Possibly Moving

[Imatk]

So, I live in Texas... it's possible I will be moving. I see all you guys with various shops with lifts (I have a lift as well) but when looking at real estate I see nothing of the kind.

Was wondering where all you folks live that have shops and is there a way to find a listing with such a thing?

Thanks

 

[racecougar]

What area are you looking at? That will have a great effect on whether or not you'll find a property with outbuildings.

I'd venture a guess that the majority of us with larger shops built them on property we already owned.

 

[reader2580]

Some MLS sites have filters for accessory buildings, but a lot of listings with shop/garage buildings don't have that flag set.

When I was looking for a house with a building for my motorhome in 2014 I used a website that had a birds eye view option of the property. I can see if the property had a building from that. I missed out on two houses with nice 40x80 shops because they sold right away. Ultimately, I bought a house without a shop/garage. It was not until 2023 that I was able to start construction on my garage.

 

[ned911]

I'm in Austin and in the process of selling and finding a new place. Always check the map/satellite view for outbuildings and/or enough flat space to build. My current place was purchased with the intention of adding a 40x60 garage/shop but life changes make that no longer feasible.

Are you just relocating in Texas or out?

 

[firebirdparts]

The only thing I ever heard of is carproperty.com and it's not really very successful. Probably costs too much to list but you check me on that.

People do advertise homes in places where people look for collector cars. You can list a house in Hemmings.

....

 

[mike93lx]

I'd finding a property with a building a priority over location?

Most people start with an area then look for what's listed. Lots of services available to send you alerts based on that. Zillow, redfin, realtors

 

[WisJim]

My wife likes looking at houses in a couple of areas (near family) and I also have searches on Realtor.com and Zillow so we look at LOTS of houses that are listed. Very seldom do they say much about the garages, and even less often do they show pics of the garage interiors. In hundreds (maybe thousands) of listing over the last decade, I've only seen a handful of houses that also had nice garages and only 2 or 3 that I recall that had a lift. I'm not sure why real estate listings don't show more that would appeal to men that do stuff.

 

[mike93lx]

My wife likes looking at houses in a couple of areas (near family) and I also have searches on Realtor.com and Zillow so we look at LOTS of houses that are listed. Very seldom do they say much about the garages, and even less often do they show pics of the garage interiors. In hundreds (maybe thousands) of listing over the last decade, I've only seen a handful of houses that also had nice garages and only 2 or 3 that I recall that had a lift. I'm not sure why real estate listings don't show more that would appeal to men that do stuff.

Garages don't sell houses. Kitchens and bathrooms do

 

[pcmeiners]

Be grateful you can find a property with a decent sized lift capable garage, no lift is a minor issue.

 

[niget2002]

My realtor filtered for houses with shops when we were shopping this last time. We would get a few new listings each week.

We did look at a few houses without shops, but it was because they were cheap for the area and had room to add a shop.

 

[Smilodon]

Part of the problem is that the agents never document the shops because they aren't "attractive" in their way of thinking. To be fair, maybe the owner didn't let them in!

So, you will get 3 angles of a yard ornament, or macro shots of oven knobs, and the multi-thousand square foot building you see on the aerial view is listed as "large garage" or even "out building".

Fortunately, some folks in the biz are a little more savvy and specialize in such stuff (at least in Florida). Considering the demographic and land availability in Texas, I'm surprised there isn't something like that there as well.

 

[reader2580]

I'd finding a property with a building a priority over location?

Most people start with an area then look for what's listed. Lots of services available to send you alerts based on that. Zillow, redfin, realtors

For me, finding an existing garage, or a property where I could build a garage was just as important as location. I was looking basically anywhere in the northern half of the Twin Cities metro area. I spent many hours calling city zoning departments and reading city websites to determine what size garage or accessory building could be built. Most cities either wouldn't allow a 1,000 square foot building, wouldn't allow 16 foot sidewalls, or both. Many only allowed 750 square feet of accessory structures with twelve foot sidewalls. In some cities an attached garage counted against the allowed 750 square feet.

