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Living in your Shop?

Tamper84

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Mar 10, 2012
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310
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Clarington Ohio
I have been wondering here, and thinking. Bad combo lol. But I am thinking about putting up a pole building, and sectioning off an up stairs or a place off to the side for living quarters. Has any one on here done this before? What would you do differently?

I am a welder, and also going to school for machinist training. So welding and machining would be going on in the shop side. I know there would have to be a fire wall for code, but what should it be made of?

Or do you all think a quonset hut style building would be better? Just some thoughts lol

Thanks!!!
 
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burleymike

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SE Idaho
The other night I pissed my wife off so bad I thought I would be moving into my pole barn. Seriously though my uncle in law did the exact same thing. He did have to do some different things for fire code but he was able to do it.

My wife liked it so much I was almost able to talk her into doing a pole barn house.
 

Outlawmws

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The Badlands
A friend of mine back 30 or so years ago rented a shop in an industrial zone that had some office space, and converted that into bachelor's living quarters.

Another option is to part a travel trailer inside the building an live in that. "to code"? Probably not but whats the most they can say?

If I was single and no family, I'd probably have a place in the hills with a large shop and small living quarters...
 
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Tamper84

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Mar 10, 2012
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Clarington Ohio
I have thought about the trailer idea. But then I thought, if I'm going to put money in a decent trailer. I could probably have living quarters for not that much more. I'm just not sure on how to go about designing it. Carpentry is not my strong suit lol.

Thanks
 

Chaz

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Apr 3, 2006
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Missoula, MT
WestSide.jpg


Our home and shop are one unit. We love it! You need good insulation for noise, Separate furnaces, and firewalls.
 

BlackdogJunkyard

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Jan 3, 2012
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A friend of mine back 30 or so years ago rented a shop in an industrial zone that had some office space, and converted that into bachelor's living quarters.

Yeah I am currently living in a setup like that.
vehe6e2e.jpg

The shop space is only 30x15 and the old office space is the same but two stories.


My girlfriend doesn't love it.
I do though. Hahaha.
Sent from my DROID X2
 

sberry

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Brethren, Michigan
Lived in mine for 12 yrs, was very convenient. Getting married put an end to it.
 

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archirelic

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texas
The wife and I have got family friends, an older couple, that own their own business/company on their land and have turned the southeast corner of their shop, which is the front of the building, into their living quarters. Seems to work fairly well for them. Everything's up to code as well.

The ultimate key here, I believe, is finding a gal that'll move into the shop with you!
 

boatmark

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Aug 23, 2012
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I have thought about the same thing, but for budgeting reasons. I am thinking about buying the land, and putting up a garage with an apartment to live in (I'm single) upstairs. Build the house later, then rent out the apartment as income.

More to your question, I know two people who lived at their shops. Worked out well for each. Marriage put a stop to both.
 

digdug18

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Danville, PA
I have thought about the same thing, but for budgeting reasons. I am thinking about buying the land, and putting up a garage with an apartment to live in (I'm single) upstairs. Build the house later, then rent out the apartment as income.

Great Idea!
 

zurud

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My garage used to have apt in it. 2 car garage with 1 bedroom, Living room, kitchen, bathroom. I tore it most of it down to park 2 cars and 1 bike.
 

sfm1951

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Apr 30, 2008
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66
Location
Grand Rapid, MN.
Not exactly living in the shop, but attached to it. Barb and i bought a 54X 99 Morton Building with a 36X32 smaller shop that we made into our home. The back side is 131 feet long the front side is 99 feet long. The first 54X39 is the fab shop the rest 54X60 is the body shop. I should've done this at 20 instead of 60. Better late than never.Steve
 

bmcdowell40

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Nov 12, 2009
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Lanse, PA
i did exactly that. In 2010 I built a 32x56 pole building with a 16x56 apartment upstairs. I have an area 12x32 down stairs that has a laundry room, a full bathroom, closet and a small sitting area for when you come in or go out to put on shoes. That area also houses the stairway to the upstairs. Upstairs I have another full bathroom, kitchen/living room combo and a huge bedroom. Outside I have a 16x10 deck from the upstairs. When I built it I ran all the utilities I needed and stubbed them out to where I'm going to build a house. My wife and I live in it now very comfortably. The garage has plenty of room for our vehicles, tractor and all our toys.
 

