Rural Lao Lum traditionally live in self-sufficient villages, typically made up of some 40 to 50 households. Houses of timber, thatch, and split bamboo are constructed on wooden piles, with the floor about 2 m (6 ft) above the ground. The agricultural year centers on the cultivation of glutinous (short-grain) rice, the preferred variety among the Lao Lum. Villagers use buffalo for plowing and oxen for pulling carts. Lao Lum form close-knit communities, but families are nuclear—consisting of two parents and their children—not extended. Marriage requires payment of a bride-price (a payment made by the groom to the bride’s family), and the groom normally resides at first with his wife’s parents. When the couple can afford it, they build their own house. Wealthier urban Lao Lum live in spacious villas. In the past, some Lao Lum men took two or more wives, a practice called polygyny, but this practice is now illegal and therefore less common.