I looked at a house with a pole barn that would have needed expansion, and the house was not great. It was at the top of my price range so I moved on. I also looked at a modular house that had an attached 36x40 garage tall enough for my motor home. I would have had to add onto the garage. I was going to make an offer, but it had sold after being on the market for a long time. The modular home was built with cheap cabinets and fixtures like what you get in most mobile homes. It was definitely modular as they had pictures of the modules being craned into position.

I ultimately bought a house that was in poor condition due to lack of any repairs or maintenance. I got the house cheap and spent $100,000 on new everything inside and out. It was structurally sound even though it had a serious roof leak. The city allowed a 3,000 square foot garage of any height up to 45 feet, and two accessory structures that could be a total of 2,400 square feet and as tall as the house. The house was tall enough to allow me to build with 16 foot sidewalls. I really like that the house was like a new house by the time I was done with the renovations.

 

[Toolfool]

Just purchased a home in Columbus Ohio. I filtered my searches to minimum 1/2 acre lots. When I spotted an interesting home in my price range I'd check the satellite images for outbuildings. If there weren't any I'd find the local zoning office and ask if/what size aux detached building I could build on the property, before even calling my RE agent for further info and a video walk-through. Purchased a 1700sf home on 0.86 acre lot, with potential 1200sf buildable shop. (I have a 1900sf home with a pool, and 2200sf shop and 24x22 shed on almost 3 acres for sale outside Tallahassee, FL)

 

[Imatk]

Thanks for the replies everyone I appreciate it... will get me going.

When we moved in our house my wife actually found the garage... because fortunately someone DID take a picture of it.

22 foot ceilings in a residential neighborhood. We're one of two houses here (ours and our next-door neighbor) that have that kind of height simply because where are houses are located is at the foot of a steep hill so they had to build the houses UP the hill.

By the time you get into my house you're at the roof of my garage.

And I don't agree at all the bathrooms and kitchens sell houses. Yes... they do, but so do other things. Like big garages... we didn't buy our house because of the kitchen or bathrooms

We're thinking about maybe New Mexico, I'm near Austin now.

 

[reader2580]

And I don't agree at all the bathrooms and kitchens sell houses. Yes... they do, but so do other things. Like big garages... we didn't buy our house because of the kitchen or bathrooms

The house I bought the kitchen was missing cabinet doors, and had rotten cabinets plus a bad Pergo floor due to a water leak when the faucet was turned on. The laminate countertop was disintegrating and starting to collapse. The main bathroom was missing most everything because the former owners had torn the stuff out due to a roof leak. The stupid thing is the roof was still leaking! The basement bathroom was absolutely gross. I planned to do a full renovation before I even moved into the house.

I've read a lot about really big garages causing people to not buy a house. I think some people think they are eyesores. I suspect some also think they are paying extra for a huge garage they have no use for.

 

[andyvh1959]

Must be different up here in east central Wisconsin (Green Bay). Many of the real estate listings include details about anything more than a normal 2-car garage. I notice it on many home listings and even my wife mentions it when she looks up a home listing, "check out this extra garage, just right for all your ****!" Up here, an extra detached garage/shop is very common for any homes over $350,000 especially if the location is a bit out of town or rural. Most new homes around here in the 2500 sqft range and near $400K have at least a 3-stall garage. I am just 1.5 mile directly west of Lambeau Field and I have an attached 2-car and a detached 2.5 car garage. Within a 1/4 mile of my house are other homes with extra detached garages.

 

[ericm]

Sometimes a large number of parking spaces in the listing will indicate shop space. Or the word "workshop". Searching for "shop" gets me a lot of places touting nearby shopping.

While I found some places with nice shops there was always something majorly wrong with the house or location or both. If you or a partner is at all particular about those things it may be better to buy a place and build the shop. At least where I was looking in California and Oregon there's not a lot of places with decent sized shops and even fewer where the shop is better than just a metal shell.

 

[PhantomEB]

Definitely look at the lot size, the bigger the lot the more likely it’s got a decent garage on it or potential for one. I happy with my 23x26.

Be grateful you can find a property with a decent sized lift capable garage, no lift is a minor issue.

I would love a lift but having my ‘toy’ be on 42” tires it’s not a must have. Next garage, yes.

