Salem is the Dent County seat and the gateway to the Ozarks — Montauk State Park, the Current River and the Mark Twain National Forest are all right down the road. It's country full of wooded acreage, hunting land and long gravel lanes, and that rural ground is exactly where MB General Contracting does its best work.
Salem sits about 40 miles south of our St. James home base, a straight shot down Highway 68 through St. James and into the heart of Dent County. We've been making that drive for years, because the Salem area is full of the kind of property we specialize in: big rural tracts, forested acreage, hunting land, weekend cabins near the river and homesteads set well back off the county road. Building or improving on that kind of land takes more than a pickup and a rake — it takes dozers, excavators, skid steers and a forestry mulcher, and one crew that knows how to use them. MB General Contracting is owner-operated by Matthew Buhlinger, a licensed general contractor with more than 15 years behind him, and we bring all of it to the Salem area.
Whether you're opening up an overgrown back forty for a food plot, cutting a new lane into a building site, fixing a driveway the spring rains keep washing out, or pouring a slab for a shop or cabin, we handle it start to finish. Because we run our own iron and pour our own concrete in-house — we don't sub it out — you deal with the same people from the free on-site estimate through the final cleanup.
Dent County is classic Ozark country: rolling, heavily wooded hills, thin rocky soil over limestone and chert, and plenty of grade to deal with. Get toward Montauk and the Current River headwaters and you add creek bottoms, springs and land that holds water in the low spots. Out here properties are big and the drives are long — it's normal to have a quarter-mile lane back to the house through the timber. That combination of rock, slope, trees and distance is what makes rural site work its own trade. A driveway has to shed water and hold up to loaded trucks and stock trailers. A building pad has to be cut and compacted right the first time. Clearing has to be done without tearing up the ground you're trying to use. We plan the work around the way water, rock and access actually behave on Ozark land.
Every one of our eight core services is available across Salem and Dent County. Out here the rural land specialties get the most calls, so we've noted how each one fits the area.
Opening up wooded acreage, hunting land, food plots, fence lines and building sites is bread-and-butter work around Salem. We clear overgrown tracts and reclaim pasture that's grown back to cedar and brush. See land clearing →
Our forestry mulcher grinds brush, saplings and undergrowth in place — no burn piles, no hauling — which is ideal for thinning timber, clearing trails and cleaning up edges on the big forested tracts common in Dent County. Forestry mulching →
Long country lanes take a beating out here. We build and rebuild gravel driveways with the right base, crown and grade so they shed water and stand up to the wet season and heavy loads. Driveway grading →
Building pads, pond work, basements, cabin and shop sites — we cut, fill and compact rocky Ozark ground and shape the land so your project sits right. Excavating →
Spring rains and creek-bottom low spots put water where you don't want it. We handle grading, culverts, ditching and French drains to keep it moving away from driveways, buildings and yards. Drainage →
Slabs for shops, garages and cabins, plus driveways, patios and footings — poured in-house by our own crew, not subbed out. Concrete & patios →
On sloped, rocky lots near the river and up in the hills, a retaining wall holds a grade, levels a yard and stops erosion. We build walls sized for the ground they hold. Retaining walls →
Running a waterline or utility to a cabin, shop or new build back off the road? We trench and install lines, and use directional drilling to bore under drives, roads and landscaping without tearing them up. Waterline & utility → · Directional drilling →
Yes. Salem is about a 40-mile run south from our St. James base down Highway 68, and we work throughout Dent County — in town, out toward Montauk and the Current River, and on the back tracts and hunting land in between. Give us a call and we'll set up a free on-site visit.
That's some of our most common work around Salem. We clear overgrown timber and brush, open up food plots and shooting lanes, reclaim grown-over pasture, and clean up fence lines and trails. Where it fits, our forestry mulcher grinds the material in place so there's no burning or hauling. See our land clearing page for more.
Yes. Long lanes on Ozark ground wash when they don't have the right base, crown and drainage to move water off the surface. We regrade and rebuild driveways, add gravel and base, and cut ditches or set culverts so the next hard rain doesn't undo it. See driveway grading and drainage.
We do full site work — clearing, cutting the pad, hauling and compacting fill, and shaping the ground so your build sits level and drains right. Then we can pour the concrete slab or footings in-house with our own crew.
Cost depends on the property, not a flat rate. The size of the area, how thick the timber or brush is, the amount of rock in the ground, the slope, how far back and how easy the site is to reach, and the materials involved all factor in. We look at all of that during the free on-site estimate and give you an honest picture before any work starts.
Yes. We trench and install waterlines and utilities out to cabins, shops and new builds, and we can bore under driveways, roads and landscaping with directional drilling so we don't tear up what's already there.
Free estimates on land clearing, forestry mulching, driveways, drainage, site work and concrete across Salem and Dent County.
