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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

#171

Post by dredmorbius »

organsnyder wrote: post #107
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…

We built a new garage with an upstairs ADU when I started working from home in 2018. It is indeed a game-changer, and when we no longer need the space we can use it for a rental, guest house, etc.

ADU: Accessory dwelling unit.

https://singlefamily.fanniemae.com/originating-underwriting/...>

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

#172

Post by MattGrommes »

bellowsgulch wrote: post #156
kslambert wrote: post #128

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…

[flagged]

Beyond the fact that there's absolutely no reason for you to post this, I'm not sure what you're looking at. I'm not a pro but I've been building sheds and things for decades and based on the pictures here I don't see low quality. Maybe I'd put more joists in the roof but Portland doesn't get a ton of snow so I'm sure it's fine. $2k is a fine price for that slab, especially compared to the pain of lifting 80lb bags of concrete yourself all day. People shouldn't be afraid of spending the money on a pro if they've got the money to spend.

Maybe he could have saved a few thousand with different subs (maybe) but your comments are nonsensical. I see tons of janky builds people post on Reddit and this is not one of them. You should spend your commenting time over there.

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

#173

Post by Marsymars »

Jeremy1026 wrote: post #80
5upplied_demand wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buy an umbrella?

Umbrellas are great at keeping your head and shoulders dry, but kind of suck beyond that.

That's like a 5-10 second walk, I can't imagine your legs are going to get all that wet in that timespan.

Like if I'm bringing my bins to the road for pickup, I never bother putting on a jacket or w/e regardless of weather. If it does happen to actually be a torrential downpour, I just switch to a new t-shirt when I'm back inside.

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

#174

Post by Marsymars »

rconti wrote: post #82
jroseattle wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, things in the west tend to cost more than elsewhere (I'm in Seattle WA.) My mother-in-law lives in rural Missouri and had her 6x10 bathroom remodeled in 2025. Full gut replacement of everything. Total cost: $5600. I got a quote for something similar in a bit larger bathroom in our house in Seattle. Quoted price: $31,000. Labor is a good chunk of cost, and the OP presented that he simply didn't have the time ava…

Yep. I'm adding 500sqft to my home in Silicon Valley and the cost will end up being more than I spent to buy the house 12 year ago. Smaller jobs are more expensive per square foot because not all costs scale with size. Which is why you see all these godawful TJ Homes being built where they just rip out the house, build a 3 story structure (including basement) that takes every square inch of the lot.

Not just places like Silicon Valley - my sister lives in rural Canada in an area where costs have exploded since covid, and just paid nearly as much as their original house price (from <10 years ago) to have a nice garage built.

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

#175

Post by zie »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #169
zie wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can put in an awning or covered walkway between the buildings. You can even do a fully enclosed, fully climate controlled hallway with lots of windows and doors out to the yard, etc. Just depends on how much you want to pay and your imagination. I've seen some properties where they build ponds underneath the indoor hallway with glass flooring to see the fish and stuff in the pond. Obviously wild things like that…

>You can even do a fully enclosed, And then lose all the regulatory benefit of whatever shed exemption you're trying to use, get absolutely screwed on regulatory compliance and code whatnot that you're leveraging by having it be a detached outbuilding. And then get sneered at by HN when you say the rules as they apply to your situation are stupid.

you might get screwed on regulatory compliance, it just depends on your local govt and how much they want to screw you.

It's got to suck to do the inspectors job. Having to keep up with whatever the code creators come up with, while also getting abused by every home owner and contractor in the area because they hate X,Y or Z. While trying to dodge political leverage from elected officials trying to get whatever pet mess they want done.

It's not a job I'd want, and I bet they get paid trash to boot.

Code compliance and inspections exist for a reason, and if you are lucky, the current inspector/code compliance dept in your local govt realizes it's to ensure the building doesn't fall down around your ankles when you least expect it and not to screw you over.

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

#177

Post by krn1p4n1c »

veverkap wrote: post #74
krn1p4n1c wrote: post #7

I ran PVC between my house and shop/office with 2 sets of single-mode fiber instead of ethernet. Electrical code will require proper grounding for copper for lightning strikes.

Do you have to do PVC or can you just bury the fiber?

Like /u/someothherguyy said it depends on the cable type. There are shielded and jacketed outdoor cables that don't require PVC/EMT, but usually you'll have to terminate them yourself so there's additional tooling required.

I went with PVC because it's the easiest to work with, NEC only required it be buried 12in below the surface for residential, but I went to 24". I oversized the PVC a bit so I had room to run more cables as well. I filled the trench with gravel, ran the PVC over that, then filled over it with some more gravel. A thin layer of dirt, marking tape and then the rest of the dirt. Rent a trencher if you have hard ground.

If you're having a licensed electrician do the work of connecting house and office power then you can ask them to run the conduit for it at the same time.

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

#178

Post by cucumber3732842 »

zie wrote: post #175
cucumber3732842 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You can even do a fully enclosed, And then lose all the regulatory benefit of whatever shed exemption you're trying to use, get absolutely screwed on regulatory compliance and code whatnot that you're leveraging by having it be a detached outbuilding. And then get sneered at by HN when you say the rules as they apply to your situation are stupid.

you might get screwed on regulatory compliance, it just depends on your local govt and how much they want to screw you. It's got to suck to do the inspectors job. Having to keep up with whatever the code creators come up with, while also getting abused by every home owner and contractor in the area because they hate X,Y or Z. While trying to dodge political leverage from elected officials trying to get whatever pet m…

This is is exactly what I meant by the last sentence.

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

#179

Post by copperx »

bombcar wrote: post #168
copperx wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's smarter (and cheaper!) to live by yourself because your entire house is distraction-free.

I visited a friend's apartment and he was going on and on about how everyone around him seems to be getting exploding dogs, so I think the key is to live by yourself in a house separated from others. But down that path lies a cabin innawoods.

This is correct. There needs to be some outside air in between you and people, not just a wall.

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

#180

Post by jen20 »

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…

> it seems like it would be ever so much simpler to go live near your actual office

This constrains the companies you can work at to ones with a local office, if you do not want to move house. If you want to live within walking distance of many companies, you could easily be looking at paying millions of dollars for a poor quality house.

There is a happy medium if you like offices (see below): co-working spaces.

> it's commuting to the office which sucks, and not working in the office

Most company offices are fucking horrific - open plan, atrocious coffee, noisy, full of people who won’t stay home when they are sick.

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