll see the plan change several times before anybody orders lumber, and that's the cheapest place in the whole project for it to change.
View custom home design
02
Timber framing
Post and beam structure for homes and commercial buildings, with joinery you'll still be looking up at in thirty years.
Heavy timber is structure you leave exposed on purpose. Posts, beams, trusses, and the joinery that ties them together, cut for the span and the load, then raised on site. We frame houses this way, and we frame commercial buildings this way too, where an exposed frame does more for a room than any finish you could hang on it.
View timber framing
03
New construction
Ground up builds from footings to final walkthrough, with one crew accountable the whole way.
Excavation, footings, framing, envelope, mechanicals, finish. One set of people you can call about any of it. We keep the schedule honest, including the weeks weather takes from us, because you're making decisions off that schedule too.
View new construction
04
Remodeling
Kitchens, additions, and whole home updates that work with the house that's already there.
Lead is full of houses that went up for mining families a century ago, and most of them were built well, just not for the way people live now. We open them up, insulate them properly, bring the mechanicals into this century, and add on where a steep lot will allow it.
View remodeling05 / Recent work
Houses we've put up around here.
Selected projects · Northern Black Hills, South Dakota
New construction · Timber framing · Remodeling
06 / Territory
Based in Lead. Building across the northern Hills.
Close enough to be on your site the same morning, and local enough to know what a north facing slope and a Black Hills winter will do to a building over twenty years. Pick a town and we'll tell you what building there is actually like.
Core, Lead and the gulches
Regular service area
Highways 85, 14A, I-90
Home base
Lead
Home. Steep lots, narrow streets, and a housing stock that mostly went up for Homestake families. Almost nothing here is flat, which means almost nothing here is standard. It's the town we know foot by foot.
New builds · Hillside lots · Historic remodels
Ask about a lot hereLawrence County
Deadwood
The next gulch over, and a town that takes its own history seriously. Tight lots, limited staging room, and work that has to respect what's already standing next door.
Remodels · Additions · Tight site work
Ask about a lot hereLawrence County
Central City
Tucked between Lead and Deadwood along the creek bottom. Small, quiet, and close enough that we're there before the coffee's cold.
Remodels · Additions · New builds
Ask about a lot hereLawrence County
Spearfish
Down the canyon and a good deal lower than Lead. Different snow, different soil, longer building season. A house that would be right for a Lead ridge is often the wrong house for a Spearfish lot.
Custom homes · Timber frames · New builds
Ask about a lot hereLawrence County
Whitewood
Out where the hills open into pasture. Room for a shop, a long driveway, and the kind of outbuilding that's hard to fit on a mountainside.
New builds · Shops and outbuildings
Ask about a lot hereMeade County
Sturgis
East edge of the hills, where wind coming off the plains becomes the design problem instead of snow. Orientation and envelope detailing carry more weight out here than they do in the trees.
Custom homes · New builds · Remodels
Ask about a lot herePennington County
Rapid City
Down on the valley floor and the longest haul we make. Worth it for the right project, and we'll tell you honestly if we're the wrong crew for the distance.
Custom homes · Timber frames
Ask about a lot here
On site · Northern Black Hills, South Dakota
Lawrence · Meade · Pennington counties
07 / Common questions
Things people ask us first.
If your question isn't here, ask it directly. We'd rather answer it now than have you guess.
Where does Horstmann Homes build?
We're based in Lead, South Dakota and we build across the northern Black Hills, including Deadwood, Central City, Spearfish, Whitewood, Sturgis, and out toward Rapid City. If you're not sure whether your lot is in range, send us the address and we'll tell you straight.
What is timber framing, and why would I want it?
Timber framing uses heavy posts and beams joined together as the actual structure of the building, rather than hiding conventional framing behind drywall. The frame stays exposed on purpose, so the thing holding your house up is also the most striking thing in the room. It suits Black Hills houses well, and it's the detail guests notice before anything else.
Do you frame commercial buildings, or only homes?
Both. We build custom homes and we've framed commercial buildings in heavy timber as well, where an exposed structure does more for a space than any finish material could. Tell us what the building is for and we'll tell you whether timber is the right answer for it.
Do you build through a Black Hills winter?
Yes. Winter changes the sequence rather than stopping the work, and we plan the schedule around it from the start. Excavation and foundations want to happen before the ground closes up, and framing and interior work carry through the cold months. We'll be honest with you about which weeks weather is likely to take.
Can you build from plans I already have?
Bring them over. We'll read through what you have, tell you what will and won't work on your particular lot at this elevation, and where the plan needs adjusting for snow load, frost depth, or grade. Plenty of good plans need a Black Hills edit rather than a redraw.
How do we get started?
Send us a note with roughly what you're thinking about building and where. We'll set up a conversation, walk the lot if you have one, and give you a clear picture of what the project involves before you commit to anything.
08 / Next step