How to build a Shop/Garage?

[OverkillYJ]

I am looking at getting a garage/shop built connected to my house by a breezeway/carport with a loft I can use as a gym over the shop. I am thinking around 1000-1500sqft for the shop floor. I want room for a 4 post lift and a room I can soundproof for the compressor I have ready. I am in SouthEast PA in Harleysville. What questions should I ask builders I talk to and what should I make sure I do when I have it built? What should I expect to pay? I have never had anything built before. I can do electrical, plumbing, and most of the other stuff, but I have never built a building so I am going to hire someone for that part. If anyone is local to me and can suggest a builder that would be great too. I talked to one place today that wanted $300 just to take a look. I was a sales guy for ten years and I am not paying someone to compete for my business when I haven't had them draw anything up. Im just trying to do this right the first time, and I'm usually a lurker, but this seems to be the best place to ask. What should I make sure I do?

THANKS

 

[firebirdparts]

Coincidentally, my shop has pretty much exactly what you describe here. Anyway....

You should decide on the footprint. You need dimensions before you call anybody. Look at the setbacks, what is allowed by the local authority, how tall it can be, etc. I think you're going to want a stick-built building in that size with a loft. That is the most direct way to support a loft, and the building is not too big for regular lumber. Maybe some others can give a different opinion with the reasons.

 

[Codyboy]

I would build as large as possible within budget and space required.

You have to figure out what you want to build first.
You have a lot of research to do.

 

[nadogail]

Welcome to the Forum from the shore of San Diego Bay, my little shop was built before i purchase the property and for many reasons it is at it's maximum size.

 

[1/4atatime]

I would start by finding where you would like to put the garage. Most likely unless you have a large plot of perfectly level land or live in the middle of nowhere your land (the terrain and boundary lines) and the county are going to dictate how big you can actually build. I wanted a building 200-300 sqft bigger but large drop-offs in my land, power lines, drainage fields, and the county forced different plans.

 

[cannuck]

Yup, as people are steering you towards: you need to do everything from 2 sides: what your wish list would like to see and what regs, zoning, obstructions, cost will limit your wish list to. Make layout sketches as you go through the process, maybe have a crack at some of the online design programmes. If you are going to work with a builder, get him involved at the start of the process so you don't have to go backwards at any point.

 

[racecougar]

The more you can plan/draw/put-on-paper ahead of time, the less back-and-forth you'll have when talking with potential contractors, and the more apples-to-apples the bids will be. When I shopped for a contractor for my building, I did the site drawings, elevations, foundation, electrical, etc. in CAD, and also physically staked off the site. I had a clear written description of features (windows, doors, other materials, etc.) for the bidding contractors to work off of. Doing this work ahead of time kicks things off in a much better fashion than vague ideas about what the building should look like, where it should be, and how it should be constructed.

If you're not able to do this, consider hiring an architect to get your preliminaries sorted out.

 

[Stuart in MN]

Just a wild assed guess but you're probably talking about well over $100,000 all in.

 

[The Metric System]

Here is how we built our garage:

1. Read and understand your local building codes. Pay special attention to restrictions like setback, maximum floor area, and building height - these are the major constraints on your structure. Do not take anybody's word for it, you need to become an expert on what you are allowed to build. Definitely confirm whether your breezeway will qualify the garage as an "attached structure" as this may significantly impact your options.
2. Make an easy-to-modify mockup of your potential garage so you can play with layouts and contents and confirm that the space will work for you. There are excellent digital tools to do this, but graph paper and to-scale cutout pieces of paper to represent vehicles and benches etc is easy and works very well.
3. Re-arrange and revise this mockup, playing with different building sizes and interior layouts etc until you are happy with the result and can't think of anything to improve.
4. Set it aside and don't look at it for a few weeks. If possible, during this time visit a few garages (residential or commercial) and get a feel for what you like and don't like, how vehicles and equipment sit in the space around them, and how people move through the building. Don't overlook lighting, storage, and HVAC - these things make the difference between a shop that is efficient/comfortable and one that is a hassle to work in.
5. Revisit the mockup and re-re-arrange everything, you'll likely have several new ideas for improvements. Get a friend to help you so you can have a second opinion.
6. Repeat steps 3-5 until you stop seeing opportunities for improvement.
7. Now you have a rough concept for a building that you know is legal, will work for you in terms of space and storage, and has been refined and optimized via several design loops.
8. Send this to several local builders to gauge their interest in the project and see what their next steps are.

I would absolutely not pay somebody to just come out and discuss ideas.

 

[Skellyii]

Wow!
Interesting coincidence.

The lady of the house and I were out having lunch yesterday, and she suggested that maybe we should have another garage built on our property, instead of leasing or buying offsite garage space.

I'm taking lots of notes.

 

[gizardlizard]

Be ready to let the moths out of your wallet. Lol

 

[1/4atatime]

Be ready to let the moths out of your wallet. Lol

Might as well just go ahead and put some gasoline on your wallet and light it on fire now

 

[The Metric System]

Might as well just go ahead and put some gasoline on your wallet and light it on fire now

This also squares with our experience of building a large garage that is integrated with an existing house.