sberry

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I am guilty of not making better egress area, it was meant to be temp and just worked out so comfy that one day lead to another. Like some of the guys here, my office is downstairs, have a bathroom with laundry and a kitchenette is part of the office. Upstairs is bathroom, shower and living/bedroom, upstairs is bigger than down and up has way plenty of room, 18 x 20. The walk door to building is before the office. My floor plan is really good for what I do, the office is in FRONT, not squirrelled in the rear somewhere. The only changes I would make are really minor, my general floor plan is really really good, super convenient.
 

Chaz

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Missoula, MT
WOW Chaz!!!! That is awesome!!!! What did you use for fire walls??

The firewalls are two layers of 5/8 FC sheetrock. The ceiling above the shop is also a "firewall"
The house is to the left and above the 60 foot long shop.

First WOW !

Second, separate exits.

Absolutely.. separate exits are a must... We spent a long time planning this. I told my wife it was the last move I was ever gonna make.
I'd like to say that fire plug is plumbed up, but it is not. Kinda like ******* on a guy.
 
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trbomax

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Mar 21, 2010
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starvation lake,mi.
Ours was built so that the 2 900 sq ft "clean" shops could be used as living quarters. Crazy insulation,fully firewalled to the working shop except for two windows in my section that could be boarded over,separate heat and ac,bathroom and separate hot water. A few partitions after machine removal and we could have a 14 x 72 house. The only thing missing is a separate exit/entrance door,but that could be fixed if required.
 
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J Persons

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Louisiana
I knew a guy that did it, built a new commercial automotive shop and to get it through code inspection built his apartment as a mezzanine storage area. After the inspectors left, he converted the mezzanine storage area to an apartment. This was in California, Your results may vary.
 

the owl

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Sep 8, 2012
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A few years ago I remember stumbling upon a website where they had Pole Barn/Shops with livings areas above them. They were really nice looking, 2-3 bedrooms, nice kitchen etc. I wish I could remember the website :(
 
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Tamper84

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A frrend has one, 6 car garage, fully functional upstairs apartment above 1/2 the garage.

Very, very, nice IMO.
 

ken w.

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Western New York
A friend of mine built a Morton building and added a loft the the rear of the building.It worked out well until he build his house.Now it's a guest loft.
 

Outlawmws

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Thats exactly what I am looking for. What are the problems with financing it?

Banks anywhere are going to want conventional buildings for loans. a shop w/living quarters will be treated as a shop, and the "housing" ads no real value for the purposes of loan collateral.

Banks don't like the unusual. conventional housing with a conventional garage. Have a 40X60 shop as well? They probably don't care much and won't add much if anything to the appraised value to the place for their purposes.
 

sberry

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I will agree, there is not much collateral value to this scheme. I built mine hand to mouth and where it really shined was once I got past that point the overhead was so low and so convenient. I could really detail my traffic flow, route it past my utilities, phone, message, snacks, coffee bathrooms, office, sleep all one spot, simple and burn a couple 3 small cfl lamps and switched lighting only where I was using it.

I married, moved into another available unit I had across the street and the shop is not occupied 24/7 but it is still handy, I store some stuff up there don't use the bedroom and only occasionally shower there but its still nice to have my private bathroom when spending time there. I have a downstairs "public bathroom" in office we use when we need to or for women, have the urinal and sink on other side of building that receives about 95% of the business which enables fairly easy maintenance of the floor bathroom.

