A storage shed can be a workshop, a laundry room, a game room, a “get away”, and they even work pretty well for storage!

Sheds and Cabana Plans Garages and workshop plans Sheds and small barn plans

Storage sheds can really help you in your home or work, or your work around your home. Finding that “just right” garden shed will give you some space for storing those materials you need to maintain your lawn and garden, sharpen your tools, and a place to put them when your done.

A storage building can help you to clean out your garage by providing a space to place all those things that are standing between you and your indoor parking.

If you plan on making any home or landscape improvements, your first improvement should be a building to keep tools and materials safe, and provide the work space you know you will need. We can help you find the building you need! If you want to build your own, just click on the item bellow that interests you the most:

Sheds and Cabanas

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Space Junk?

What some say was a meteorite seen crossing the skies in Texas a few days ago, may have been space junk! The people in charge of keeping such things regulated say that it was a meteor about the size of a pickup truck. What ever type of space junk it was, whether man made, or a chip off the old solar system, it made a spectacle in broad daylight.

Why am I even bringing it up?

Well, just to say, that too much junk is a problem, even in space!

If you need some help getting the junk in your space under control, we can help! we have lots of informative articles on choosing and using your storage space, including information on finding the right building, how to buy the right storage building, what you need to know about placing your utility building, and packing, for your storage shed, right here in one place. So, have a look around, and enjoy your stay!

And, oh yeah, watch out for falling debris!

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How To Buy Storage Buildings

In today’s economic climate, everyone wants to get the best bang for their buck. Renting storage space in a public storage facility is not going to provide that bang! Money spent on renting storage space is money you will never see again, and you have nothing to look forward to but more rent, and nothing to show for it in the end. If you have reached that point in your thinking, it is time to use that mental energy on deciding what size and type of building you need to buy, where to buy it, where to place it, and how to finance it. The following information will help you through the process.

The purpose of your storage building

Decide exactly what the purpose of the building will be. Will it be a workshop, an office, a play room, or just used for storage? Will it serve multiple purposes? Knowing what your long term plans are will help with the decisions you will need to make throughout the selection process.

The size of your storage building

Decide how much space you will need in order to reach your goal. If your goal is to store a certain number of boxes for a certain amount of time, and then use the building for a tool shed, you should figure the number of cubic feet of space you will need, and base your decision on that figure. Remember to add aisle space into the equation so that you can get from front to back.  A note to the wise, always add 10 to 20 percent, you will be glad you did.

If your goal is long term storage, of course, the same things apply about the number of cubic feet. If your goal is to have a workshop, the number and type of tools and equipment, and the space to safely use them should be considered. Again, adding 10 to 20 percent for expansion is a good idea. I have never known anyone to say, I wish I had gotten less space!

The placement of your storage building

Decide where you want to place your building. If you already know the size you need, available placement space may help you to determine the buildings configuration. What I mean is this: If you have decided that you need 200 square feet of floor space, but a 10 x 20 building is too long for the space you have available, perhaps a 14 x 16 building would fit into the available space more readily.  There is always a solution. Have the building placed in a position so that it will not interfere with normal lawn maintenance activities. You will want to give some thought to how this new addition to your lawn will effect, and be effected by your irrigation system, and make the needed adjustments. You wouldn’t want your building placed on top of your irrigation heads. This should not be a major problem if the building can be placed between the irrigation rows. The heads adjacent to the building can be adjusted to compensate for the new addition after the building is in place.

Accessories for your storage building

Decide what extras you will need. This is a function of the buildings purpose. Do you need to add a workbench to the building? If you plan to work in the building during the heat of summer, or the cold of winter will you need insulation to moderate the temperature? How about ventilation, or a cutout for an air conditioning unit? Will you need extra space above floor level such as a loft? How about extra shelves? Planning on storing and maintaining power mowers or all terrain vehicles, you might need a roll up door, and a ramp. Tailor these things to suit your needs, and you will be able to make a better decision.

Your storage building type

Decide the type of building you will need. This is also a function of the purpose of the building. If your goal is a small tea room for your Japanese garden, you might want to get a small wooden structure that will weather naturally. For almost all other applications, the more weather resistant the materials, the better.

Storage building materials

Composite shingled roofs look great, for a while, but they will need to be replaced regularly over the years. The same is true of wood siding. Steel clad buildings seem to weather more gracefully, and as a result, stay functional for a longer period of time.

When choosing a building the longevity should be taken into account as a part of the value. Maintenance costs should also be considered. If the building is going to last half as long, before needing to be replaced, and during that short life, add to the over all cost per year by $500.00, the value has decreased. If that cheap wooden structure with the shingled roof you picked up for $1500.00 dollars costs you $500.00 per year to maintain, and only lasts for a quarter of the time that the $3000.00 building, your bargain is not really a bargain. Materials matter!

