The expensive part of the house isn’t the shell. These companies prey on people that don’t know that. The shell of a conventional build is cheaper in lumber and vinyl siding than steel.

To make an agricultural shed kit meet residential building codes for a habitable dwelling ends up being more costly than just stick building with standard technology. Not meeting residential building codes for safety and comfort are the only way that it comes out cheaper. Would you really want your family in a cow barn where moisture rains down from the ceiling because of inadequate insulation and air sealing? That’s just one common failing with these structures. HVAC control is another. Concrete floors, if you want them to be durable and attractive, and not look like your stained garage floor, are among the most expensive choices for flooring. Not the cheapest. There are more “gotchas”like that that this trend preys on.

Use your money wisely. Buy existing rather than building. Especially with the market turning. Buying existing is the cheapest path that exists to homeownership. If your”can’t afford“ that, then your wish list is too long. No one ever starts out in their dream home. That’s 5 houses down the road.

Thank you, I'll admit I've read conflicting opinions from contractors of whether or not the shell is the most expensive part of building or if it's the rough-ins or interior finishes. We figured we could skimp on interior finishes as much as possible to finish out later if it meant saving as much money as possible (read: we're desperate to have our own home and make it work!). As far as the concrete floors go we understand they would be ugly, that's something we could live with for 8-12 mo until we could install flooring from scratch.

Thanks alot for the advice, not that I'm totally giving up the idea yet! Well, at least until I start to see existing prices come down (fingers crossed, it would at least be a silver lining to all this awful COVID-19 stuff).

I would recommend using your and your husband's DIY abilities on a regular, stickbuilt fixerupper. Worst case, you have a liveable house from Day 1, even if it's too small and unattractive. They you fix it up and expand it as your finances permit.

Contractor "opinions" on whether the shell is more or less expensive than the finishes can be so vague as to be useless. You can start by doing real, fact-based estimates of your own - using a complete list of all the materials, purchased finish items, labor, permits, engineering, overruns, unpleasant surprises, insurance, surveying, and planning and management you would need for either the stickbuilt fixerupper or the metal shed. Use local rates and real pricing. Sure, this is a lot of homework I am assigning you (ha), but it is only 0.1% of the work you are contemplating for yourself, and some of the best prework you could do.

Your spreadsheet should have at least 500 specific line items. Complete that, then come back here and we can talk some more. Yes, it will be hard to figure out what the 500 line items are and how much they cost.

The other issue is bank financing for a build. Self builds are difficult enough to finance without trying for something half built as the “final” result, so that you can save money. That’s not how bank loans work. You’re contracting with the bank to build something that they could resell if you default. They don’t want to deal with something half built as the result. It wouldn’t appraise high enough for the loan that you need.

If you hope that your build stays under 200K for costs, that means you need at least 50K or more cash to start. You’ve got your 500 line spreadsheet budget down. 200K of land and building. You’ve got 40K saved for the down payment. Your bank does an as built appraisal on your plans, and your fancy barn will only appraise for potential resale at 150K. Not 200K.

They aren’t going to loan you more than they could resell the house for. Which is why you can’t build something half done. They’ll only loan you 80% of the appraised finished resale cost. 120K. Where does the other 40K come from? Your parents? Your 401K? So you start cutting out stuff. There goes the powder room, and the 3rd garage bay, and the fireplace. But, because you cut all that stuff, it won’t meet even the 150K as built appraisal. It’s a less valuable house as a result of the cuts. It only appraises for 120K now. You’re in a bigger hole than where you started, needing even more cash.

So, plan an aggressive savings plan for building. For the future. In the mean time, buy small and ugly. In a decent but not the best neighborhood. Look at specialty programs like HUD owned houses. Make that small and ugly into pretty and larger by finishing out the attic, or garage. Start homeownership on the bottom rung.

If you're willing to stick to a rectangular, gable-roof house, I think you'll save money going with conventional wood framing. The shell could be built in a week for what you'd pay for materials only for a metal building. You'd also have a much easier time meeting codes for insulation and air tightness, in addition to using doors, windows, etc. suited for traditional construction. Good luck on your build!

You've got to think about what you'll have when you're done. You may love it, but trying to get someone else to pay for an unusual design/construction when you go to sell may be problematic.

I've been in some geodesic homes here in Florida. Hurricane proof, but ugly as sin, inside and out. Those folks are never getting their money out.

If you're starting out, you buy the worst house that has good bones in the best neighborhood you can afford. You fix it up and then when the market is good, you sell and use the profit to buy up.

If you're okay with the shape of a metal building, just stick frame the house. Don't try to back into a barndominium.

You have a lot of resources that'll make a diy build without a GC a big savings over buying new. And you get what you want. You need to start working on spec'ing the component costs of every part of the build. A lot of work. It can lead to major savings if you put the time in and have good size diy segments between you and family/friends. It can be done. We registered a company to get a sales tax license.

These guys have metal building info-

We are building our home this way (out in the country with no residential codes etc.). We already have one metal building we use as a venue, storage, and garage. It has worked excellently and has held up beautifully to Texas' mood swings. I would certainly encourage you to do plenty of research and hire professionals when you are not confidant in your own skill. We are blessed to have many professionals in the family to assist us. I wish you well.

So much depends on the location especially the real estate market, cost of construction, availability of land and climate. That's where this discussion should begin rather than the kind of structure.

Since the cost of financing and resale value is critical, a steel building might be the worst choice possible.

“We are building our home this way (out in the country with no residential codes etc.).”

Bragging about not meeting building codes is also the worst possible approach to building anything. Codes are merely the absolute lowest level bar for building a comfortable and safe home. Most people want to build better than code if they can. And not punish their families with the lowest common denominator uncomfortable and unsafe scofflaw cow shed.

I'm not aware of the OP bragging about not meeting building codes. Was a comment deleted?

RES2: anyone with any sense can tell it's planned to be a "SCOFFLAW COW SHED".

THE END

P.S. Now it's the name of my new band.

I think it helps old posts last longer.

Leslie, they're pros..... and apparently have no clients (hmmm, wonder why?), so spend their days spreading "taste" and nasty to the unclean. You might have noticed the dwindling of posts here.

Wow! a bunch of people commenting and have no experience building a metal home house. Well I do. I did my home work and built a really nice house out of metal building Granted codes are little more lax where I built but my code enforcement guy actually helped more than he hindered me. The wind codes are rated far higher for metal buildings than stick houses, so that was a plus living in Florida I dont have and exact number but I built for appox. half the cost conventional house The biggest factor for me was I built out of pocket ( No Mortgage) and length of time wasn't an issue

Good luck with baking in a tin can oven in the FL heat if you ignored code required better residential windows and insulation. Plus all the condensation and mold issues.

Definitely can, and honestly I think steel buildings are way more cost effective than wooden ones.

"Definitely can"

There's a joke in there.