 

[Skellyii]

My wife likes looking at houses in a couple of areas (near family) and I also have searches on Realtor.com and Zillow so we look at LOTS of houses that are listed. Very seldom do they say much about the garages, and even less often do they show pics of the garage interiors. In hundreds (maybe thousands) of listing over the last decade, I've only seen a handful of houses that also had nice garages and only 2 or 3 that I recall that had a lift. I'm not sure why real estate listings don't show more that would appeal to men that do stuff.

I started casually looking for a house just before Covid, since my youngest was going to finish high school, and I would have the freedom to move out of the school district, if needed. The search got suspended for awhile, then picked up again in early 2021. I finally found a suitable place in the summer of 2022.

In all that time, I only saw 3 houses in the listings that had lifts, and 2 of 3 specified in the listing that the owner was taking the lift with them. Compared to the cost of the house, it's not that much more expensive to have one installed once you find/build a suitable place. But yeah, even if the garage was nice, there were rarely pictures in the listing.

If you want something specific, a GOOD realtor is your friend. I ran across a lady at an open house who had clients that specified that they would only consider houses with a garage that could comfortably fit their F150 Crew Cab Long bed.

My realtor was a guy that I had worked with before when I was buying rental property. He got access for me to the Pre-MLS listing, so that I could see the house listings BEFORE they hit the market. He also clued me in on the county websites that had the layout and sizes of the house and garage. When he went to the realtor only showings, he would check the height of the garage ceilings, because he knew I wanted to put in a lift.

 

[Skellyii]

My wife likes looking at houses in a couple of areas (near family) and I also have searches on Realtor.com and Zillow so we look at LOTS of houses that are listed. Very seldom do they say much about the garages, and even less often do they show pics of the garage interiors. In hundreds (maybe thousands) of listing over the last decade, I've only seen a handful of houses that also had nice garages and only 2 or 3 that I recall that had a lift. I'm not sure why real estate listings don't show more that would appeal to men that do stuff.

While we're surrounded by men AND women that do stuff here on GJ, in the real world we're vastly outnumbered by those folks who want fancy kitchens and bathrooms, and don't even park their cars in the garage, since it's full of "stuff".

 

[BlakeTheCarGuy]

In my area I’ve found several places like that on Zillow. Probably varies depending on area but it’s where I’ve seen shops/ houses for sale in my area.

 

[Bucko]

The wife and I spent nearly a year searching for a house that fit her wants and had a decent sized shop for me or the price was right that we could build a shop on the property.
The biggest hurdle was one we didn't expect in these times.... HIGH SPEED INTERNET. She works from home alot so it was a must. We would find just the right property and low and behold it would not have high speed internet available.
We finally found a place that fit and had internet.

 

[jives]

Regardless if you need a lift in the garage or the bathroom, the essential feature of any real estate is location. Limiting your search for existing garages with lifts seems, well, limiting. More important would be the right location, right piece of land, right price, and the ability to put in a garage/lift. We chose raw land because we could not find the right house that met our needs and wants, including location. Finally found the right location and price, and it was raw land. Built the house, but the garage did not come until 5 years later.

 

[Pluribus]

Even living in a rural area, there are still some agents who don't understand how to properly describe a shop building in a listing and understate great buildings. Then there are the ones who plug a beauty like this as having 11 official garage spaces...

 

[My Old Tools]

Our last home sold to a couple retiring out of California to Texas. They were looking at the DFW area, but came out to see ours because it had a 4 car garage and a 1200sf nice shop. Almost every house in our neighborhood had a red iron shop building in the backyard. These were newer 4000sf brick and stone homes on 2 acres 30 minutes from downtown Dallas.

 

[dcg9381]

Was wondering where all you folks live that have shops and is there a way to find a listing with such a thing?

Texas MLS, here are some hints:

1) Shop for places with lots that are bigger than 3/4" acre. More space = more likely to have shop
2) You an often keyword search "shop" or "barn"
3) Search for 4+ car garage, I see shops show up that way.

Generally you're looking for places where you can get a big lot. Municipalities can make it difficult to do a shop or accessory building (not all). Might figure out where the "city" boundary is and also seek properties in the county - less restriction, more likely to have these buildings.

