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Building a building on Light Industrial property

Portable Welder

Cast Iron
Joined
Jan 9, 2015
Location
Milan, MI
I'm in the process of buying 23 acres of light industrial property that runs along the railroad tracks and a federal prison is on the opposite side of the railroad, I like the idea of the railroad and prison being my neighbor because they are unlikely to complain about anything I do and thieves are unlikely to enter onto the property through the prison.

I'm open to ideas on what to do with this property ? One thought is to develop it into a little industrial park, a thought I have is to put up a 6 unit building and provide 40' x 60' warehouse / manufacturing / machine shop space for the 6 units with offices on the front that are 30' x 15'.
The ceiling in the warehouse area will be 18' tall.

My question is ? Could this be pole barn style with white metal siding on all interior surfaces like I did at my shop.
When someone comes in my shop, there is no wood showing, its all white metal siding.
If I go to the Twp. and ask if I do a wood pole barn, they are likely to shoot me down, but if I have a engineer draw it up and just submit what I'm going to do ??? might it get approved.
I'm on a shoe string budget, so I'm looking for ideas to keep cost down !!!
 
I don't think I would half-ass a project like that.

Go to the Twp and tell them what you want to do and listen to what they have to say. They may be more helpful than you think.
 
I'm not looking to half ass it, however I like the finished look of my pole barn with, because I have siding on both sides it allowed me to put R-19 insulation in the walls and blow R-38 insulation onto the metal siding which really sealed up my building verses the white vinyl backed insulation you see on pre-engineered buildings.
I also want to put steel columns and beams on the inside for cranes as I did in my shop.
 
I actually want to do the same thing. Find a piece of property and build myself a shop on it so I can quit renting.

I'd be talking to the Twp first about what I want to do and what they will allow. Sewer/septic, storm water runoff etc. I would also be calling the local utilities to find out costs and service for their infrastructure.

If all that stuff is doable, then I would pursue the property. I would hate to get stuck with a piece of land that wouldn't serve my needs.
 
Wood poles buried in the ground, and then crane rails ?

That's a bit "half assed"

At least pour footers in sonotubes, and keep the wood out of the dirt.

Better yet, look at a prefab building.

Also, investigate cement block walls up at least 4' in between the columns if you want to rent
to a shop.

Either way, you can still have your "look" by running the tin down the walls all the way both inside and out.

As mentioned above, there may be some building codes that will dictate method of construction.
 
I don't know what your local codes are there, but out here commercial building construction and shoe string budget are never going to happen. Also starting from bare land and cheap will not go together unless you are building an off grid cabin. Have you priced out basic utilities infrastructure for this lot, because that can likely get you up into 6 figures long before you even start a 6 unit building.

I would talk with an engineer or architect who is familiar with this type of work in your area first to get there take on what you can or can not do.
 
Digger Doug, I did 24" dia x 48" footings every 15', I then cast a 3/4"thick x 12" x 12" base plate into it, I then welded my 6" x 6" x 1/4" tube steel columns to the base plates, then the floor ( 8" thick ) got poured around that..., they did require me to weld clips off the crane columns over to the building to stabilize the building.
It wasn't until I showed a structural engineer that I was fastening the building to the columns that one would seal my drawings. ( However, my shop is on my 8 acres out in the middle of farm country ) So all the home owners and farmers are allowed to build these pole barns and are not required to do steel columns, but because the inspector said I was doing commercial work out of the building, he held me to commercial code.
 
I don't know what kind of seismic codes you have in Michigan, but a plan like what you outlined wouldn't fly here.

I bought 4.2 acres of light industrial property and put up an industrial building. We needed fully engineered stamped drawings for building / cranes / offices, etc. We spent $600k on just the engineering, drawings, soil compaction studies, permits and fees . . .
 
When building and intending to rent, I would think about durability. You don't know what someone will want to do there, you don't want to have to fix things when they leave

Also, round here code requires 2 sheets of 5/8 sheetrock between bays[I am sure of], unless sprinklered[I think] i f they are rented or sold separately

People put up Space or Morton buildings all the time, I assume they are preengineered.
 