If you hire out the work it will be very expensive.

I recommend saving up a sizable war chest, and making sure you plan to stay in the place long enough to get your money's worth out of it.

 

[75gmck25]

If you want to get responsive estimates from contractors for the entire job or any major part, it will help a lot if you have a rough set of scaled architect's plans and drawings. Otherwise you are just waving your hands and providing lists of requirements, and they have to figure out what you really want. Then they later have to break it to you that it's going to cost a lot more than you expect if you get all those features.

Most contractors want a set of plans because they are not prepared for a full design/build scenario. Even a set of standard plans out of a book might be sufficient. The guys that do full design/build would also be fine, but it's the expensive solution.

 

[Lenny99]

I am looking at getting a garage/shop built connected to my house by a breezeway/carport with a loft I can use as a gym over the shop. I am thinking around 1000-1500sqft for the shop floor. I want room for a 4 post lift and a room I can soundproof for the compressor I have ready. I am in SouthEast PA in Harleysville. What questions should I ask builders I talk to and what should I make sure I do when I have it built? What should I expect to pay? I have never had anything built before. I can do electrical, plumbing, and most of the other stuff, but I have never built a building so I am going to hire someone for that part. If anyone is local to me and can suggest a builder that would be great too. I talked to one place today that wanted $300 just to take a look. I was a sales guy for ten years and I am not paying someone to compete for my business when I haven't had them draw anything up. Im just trying to do this right the first time, and I'm usually a lurker, but this seems to be the best place to ask. What should I make sure I do?

THANKS

1st step is to speak to your local planning and development dept to see what you can and can't do with respect to zoning bylaws. Once you have a clear understanding of what you can do then as others have said make a drawing of how you would lay out your garage and what you want tomuse it for. I am currently building my garage and that is the process I went through. I ended up with a 26' wide by 36' deep garage and I did 11' ceilings. My plan was to have parking in front portion with a 4 post lift to store my car. The back portion I am planning a golf simulator but could also be used as a wood working area. Once you have a plan the decide what you can do yourself and what you need to hire out. I have the ability to do everything but not the time so I hired a contractor to get it to the weather tight stage and then I did all of the electrical and interior finishing.

 

[NUTTSGT]

Once you talk to the AHJ and knowing what you can & can't do, pick a size and stick with it... take your planning from there and decide how much of it you want to do yourself, if any.

 

[WisJim]

We had a new building built just as Covid started. I had an idea what I wanted, and took sketches in to the building inspection department and found out that I couldn't do what I wanted where I wanted on our lot because of zoning, setbacks, green space requirements, etc., but our building inspector was VERY helpful (which might not be common) and suggested applying for a variance for building size, set back and reduction of green space area. The variance application cost money up front with no guarantee of approval, but we did get it approved. We got a variance for set back, allowed 6 feet on one side and 2 feet on another, instead of 10 feet, but we had to use 5/8 fire code sheetrock in the building. We didn't get a variance for building height (didn't realize we should have included it) so we ended up with a gambrel roof instead of a steep single pitch, in order to have an upstairs room. I drew up plans and got them approved by the building inspection department and had the plans to show to contractors, and it was difficult to get a contractor to even talk to us, and we ended up only having a couple show up and only one actually gave us a price and enough info to go ahead with the project--and he turned out to be kind of sketchy. We continually found errors in construction mostly due to him not following the plans (such as 10 foot walls instead of the 8 foot that we needed due to height restrictions, and ordering the wrong trusses, and lots of other details).
If I were doing it again, I would spend some extra money and get plans and estimates through our local full service lumber yards, which we are lucky enough to have one in town and another couple close enough that they would finish my plans, do estimates, and deliver materials to a crew they would recommend.

 

[slackdaddy1]

I have been a lic residential contractor for 32+ years,
That said, if you are on the east coast/mid Atlantic,,, good luck finding a competent contractor or any subs,,, 99.99% are worse than weekend hacks in a pickup truck.

 

[r00a005]

You are fairly close to me (spring city PA), and you might have good luck finding a reliable contractor in the Amish/Mennonite communities west of you. We had our house re-sided by one contractor, and I had my garage built by another. They may not be the least expensive, but the quality in my case was very high, and they were reliable. The siding contractor (https://www.mossyoakconstruction.com/) probably did 15 houses in our development. I can't remember who built the garage but I can find out if you like - it was a pole barn built to the same appearance as our house.

Bruce

 

[larry_g]

In addition to all the above I'd suggest that you define ALL the things that this building is to do for you. Storage, woodwork, metalwork, auto repair, party space, and whatever the spouse expects. Once you know what the building is to do then you can design it. Have you perused all the build threads here?

 

[thammel]

What everyone says...but most important get multiple quotes if you can. Get recommendations from anyone you know. Ask around. Post on Nextdoor app asking for recommendations.