Shipping Container Housing

[DrakeMaiden]

If I were buying a piece of land with minimal improvements and no existing house, I would want an ecopod ! This is just a shipping container that has been modified for living and has some solar power capablities. Not sure how well the solar would work in my area, but I still like the idea. If your plan was to build a house, you could use it for storing food, after you lived there temporarily, while your house was being built.

There are people building houses with shipping containers. They use them mostly as the framing of the house and modify them however they like (to look more traditional or more modern). The containers are very sturdy and can withstand strong winds and supposedly flooding.

 

[big brown horse]

Now that is cool... Perfect size for me.

 

[DrakeMaiden]

Me too!

 

[TanksHill]

I read an article about these somewhere. I actually used one as storage for when we built our house. We had a 33 ft trailer(tow behind) and a container parallel to each other. Framed a room in between with just end walls.

Those Ecopods are amazing!!!!

 

[davaroo]

A friend of mine has one of these things as a storage building. He paid, like, $800 to get it and it will probably outlast him.

My first thought when I saw it was how you could convert it for living in.
Very cool.

 

[lupinfarm]

There is a farm near me that uses storage containers as run-in sheds (they get the extra tall ones) for their horses.

IMO, they're kind of ugly and I'd really rather live in a bunky lol

 

[paul wheaton]

I saw a really great one last summer. I finally mashed the pics and videos together into this youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csNeFYs8qpg

 

[sylvie]

These would never make it past zoning here.
They give residents grief over sheds and decks

 

[bibliophile birds]

i saw several of those in Austin when i lived there. they were really cool.

the thing that's insane about those shipping containers is that it's cheaper for companies to make a new one for EACH trip over from China (where most of them are coming from) than to ship them back and reuse them. that's why, if you are on the W Coast, you will see whole shipping yards stacked with TONS of these things. and why they are so cheap.

i'm thinking of trying to get one to incoporate into my strawbale cottage that's in the planning stages now. they are a bit harder to comeby in Middle of Nowhere TN than big cities like Austin, but i've got hope!