Digger Doug, I did 24" dia x 48" footings every 15', I then cast a 3/4"thick x 12" x 12" base plate into it, I then welded my 6" x 6" x 1/4" tube steel columns to the base plates, then the floor ( 8" thick ) got poured around that..., they did require me to weld clips off the crane columns over to the building to stabilize the building.
It wasn't until I showed a structural engineer that I was fastening the building to the columns that one would seal my drawings. ( However, my shop is on my 8 acres out in the middle of farm country ) So all the home owners and farmers are allowed to build these pole barns and are not required to do steel columns, but because the inspector said I was doing commercial work out of the building, he held me to commercial code.

Well, that's why I had to describe what "wood pole barn" means around here.

Now we have a better definition, and an engineer was consulted, we can go from there.

As Motion (and others ) have indicated, check with the local authorities.

In farm country, where I am at, anything goes, for an owner.

My neighbor however, put up a cheap building, and because the shop has several "employees"
a state agency called (maybe not the same in your state) "labor & Industry" got involved.

Really involved, to the point of having to beef up the basic structure of the building.
Snow & wind loading was the main problem, and it was a prefab building (damn southern vendors
can't under 60 psf snow loadings)

Seems if open to "the public" they get picky.

Might need exit signs, sprinklers, spec grade outlets, etc.
 
Around here a multi unit commercial building would have to be non combustible construction. Which ends up being another way of saying no wood. So your proposal would not fly. I've looked at building what you describe, but around here at least the numbers don't work out. You can't rent an industrial condo for enough money to cover the cost of getting the building up. Maybe if you do a lot of the work yourself you can get it to work, but I doubt it. I wouldn't expect Michigan to be much different that Wisconsin. I do see projects like this go up occasionally, but usually there is an anchor tenant who is building the building for his own use and then renting some of the satellite spaces to cover some overhead. That's a little different.
 
Seismic codes in Michigan. LOL!

The R/R will be the closest anything built there will likely see in the next 10,000 yrs.



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Think Snow Eh!
Ox
 
You can't rent an industrial condo for enough money to cover the cost of getting the building up. Maybe if you do a lot of the work yourself you can get it to work, but I doubt it.

The way it is here you can't do any of the work yourself on a commercial property. (unless you are a licensed commercial GC) I would guess that is true in many/most of the rest of the states. Doesn't matter if you own it or not, so no saving money there.

If new commercial construction is going up it is most likely being built by the user, or built for the user as a "build to suit" which will typically want ~8 year lease minimum to be worth the investment.

(Any of my input is only from my experiences here in AZ, so might not apply completely to other areas)
 
The way it is here you can't do any of the work yourself on a commercial property. (unless you are a licensed commercial GC) I would guess that is true in many/most of the rest of the states. Doesn't matter if you own it or not, so no saving money there.

If new commercial construction is going up it is most likely being built by the user, or built for the user as a "build to suit" which will typically want ~8 year lease minimum to be worth the investment.

(Any of my input is only from my experiences here in AZ, so might not apply completely to other areas)

that's the way it is here. At my old shop, (rented) the management company got busted by the city of LA for having a handyman change a light bulb. No shit, you need to be a licensed electrician to change a light bulb.
 
Seismic codes in Michigan. LOL!

The R/R will be the closest anything built there will likely see in the next 10,000 yrs.



-----------------

Think Snow Eh!
Ox

It don't have to make sense, it just has to "meet code".....
 
Stop...

6 places to stop and have a conversation then additional rounds until all agree.

Zoning department to confirm what types of buildings and renters are allowed. The prison may limit the types of buisinesses...no drones.

Prison to confirm any limitations of any kind regarding activities and hours.

Insurance company to confirm requirements for building requirements.

Power company to confirm power is deliverable.

Fire department to confirm response time and other possible restrictions.

Property management place to determine value of your property as well as sourcing legal support for things like evictions and other issues you have no clue about.

Along this path you may learn things from conversations along the way that bring up questions of place you already have been.

After you have made the rounds a few times and think you have a plan, make a set of drawings that have everything included as if you were pulling the permit.

No need yet for engineering but building type size power and every other detail included.

Now make the rounds again to make sure all details are good and get copies of any "special rules" as they may tell you something that may be wrong or a need to know where to look thing. (We had this with ours).

Yes it is a lot of work but the locals know the code and market.

Along the way word may get out and you may find a remnant before building.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk
 
It don't have to make sense, it just has to "meet code".....

Ain't that the truth.

Most recently wanted me to put in the same amount of paved parking spots required per sq ft for an office building, but on a warehouse addition. Takes calling around the dept for hours to find someone with the sense to see those differently, and the power to allow a variance.
 








 
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