 

[NUTTSGT]

Thanks for the replies everyone I appreciate it... will get me going.

When we moved in our house my wife actually found the garage... because fortunately someone DID take a picture of it.

22 foot ceilings in a residential neighborhood. We're one of two houses here (ours and our next-door neighbor) that have that kind of height simply because where are houses are located is at the foot of a steep hill so they had to build the houses UP the hill.

By the time you get into my house you're at the roof of my garage.

And I don't agree at all the bathrooms and kitchens sell houses. Yes... they do, but so do other things. Like big garages... we didn't buy our house because of the kitchen or bathrooms

We're thinking about maybe New Mexico, I'm near Austin now.

Do you have a location in New Mexico you want to live ? How far is it ?

I think I might just consider a two day trip to the area and just drive around looking, visit a few realtors in the area but sign nothing with them.

 

[dura eagle]

I had the same problem when I moved from Kansas. There my main shop was 4800 square foo, I thought I. Could find something like that where I wanted to be, no dice nothing even close to what I wanted.
Seen a couple listed as huge shop 30x50x10’ sidewall’s and it even has electricity!!!

 

[1/4atatime]

It also depends on budget. I live in the country so when I was looking for my first house I found lots of houses with garages but usually they are very big money because someone is selling off a farm. looked for the longest time for starter houses in my area I only saw one come up for sale with a decent garage and there was a major bidding war. I probably only saw 5 in a 6 month span that even had anything close to what I considered a garage. So I threw in the towel and found a house with land for a garage. Then about 2 years later built my own. I don't think I'd do it any other way because now I can make it my own. Also I know in the future that if I ever go and sell the house I'll have a bidding war for it due to the lack of any decent sized garages that aren't on a farm somewhere. My house, my neighbor's house, and a buddy up the road have probably the only 700sqft+ garages in a 15-20mi radius not on a full fledged farm. Also Internet is a huge hurdle to finding something if your like myself and work remotely sometimes.

 

[reader2580]

Seen a couple listed as huge shop 30x50x10’ sidewall’s and it even has electricity!!!

The average person is going to consider a garage that size as huge when it is two to three times larger than a typical garage.

 

[dudley123]

Open up your search filters for Larger lot size+garage+(3+ car parking) and you can find them. Lot size and 4+ car parking was what helped me find mine. (2k sqft house with 1900sqft of Garage/Attached Shop space)

 

[1/4atatime]

The average person is going to consider a garage that size as huge when it is two to three times larger than a typical garage.

Yeah I was going to say I was talking with someone today who said their house has a 3 car garage and I was telling them I had just finished an oversized 2 car that was like 800sqft and they were shocked because their 3 car wasn't even that big. You have to keep in mind most residential garages are being built like 22ft deep so even a 32x22 which would be considered 3 cars is only 704sqft. We are just oversaturated with huge garages on this form we lose sight of what most residential garages actually are.

 

[dcg9381]

It also depends on budget. I live in the country so when I was looking for my first house I found lots of houses with garages but usually they are very big money because someone is selling off a farm.

It's interesting, because if you build a shop, the value add to the property is probably negative against cost to build.. At least that's what my tax assessor says. Course, the "market" dictates reality...

Obviously we're a biased bunch in terms of "desirability" of an existing shop. But I definitely have seen a shop sell the house in an area where shops are unusual.

Different if we're talking 800 sqft garage or 2000-4000 sqft "shop"... 800 sqft to me is a garage.

I'm actively looking for property in Indiana. I can find quite a few places (on acres) with existing barns/shops, but finding one with 14' high doors is proving to be challenging... We'll likely take the "shop" out of the purchase decision and just make sure we have budget to build one. Again.

So I threw in the towel and found a house with land for a garage. Then about 2 years later built my own.

Just be careful that you CAN build you own the way you want to. Lots of places have restrictions that make a steel building impossible. Choose carefully. Seeing existing steel buildings is a "good sign".

Also Internet is a huge hurdle to finding something if your like myself and work remotely sometimes.

That problem has been 100% solved. Starlink.

 

[My Old Tools]

Also, look outside of city limits. Many towns and cities make it hard to impossible to build a real shop, Most Texas counties don't.