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Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

imkylelambert.com

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Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#121

Post by kslambert »

sailfast wrote: post #6

Looks like a great setup! $20K still seems like a lot to get some mosquito bites walking through the yard to work. Lack of plumbing, coffee, etc (some of those are fixable of course) is a bit of a turnoff but perhaps the walk is part of the charm. I find that with kids mostly in school and knowing the rules the exterior space isn’t a requirement, but I don’t have a ton of meetings these days so YMMV. Mostly this is c…

Author here. I have heard this complaint from others before. If you live in an area where it snows I am assuming this would be a pain. But a 20 foot walk to my house is not a trek. If I was in an office the bathroom and coffee would be farther away. Honestly I like the outside part of the trek, it is a nice change.

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#122

Post by porphyra »

titanomachy wrote: post #44

Thanks for taking the time to make this detailed write-up! You got a beautiful result, and I appreciate the spirit of sharing what you learned and helping people who are considering similar projects. I'm glad you measured CO2. I've recently noticed I tend to get headaches when working or sleeping in small poorly-ventilated spaces, and I'm surprised how often I encounter new structures without ventilation. I guess tig…

Mini split + ductless ERV [1] would probably be cost efficient and effective for this home office. No need to get a full ducted hvac setup.

[1] e.g. https://www.pioneerminisplit.com/products/pioneer-ecoasis-50...

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#123

Post by tomjakubowski »

ryandrake wrote: post #3

For work-from-home, I can't emphasize enough how much of a game changer it is to have a physically separate building for your work, especially if you have a family with kids and noise and pets and things. Working from a spare bedroom, even one without a bed / outfitted as an office, is just not my thing. Even if your family "knows the rules" and let you work in peace. It subjectively still "feels like you're home". W…

Head to the shed:

https://www.idler.co.uk/article/sheds-in-the-time-of-lockdow...

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#124

Post by rdiddly »

benoau wrote: post #90
ryandrake wrote: post #3

For work-from-home, I can't emphasize enough how much of a game changer it is to have a physically separate building for your work, especially if you have a family with kids and noise and pets and things. Working from a spare bedroom, even one without a bed / outfitted as an office, is just not my thing. Even if your family "knows the rules" and let you work in peace. It subjectively still "feels like you're home". W…

Yeah the worst thing about working from within your house... bathroom, coffee, anything at all that necessitates going out of the room entails a major context switch for the most inane reasons and conversations.

I agree with that, but I often wonder whether maintaining a separation for longer periods just leads to a bigger backlog of these topics building up and making it worse when it does happen.

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#125

Post by linsomniac »

marssaxman wrote: post #101
ryandrake wrote: post #3

For work-from-home, I can't emphasize enough how much of a game changer it is to have a physically separate building for your work, especially if you have a family with kids and noise and pets and things. Working from a spare bedroom, even one without a bed / outfitted as an office, is just not my thing. Even if your family "knows the rules" and let you work in peace. It subjectively still "feels like you're home". W…

If what you want is an office you can go to which is not in your home, it seems like it would be ever so much simpler to go live near your actual office, which your employer already pays for, than to move far enough away from everything that you can afford to buy a piece of property, build an office on it, and then have to deal with all the extra driving a remote lifestyle implies. In my opinion it's commuting to the…

>live near your actual office, which your employer already pays for,

I've been in the game for almost 40 years now, and I'll say I've never had an office paid for by my employer that is as nice as that toughshed. I've never been in a dedicated office with a door, except when working from home.

Edit: ProTip: If you are doing concrete, rent a "Mud Mixer". Me an the kids were able to pour the 8x12x5" (130 bags of 80lbs) in well under a day, probably would have been even less if we had moved the bagged concrete to the pour site before the pour happened rather than as we were pouring.

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#127

Post by ryandrake »

jryan49 wrote: post #113
benoau wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the worst thing about working from within your house... bathroom, coffee, anything at all that necessitates going out of the room entails a major context switch for the most inane reasons and conversations.

In this case they'd still have to go inside to go to the bathroom. :/

I've got a bathroom in my out-building office, too, and a small kitchen with a sink, coffee maker, toaster, fridge, and so on. The limit is money to spend and land area to build on :)

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#128

Post by kslambert »

Author here. Thanks for the comments everyone!

There are many comments on the price point. I would like to comment on one thing.

"$20k is too much"

I agree $20k is an investment. Could I have done it for cheaper? Absolutely. Would a DIY shell been cheaper? Would doing more of the work myself have been cheaper? Could I have saved by putting in the smaller stock windows and not having a skylight? Of course!

But I am a dad with a young kid, he was 1 when I built the office. I didn't want to spend my limited free time on this project. There was a trade-off between paying for labor and the time it would take to do it myself. At this point in my life I always look at these decisions through a lens of: is the cost savings worth my time. In this case I valued my time more than the cost savings. I was lucky enough to be in a situation where I would rather spend money for someone else to build this then spending my nights and weekends on this project.

I am almost 4 years in I would have paid over $20k for a co-working space. We were able to stay in our smaller house with a ridiculously low mortgage rate. We made the right choice for us.

Cheap is relative. Sometimes your time is worth more. There are litteraly entire companies built on this premise, cough DoorDash

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#129

Post by skarz »

jryan49 wrote: post #113
benoau wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the worst thing about working from within your house... bathroom, coffee, anything at all that necessitates going out of the room entails a major context switch for the most inane reasons and conversations.

In this case they'd still have to go inside to go to the bathroom. :/

to be honest, having to walk inside to use the bathroom or refill your cup of coffee seems like a nice way to stand up and get the blood flowing again + breathe some fresh air.

Re: Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown

#130

Post by dearilos »

Building a home office in your backyard is really hard. It's a good idea (though expensive) to go with a pre-built if you don't wanna figure all the details out. If you DIY the design and build, you have to figure out:

- What type of floor? (2x4? 2x6? will it hold me and my chair without collapsing?)

- What roof type? How big should the overhang be? What's easier to build yourself vs looks nicer but a real pain to build?

- How many windows should be in my office?

- How do I build something within my budget?

- What size of shed should I go with for my purpose? (workshop? office?)

I'm working on https://myhomecat.com - which lets you do all of this. If you enter your address and the kind of shed you want (i.e. 10x12 office), you should be able to get something fully code-compliant that figures out all of your details. It's still early so it doesn't cover every edge case, but the idea is there and it works really well from the feedback I've gotten.

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