Building a storage shed

Oburis; that’s correct….but there are a couple points I’d like to talk about. Yes, the posts are set in the ground, on a concrete pad. They should never, ever be backfilled with concrete (the lime in concrete reacts with both ACQ and CCA checmials). For residential buildings (e.g., what the O.P. is talking about), commerical, and longevity, there are special sleeves that go over the bottoms of the posts, so they actually are never in contact with the ground. Further, there are (I’ve only used them a couple times), special posts that have concrete bases (think of this; the first 5′ of the post is concrete, rather than wood), and built-up posts that have either concrete or pressure treated wood at the bottom, and through finger-jointing, have regular lumber above grade.

“Pole” barns have come a long, long, long way in the past 15 years that I was building. Second, most that I worked on had either steel siding, or OSB and vinyl, or T111. But we worked on more and more at the end of my time that had brick or slate on the outside, or one of the newer ‘manufactured’ brick-style sidings.

The idea behind all this is simple; you can enclose a good size rectangular area (for the most part), for very little money, then finish off the interior. A rough 24×48′ building with siding, windows, roofing, and concrete was 20K. That’s less than $20 a square foot for the structure; with no interior.

A typical building would work like this; Build the shell, bring in the sand and put in radiant heat for the back half (24×24), or not, pour the slab; build up walls at the half-way point, then interior walls. The floor would generally be raised with sleepers and insulation, the truss area would be literally loaded with cellulose, and for the walls, you have 8″ or more for insulation. You can heat them with a candle almost.

For our customers and for thousands of others; what’s not to like? You get two buildings in one; the front half is basically storage/garage, the back half is living. Granted, these buildings are not as aesthetically pleasing as something from This Old House or from Susan Susanka, but heck; a lot of them were coming in at 40-60/sq. ft. FINISHED. What’s not to like about that? There are literally tens of thousands of these buildings out there, and I’d stack up their longevity (when properly constructed), against anything else.

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