Shopping for your storage building electronically

Go shopping. You don’t have to climb into the car and drive all over town to start this. You can do it from the comfort of your own home. Search the Internet for buildings like the one you know you will need. Search locally by adding the name of your location. For instance, if you live in a town known as “Example”, search for “storage buildings Example My State”. Don’t add commas between the words. that will cause the search engine to serve up results for storage buildings, and results for Example, and results for My State, all separately. Look through the results of your search. There should be at least some results for businesses close to your area. click on the results, and see if they have what you are looking for. Continue to click on the results until you have the results you are looking for, even if it takes several pages of results to find what you need. Collect the phone numbers and addresses of the most promising dealers. If at first you don’t succeed, try a different search for a different group of words.

There is also the good old fashioned phone book. Use it to find local dealers, and call about details. You are already armed with the facts about what you need!

Shopping for your storage building in person

Now, hop in the car, and take a look at the buildings that you have discovered. There is a good chance that exactly what you are looking for, is setting somewhere on a local lot! If it is not, many dealers can have one custom made for you in short order. In most cases, you will not be charged much, if any, above what the
building would cost if it were already setting on a lot.

What if they don’t have the building I need?

Even if the building you need is not on a lot, one can be built to your specifications. Most dealers and suppliers will be happy to do this for you. They will have some questions, which you will already know the answers to. Tell them what you need, and they will probably go to a book which will start with a basic building in the size that you are looking for. Then they will start to add the accessories that you need. Just about anything you might want should be available, from ramps, to extra blocking, work benches, peg boards, shelves, lofts, insulation, extra windows, roll up doors, or standard doors should be available. Add the ones you want in whatever combination you desire, and you should be in business.

Financing your storage building

There are several options where financing your building is concerned. There is of course, cash. There is bank financing, either the financing that you work out, or the financing processed through the company you are dealing with through another financial institution. There is the option to rent to own offered by some companies, and even a few other options that vary a lot throughout the industry.

Rent to own

Rent to own is a viable option for those who want to own a building without all the hassles of regular financing. Rent to own payments are usually pretty close to the amount you would pay for an equivalent amount of space in a public storage facility, the major differences being that with rent to own, you will own the building, and you won’t have to take trips across town to get to your stored goodies, both of which save you money.

How to buy a storage building How to use a storage building. How to maintain a storage building Where to buy storage buildings

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Out with the old, in with the new!

Okay, we all know that we need to make a few resolutions for the coming new year. The birth of a new year is always a great time to make plans for getting our lives organized for the coming year. Isn’t it time to get all the clutter around your home organized? We have an idea that will help!

Get yourself a storage building, and read the rest of this blog. The storage shed will give you a place to organize your things, and this blog will give you tips on how to do it. Before you know it, you will have a clean, well organized home, with plenty of room for day to day living!

It’s not that hard, and not that expensive, and you will wonder why you didn’t do it last year!

Also read these articles for more information you can use.

Storage Buildings And Carports In East Texas Where To Buy

Storage Tips

Packing For Storage

Storing Tools And Appliances

You can also get some great tips at  Shed Advice

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If you have been busy trying to untangle Christmas lights from the last year after they were put away in haste, and piled into a closet or a corner, and are now digging out the tree, and all those lawn ornaments, and all the garland, tinsel, stars, angels, and everything that makes up interior and exterior Christmas decoration, then you already know you could use some extra storage space.

Well, just make your mind up to do it, and go out and get a portable storage building before the holiday is over, so that you can relieve the stress of the disassembly process after Christmas. Imagine having a place for everything, and everything in it’s place, so that next years decorating will be less of a hassle.

A little planning now, and you will avoid a world of frustration and angst next time.

Try this:

When you have your building in place, install a few hangers on one wall. While you are at the hardware store, pick up some of those cheap extension cord rollers to coil your strands of lights around, and then hang the lights and rollers on the hangers when you are done. You can do the same with the garland and tinsel.

Buy yourself, or someone you love, or maybe even Santa a storage building for Christmas!

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Storage buildings Rent to own

Financial uncertainty is a fact of life in today’s economy, and unlike the perfect world sometimes offered by on screen entertainment, most people do not have perfect credit. There are a lot of reasons why, some may be the result of difficult economic conditions, and some may even be of our own making. Everyone makes a mistake or 2 in life, and that doesn’t mean that we should be ground into fiscal dust. In a perfect world, we wouldn’t have credit rating problems, but in a perfect world, we wouldn’t need credit to begin with. The world is not perfect.

Storage building financing

So, what can we do when the need arises for a fairly large purchase, and our creditors say no? We could always save our money until we have enough cash to purchase the product, but it takes a while to save a few thousand, and time can be our enemy, especially if we need the product for the purpose of making and saving money.

There are always options like loan companies, who can eat your financial lunch when it comes to interest, and you have to be careful when it comes to the way the interest is structured. In some cases,  the interest may be as costly as the purchase, and there may be no way of paying it down ahead of time, and no route of escape if something goes wrong. Similar problems may exist with credit card purchases.