A super big decision is the floor plan door locations. I see many owners expressing ideas to a contractor that wants to agree with them that doors are everything imo. We drew a traffic flow on a plan view. For the most part with modern construction I am still amazed people put the doors in the sides of many buildings that there is no need for. In any kind of crappy climate doors in front. I see a lot of 2 car garages that should have been 3 wide, 2 doors with walk door in gable end and bench/tool boxes along wall near entrance. My bud built one 30x40, nice enough thing with 2 doors on one end and entrance on other. Besides the fact that the elevation was too low it should have been 36 or 40X40, with stuff along the walls it crowded 2 cars wide to do any work. 40 was fundamentally long enough to have benches tools up front, never did move a noisy azz air comp but I think in hindsight he would have taken a little advice, spent up a pinch especially when he end up working out of it for a number of years.
 

sberry

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Making this kind of building is a real effort and some colateral would likely be in order, property outright. I am a builder so I work for myself for free for 2 yrs, makes a difference. To me this investment means some econemy of scale, come up with enough to make getting a few sq ft practical, its one reason for building this type of unit, cheaper sq ft. You can build it taller cheaper to get things in and for storage.
 
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sberry

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It boils down to intent, is all this worth the effort? In todays world with real estate what it is I would be hard pressed to build, I would go shopping first. I built mine because I had a specialized need with special infrastructure and a great deal of utility, kind of all rolled in to one with the by product no living overhead. If you have to finance anything substantial then the question is the value of the money and effort worth 20 yrs of payments or is it cheaper to rent it.

I went looking at some derelict factory space, even though it could be bought at fire sale they were willing to rent so cheap it wasn't worth messing with, would have ended up way less than buying over 20 yrs easily.
 

Zeke

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Aug 13, 2009
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Long Beach CA, the sewer by the sea.
I knew a guy that did it, built a new commercial automotive shop and to get it through code inspection built his apartment as a mezzanine storage area. After the inspectors left, he converted the mezzanine storage area to an apartment. This was in California, Your results may vary.

We were going to build a garage apartment but could not get a loan for it so we bought a house with a detatched garage instead.

The aversion for loans has been addressed above, but it is a factor and it is real.

Insurance is another factor. Make sure you can get insurance.

Living in a trailer more or less attached to your building makes the most sense as nothing is really permanent. I'm thinking of plumbing and other costs here such as heating/AC which could run as high as a modest trailer.
 
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Tamper84

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Clarington Ohio
Hmmmm I got a lot of thinking to do. Im thinking I might need something quick and cheap lol. Thanks everyone for the tips!!
 

RCStocker

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Indiana, California, Australia
The whole world has been doing it for years. Europe is full of huge animal barns on one end and living quarters up or on the end. They have thatched roofs as well. In all the old US Cities those narrow deep buildings have apartments upstairs. So many places will not let you live above a business. It is nuts. 70 percent of the world does.
 

64dragnwagon

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Sep 3, 2006
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Northeastern Tennessee
Hmmmm I got a lot of thinking to do. Im thinking I might need something quick and cheap lol. Thanks everyone for the tips!!

Building living quarters would be much more expensive than a used travel trailer. As mentioned above it is the utility (plumbing, electrical, heating) that will drive the price way up. Of course living in a travel trailer is not for everyone or at least not for too long.
 

JimL

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Jul 12, 2005
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Indiana
Making this kind of building is a real effort and some colateral would likely be in order, property outright. I am a builder so I work for myself for free for 2 yrs, makes a difference. To me this investment means some econemy of scale, come up with enough to make getting a few sq ft practical, its one reason for building this type of unit, cheaper sq ft. You can build it taller cheaper to get things in and for storage.

I am thinking of building a building with living area upstairs. Going to be a stick frame, saltbox style. Not a "barn". Property is paid for, have been curious if the bank is going to want to loan me money to build. Guessing it may be a bit difficult now...
 
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