Barndominium/Shop or "real" House?

[LouNY]

Last week was kind of a miserable week for working outdoors, temps down into the low teens and windy, then it "warmed" up to the 30's and low 40's with rain and wind.

 

[WinterDeere]

Last week was kind of a miserable week for working outdoors, temps down into the low teens and windy, then it "warmed" up to the 30's and low 40's with rain and wind.

Yeah, we had a brutal early December, here. Several mornings of single digits, with afternoons in teens and twenties, with many of those days too windy. I was trying to do wiring on a trailer, and it’s real hard to keep fingers working on tiny splices and crimps at those temperatures, let alone make heat-shrink tubing shrink or solder a splice.

 

[ETD66SS]

Yeah, we had a brutal early December, here. Several mornings of single digits, with afternoons in teens and twenties, with many of those days too windy. I was trying to do wiring on a trailer, and it’s real hard to keep fingers working on tiny splices and crimps at those temperatures, let alone make heat-shrink tubing shrink or solder a splice.

I am really looking forward to my heated concrete floors in my shop after 30+ years of working on vehicles and equipment in the cold.

 

[WinterDeere]

I have 5 garage bays here at the house and a 6th much larger at a rental, and my shop is both heated and air-conditioned, so I get to do most vehicular work indoors in heated (or cooled) comfort. But this trailer is too big to fit in any of those here at the house, with any sort of ease.

I will admit to one big mistake, tho. My shop has two heated bays that are only 20 feet deep, since it's built into a standard 18th-century carriage barn, which were pretty much always 20 feet deep. I should have put more effort into expanding the footprint of the structure in a way that gave me deeper bays, when I electrified, insulated, and re-sided the building. I was having trouble envisioning an easy way to do that without violating property setbacks or really blowing the project up bigger than I'd budgeted. But as is often the case, a plan to have done so became apparent to me after the project was completed. Doh!

I have two 25 foot deep bays attached to the house, but my tools are 150 feet away in the carriage barn, so not real practical for working on things.

 

[pmsmechanic]

I have two 25 foot deep bays attached to the house, but my tools are 150 feet away in the carriage barn, so not real practical for working on things.

It wouldn't take me long to have 2 sets of basic tools.

 

[WinterDeere]

It wouldn't take me long to have 2 sets of basic tools.

Attached garage is for cars, kids bikes, sports equipment, and refrigerators and freezer. I'm happy enough having all my tools in the detached shop.

At some point, despite having spent a fortune on building out that old carriage barn, I might very well blow up the whole thing and start over with a larger footprint. I'm currently paying to rent a very large garage bay to store a few boats, and it would be very nice to make space to bring them home, in addition to making more space for working on larger vehicles indoors.

 

[ETD66SS]

I finally finished putting up all the pex tubing under the subfloor.

I have all the tubing running to the area under the stairwell, still need to clean that up when I figure out how I am mounting the manifolds. For now I left all the pex tubing extra long.

For the under fridge area, I insulated the pex from the sub-floor so I'm not over-taxing the fridge when heating the floor.

Issue I am having now that maybe some of you can help with is distance between the opposing countertop and the range island. My current layout has about 44" between them:

Right now the range is backed up all the way to the gas line to get that 44", I may consider moving the gas line about 6" to get me more room because when I stand in my mockup, the range feels too close to the fridge. Plumber says jogging that over 6" is not a problem.

Here is a mock up picture of the spacing, the cardboard box represents the fridge location.

I'm reading that a comfortable galley kitchen spacing is 42", so I am 2" over that. Some people prefer 48".

 

[Carl_NH]

48" is not too much - we have 72" between the Fridge to sink and stove side. Two can work in the kitchen and not trip over each other.

Overall it's looking good!

 

[civilian]

How many are working in the kitchen at a time? Can two appliance doors be opened at the same time and provide work/walk space between them? Our kitchen works great with one person. When the kids come home, two people in the kitchen is tight but doable. Jon

 

[WM75Guy]

We went with 42" for our aisles. The appliances open to an aisle. We moved the dishwasher over and put a cabinet between it and the sink so it lines up with the aisle. On the other side of the sink is a trash cabinet that slides out. Two people can pass in the aisles fairly easily.

 

[ETD66SS]

We went with 42" for our aisles. The appliances open to an aisle. We moved the dishwasher over and put a cabinet between it and the sink so it lines up with the aisle. On the other side of the sink is a trash cabinet that slides out. Two people can pass in the aisles fairly easily.

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Thanks for the info, it helps.

I don't have a lot of room, this kitchen is for one person. However, I grew up in a home with a giant kitchen with no island. Also, the house I owned had an open kitchen as well, so never had to deal with isleways.

 

[ETD66SS]

How many are working in the kitchen at a time? Can two appliance doors be opened at the same time and provide work/walk space between them? Our kitchen works great with one person. When the kids come home, two people in the kitchen is tight but doable. Jon

It's planned for one person, but I don't want it to be too tight.

