The house was begun in 1951 by Iakov Hryhorovych Basans'kyi and his wife Odarka Dmytrivna, both born in 1894. The house was completed in 1953. The house is wattle construction and it was hand-built.

According to their daughter, Polina Iakivna Latysh, there was a house on the land, but it was in disrepair after the war. According to other farmers, wattle houses, the type of house construction used in this area, are not long-lasting and houses need to be rebuilt every 50-75 years. Because the existing structure was in bad condition, the family set up temporary shelter on the land and began construction of the main house.

Construction: The first step was setting up large logs as corner posts. Iakov Basans'kyi did this by eye. Smaller posts were set up between the main ones and window frames were inserted into these. After that came slats about 20 centimeters apart. Then reeds were woven between the slats. The structure of slats, posts, and reeds is covered on both sides with a layer of mud, about 3-4 centimeters thick and this is allowed to dry for about 2 weeks. Then another layer is applied and allowed to dry. The third layer is the final layer.

The floor is made by mixing ashes with the dirt. This will harden to a cement-like undercoating. Though some houses stop at this stage, the Latysh house and most others have a wooden floor about 10 centimeters above the dirt one.

The original covering was a thatch roof.

Additions and changes: extensive renovations were done on the house in the 1970's.

The roof: The thatched roof was replaced with tin in the 1970's. According to Baba Polia, the metal roof was terrible. It was very noisy and leaked when it rained and it provided poor insulation, making the house colder in winter than it had been and warmer in summer. When asked why the family went from thatch to tin, she responded that tin was the fashion in the village at the time and they wanted to keep in style with the neighbors. More recently, the roof has been replaced with corrugated fiberglass sheets. This is the roof covering used on most of the houses in the village. There are still decorative edges of snipped tin around the main entrance to the house.

The outer walls: A layer of bricks was added to the outer walls for stability, insulation, and to improve appearance in the 1970's.

The dining area: A dining area was added on to the front of the house in the 1970's. This is the area that is regularly used for meals. Eating in the main room is reserved for ceremonial occasions and for meals with guests.

The summer kitchen: The summer kitchen, small building adjacent to the cellar and across the way from the dining area was built at the same time, that is, in the 1970's. Having some sort of facility for summertime cooking that is external to the house, is common in this area. Some houses have a separate building, like the Latysh home. Most just have a stove heated by bottled gas somewhere to the edge of the house, where it will not heat up the rest of the structure in the heat of summer.

The Latysh summer kitchen is an entirely separate building. It does not have an oven. It does, however, have several burners connected to a cylinder of bottled gas. There is also plenty of storage space for the various foodstuffs that will be prepared in the summer kitchen. A great deal of food is processed during the summer. It will be stored in the summer kitchen, in the cellar next to the kitchen, and in the attic of the house and it will feed the family all winter.

-The farmstead: The farmstead is divided into a people area and into an animal area. The outhouse and the bathhouse are in the animal section. This is the "unclean" part of the farmstead.

The entrance into the Latysh property is into the farmstead, not into the house. This means that the house faces away from the street and that the door to the house opens from the yard, not from the street.

Every farm has a guard dog. The dog on the Latysh farm is named Tuzyk and he is not terribly ferocious.

The family keeps a milk cow, a pig, chickens, rabbits, and indokatchki (turkey-ducks).

Vasyl' is quite a handyman and he has made assorted machines, such as the one that chops root crops for pig feed.