Storage buildings rent to own options

There is another option. Rent to own. In the rent to own system, you are paying for rent and ownership. You are not paying interest.

If you are paying 75.00, 100.00 or more per month for storage, you can find an equivalent amount of storage space in a portable storage unit, and rent to own for about the same price. The big advantage is that you will be paying for something that will belong to you, and you won’t be throwing those dollars away! Throwing away dollars makes no sense! Neither does driving all over the country to get something that you need from storage, when you can just walk into your back yard to do the same thing.

There may be other advantages to storage building rent to own programs. If you use your home as a base for your business, and if you use your storage building as a place for storing building supplies, an office, or a business work shop, you may be able to write off the cost of the rent as a business expense. When it comes to storage buildings, rent to own can make a lot of sense for the home business.

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Do you have a Santa in your home? I am willing to bet that you do! Some Santas make toys for Christmas, some build furniture, and some spend countless hours this season putting together the things that go under the tree for Christmas morning. Either way, your Joly Old Elf needs a place to work.

Your Saint Nick probably also needs a shop to keep his tools safe, and to perform normal maintenance and repair work, some extra storage space for your Christmas decorations, and other items as well.

We have a solution!

Buy your Santa a workshop for Christmas! A portable utility building or storage building will make your Santa a very happy elf!

It is a great idea on many levels. It adds value to your home, provides a place for storage for tools, for boxes, and other items, a place for small work and craft projects, and you don’t have to drive anywhere to access your stored decorations every year, or clog up your garage with wreaths and tinsel!

To buy your Santa a work shop in the East Texas area, call 903.504.3938.

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The summer heat and humidity can be brutal here in East Texas and while it may not be as cold here in the winter as it is in some parts of the world, the humidity during our winters can make it miserable. If you are going to use an outbuilding, or a utility building as a workshop in East Texas, there are a few options you should consider.

Ventilation:

Most builders offer the option of vents in the highest ends of their buildings, and the cost is minimal. Because heat rises, much of the accumulating heat will pass out through such vents, and that can mean the difference between pleasant working conditions and heat stroke in July and August in the Texas sun. Unfortunately, vents won’t help in the winter, but they can be easily covered to prevent them from doing any harm when the mercury drops.

Insulation:

When the summer sun bares down on sheet metal on a hot Texas evening, conditions inside a metal structure can become like an oven, and can be unbearable. Insulation can make a major difference,  Just insulating the roof can provide a lot of relief, insulating both the walls and the roof can mean the difference between being able to stay on task, or having to head to the nearest water hole. Insulation can make a big difference in our workshop’s winter conditions as well.

Air Conditioning Cutouts:

AC cutouts are available from most manufacturers for a small fee. If you don’t feel up to sweltering in the heat of a 104 degree day, and want to work in luxury and comfort, this option may be for you.

Whatever the weather conditions in your neck of the woods, your manufacturer or supplier has got an option that will help to meet your needs, ask them about these when you make your next purchase.

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In East Texas. there is a joke, that if you don’t like the weather, just wait a minute… Your storage building will be exposed to extremes in in weather condition, and if you are going to use it as a shop, added insulation and ventilation may be needed. To prevent the unpredictable Texas wind from relocating your building for you, some extra anchoring might be in order if your building will be in a highly exposed area such as a bare hill, or a large open area. Talk to your suppliers about these options.

Most builders and suppliers also offer a number of entry options, such as door types and sizes, and window types and sizes. When looking at any storage building for long term use, you should consider such things as: What purpose will the building serve in the long haul? If the building is to be used for storage, will all the items you will want to store fit easily through the door? If the buildings current use is no longer a concern, what other ways can the building be utilized?

To figure the amount of storage space available, you can multiply the length of the inside of the building by the width. If you have a 10X10 building, with 8′ high walls, then you would have roughly 800 cubic feet of storage area. The frame will consume part of the space. If you wish to gain access to items in the back and to the side, you would need to make an aisle, and subtract the cubic footage of the aisle from the overall measurement.

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In times of economic downturn people sometimes have to make sacrifices. It is a fact of life, sad but true. Some folks are having to down size from the home of their dreams, to a smaller home, until the economy stabilizes. In such situations, the question often becomes: “What do we do with all the furnishings, memorabilia, scrap books, boxes of family photos, and old family records?”

Smaller homes have less space for storage, and then you are left with more things to store than you have space for. You could go out to your local self storage place and rent a room from them, but that means that you are paying someone else to let you put your things in their building. Wouldn’t it make more sense to buy a portable storage building of your own, and pay yourself instead?

Another way that buying a storage building can save you money is in fuel cost. If you rent from a self storage complex, you will have to drive back and forth to get the items you need. That can mount up to a substantial cost in fuel.

Savings in fuel costs, and savings in rent cost will quickly cover the cost of buying a building, plus, when it is all said and done, you will own the building, which will give you something to move with you when the financial crunch is over, which will add more value to your property.

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