 

[vanskills]

I actually just emailed the town assessor to try and get them to pre-assess based on the plans. I have very high property and school taxes in my area. For the ICF design, I am expecting about ~$12,000 per year in taxes (for a 1243 sq-ft home, which is nuts). I'm hoping the assessor can clue me in on how much less I'd be paying on the Barndominium.

$12,000 a year in taxes???

That’s criminal !

 

[Paystar]

So, been wanting to build at a lot that I have owned for nearly 20 years now. I think I am finally in a position to do so, albeit at the worst time to build... That's my luck.

I have attached my shop/living space design. Talked to various residential and post frame builders. Many of them suggest bookshelf framing the garage and upper living space portion of the structure. Most of them recommend sheathing the garage and living space walls with 7/16" OSB and the living space roof with 5/8" OSB before the steel siding and roofing is installed. One of the builders thinks that's just a waste of money and that the steel provides the anti-racking for wind loads just fine. Thoughts? Will drywall in the living space be subject to more cracking without the sheathing?

The 10 X 12 OH door bay will be for a 2 post asymmetric truck lift. The 14 X 14 sheet roll doors will be in a 48 X 48 area where I'd like to have a 5-7 ton bridge crane someday. Want to go with sheet roll doors to make sure the doors do not interfere with the future shop crane.

The living space is minimal, per the municipality, I cannot go under 900 sq-ft living space, this design ends up at around 990 sq-ft.

I have also attached an ICF design as the "real" house option. Both designs are of my own making, but RA's have looked at both and they will be stamped, which is required in my area.

One of the builders is looking at both of these designs and will be pricing out the builds for me. (For either design I will be helping with labor wherever I can digging my own trenches, etc, but I do have a fulltime job) If they are similar in cost, what would you build? This would be my final residence, so the decision is a life decision...

I really want a shop ASAP because I am almost 50 years old and sick of working on my equipment outside in the weather.

At the same time, a "real" house would be nice as opposed to living in a barn. Not to mention it is an upper story with stairs that I will have to deal with the rest of my life.

If I were to build the ICF house, that puts out my shop probably at least another 5 years.

The ICF house design has a decent garage and will have provisions in the floor for the asymmetric truck lift. So I will have somewhat of a shop to tide me over until I put up a larger structure for working on my equipment. (Not an contractor of any sort, equipment is personal/hobby stuff).

If I had the money to build new again I would go ICF for sure. My friend's house and shop was ICF from ground to roof and it was unreal!
I stayed in his shop a couple winters when I was working in his area. I think it was 40x60? I had my travel trailer in it and every night after work I'd open the big door, bring my freezing cold dump truck inside and park for the night. I'd light and load the wood stove once and never touch it again. it would burn out and even with opening door again to bring truck out, then putting it back in that night, I could still do it in a tee shirt all winter.
In the summer he'd keep his beer on the floor and it was always cold.

 

[Carl_NH]

$12,000 a year in taxes???

That’s criminal !

High real estate taxes are common in the northeast US - and here in NH there is no sales or income tax, and towns set the tax rate based on the assessed evaluation.

Then they reassess every 5 years, so almost guarantees a tax increase of $500 per year. In 30 years it's gone from $3K to $10K but with improvements and additions too.

 

[WinterDeere]

$12,000 a year in taxes???

That’s criminal !

lol... never visit NJ. I knew guys paying close to $30k per year, 20 years ago! I can't even imagine where they are, today.

PA has always been cheap by comparison, we're right around $12k for a relatively large house and property, but it can vary a lot by county.

 

[LouNY]

When the taxes are more then a mortgage would be (should be) you know your getting screwed.

 

[ETD66SS]

Dryer ducting was a project in itself. Designed my own custom oval to round elbow in 3D CAD and had it CNC machined as opposed to using the store bought elbows that are not smooth flow.

Also bought a large radius 45 degree elbow to connect to the custom to make a full 90 degree bend while clearing all the nearby plumbing. This ducting will be encased in the garage ceiling and I don't want to be cutting out drywall at a later date to mess with it.

I backed myself into a corner on this because the 2X6 wall for all this plumbing fell partially on top of a floor truss, so needed the oval to pass by the truss top chord without notching.

I also designed some sheet metal brackets that I am getting laser cut that I will be using to attach the duct to the trusses so I can maintain the correct pitch. Then I'll be wrapping the duct in R6 insulation.

I got approval from the building inspector to start insulation, so once the ducting for both bathrooms is complete, insulating the living space will be the next step, however still waiting on the plumber to come back to finalize the waste venting.

This project is going very slow due to the fact I am rejecting a lot of quotes due to labor costs and doing the work myself. Even if I could afford to just sit back and pay others to do the work, I'm finding that the quality of the work I have paid for just isn't there...

 

[LouNY]

Looking good, quite the snazzy dryer venting.

 

[dkmc]

Dryer ducting was a project in itself. Designed my own custom oval to round elbow in 3D CAD and had it CNC machined as opposed to using the store bought elbows that are not smooth flow.

I also designed some sheet metal brackets that I am getting laser cut that I will be using to attach the duct to the trusses so I can maintain the correct pitch. Then I'll be wrapping the duct in R6 insulation.

Man is that overkill! I love it!!