I’ve finally made a decision on my workshop! And let me tell you, it has been a tough decision, and I have gone full circle with this one. If you’ve been following along over the last two weeks, you know that my biggest priority is to find something to use for storage so that we can move towards getting our kitchen addition started. In order to start on the kitchen, I need to get the sunroom completely cleared out, and I need a place to store the things I want to keep.
My initial idea was to go ahead and build my workshop, which has been in the plans for several years now. You can see it on our landscape plan sitting just behind the carport.
But after looking at those options and getting prices, I thought maybe it would be better to just replace the old rusted storage shed that is in our back yard right now. This thing was here when we bought the house, and while there are a few things in there, I don’t actually use this storage building because (1) it has leaks, and (2) there’s no light in there (no electricity and no natural light) so it’s just dark and creepy.
I thought it would be easier and faster to go that route because that shed sits on a concrete slab. So if I just rip that one down (which can’t be that hard as old and rusty as it is), I could just have a new one built on that slab, right? Quick and easy!
Well, not so fast. I went out and measured the slab (it’s 10′ x 14′), and I also took my framing square out to make sure the slab is square. The local shed company asked me to make sure. It’s not square. It’s not even close to square. So basically, the man at the storage shed company suggested that they could put the shed on that slab, but they’d still use their wood foundation. That means that the finished shed would be about 12 inches above ground. The total cost of a new 10′ x 14′ storage shed was going to run about $5600.
I didn’t love that idea, so I kept searching for other ideas. And then I was scrolling Instagram and saw that on one of the woodworking accounts I follow, they use a shipping container as a spray booth. I loved that idea! Every time I have to spray something, I find myself wishing I had a permanent spray booth set up somewhere to make it easy and to get out of the wind and weather. A little shipping container is a great idea for that!
So that sent me down a rabbit hole looking for a shipping container. The problem is that I wanted a 10-foot shipping container, but those are quite expensive. Until two days ago, I didn’t know that 10-foot shipping containers are generally more expensive than the 20-foot containers because they’re custom made. They take 20-foot containers, cut them in half, and then seal the up. So you’re paying extra for the extra work that goes into them. But there’s no way I want a 20-foot shipping container in our back yard.
After all of that, I went back to the idea of just building the workshop. I found a local company that I really like, and spent lots of time on the phone with the man getting all of the details, asking all of my questions, and getting pricing on various options. I finally decided to go with the 18′ x 32′ garage. I’m still not sure if I want to go with the metal roof or the shingle roof, but the building itself will look like this on the front, minus the shutters…
And then this is the end that will be seen from the carport. It will have a roll-up garage door on this end where I can bring in sheets of plywood and MDF.
And then I’ll have two more windows on the back side…
And then the end opposite the garage door will be solid. I know people suggested having two garage doors, one on each end, but I’m pretty determined to have one solid, uninterrupted wall in there.
I really like this local company. They have been so patient to answer all of my questions and go over all of the options with me. I also like that they’re willing to use my windows. If you’ll remember, way back when I had that misguided notion to turn our carport into my workshop and then build a separate detached garage, I bought four windows that match the windows in our house (same brand, same style, same everything) to use for that. I’ve had them out in the storage building for about two years now, so I’m glad they are willing to use them.
I also decided to have it built on their foundation rather than pouring a concrete foundation for it. I know I’ll get mixed reactions about that, but I told the man what I was going to be using the building for, and asked him his honest opinion. He told me that he ran a cabinet making business out of one of these buildings built on their foundation, and he had every tool I mentioned plus a whole lot more. His building that he used for his cabinet making business was 18 x 50 because he had walled off one end to use as his spray booth to paint the cabinets. But he said he never had a bit of problem with all of his cabinet making tools sitting on their foundation. So I decided to go with that since it will be a savings of several thousands of dollars that I’d rather put towards our kitchen.
So how did I almost get scammed out of almost $2000? Well, I sat down at my computer yesterday morning to write this post and tell y’all all about my workshop decision. And I wanted to include a picture of a cute 10-foot shipping container. So I headed over to Facebook Marketplace to see if I could find a picture of what I was talking about.
And lo and behold, the first result of my search was a cute little gray 10-foot shipping container with a roll-up door that looked to be in GREAT condition for only $1600!!
I couldn’t believe it! Here I was, settled on moving forward with the workshop, and the perfect little shipping container at an unbelievable price landed right in my lap. I was so excited!
So I didn’t want to come here and tell y’all that I had decided on the workshop if I was about to change course. I contacted the seller and asked what the shipping fee would be. The listing said it was in Conroe, Texas, which is about a 2 hour 20 minute drive from Waco. He said it was $225. So the total cost came to $1825. I asked about sales tax, but he said there wasn’t any sales tax. That seemed strange to me. This wasn’t an individual selling his own shipping container. It was a business selling shipping containers. Every for-profit business in Texas has to collect sales tax. It was a little red flag to me, but I thought maybe there was something about shipping containers (since most of them are used) that makes them exempt from sales tax.
Anyway, I said I wanted it, and he said he’d send my info to the billing department. But when I got the bill, it was coming from Florida, not Texas. That in itself is not strange, but it was just another little red flag. So I looked up the business website and it said they were the leading provider for shipping containers, blah, blah, blah. But when I looked up the registrar info for the website, it was only a few months old. The website had been set up in February of this year. How can you be a leading anything in just a few months? And the man selling this shipping container had only joined Facebook in 2024 and had no history and no profile picture.
So I called the number on the invoice, and a man answered. He had a very thick Indian accent. Again, that’s not a strange thing in isolation, but with all of the other little red flags piling up, it just didn’t feel right. But what really sealed it for me was that there was a lot of static on the line. Why would there be so much static on a call from Florida? And interestingly, it seemed to cut out (or he pretended not to hear me) every time I asked where they were located. I finally hung up, and he called right back. Same thing. Lots of static, and conveniently cutting out (or he pretended so) every time I asked where they were located. I asked that several times, and every time (on both calls) he pretended like he couldn’t hear me each time. He never did answer my question about where they were located.
I hung up again, and he called back three more times. I ignored those calls. And then I wrote the guy back on Facebook and said, “Never mind. I don’t want it. This seems like a scam, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to get scammed out of nearly $2000.” To which he responded with a thumbs up emoji. 😀
Interestingly, this morning I looked at Marketplace again for 10-foot containers, and I saw that exact picture in three different listings from three different Texas cities — Conroe, Stephenville, and Dallas. So I’m pretty sure it’s a scam. The ones that seem legit are the ones that ask you to pay a percentage down, and then the balance on delivery. But I’ve yet to find a 10-foot container from one of those places.
*Sigh* My hopes for having a cute little gray shipping container with a roll up door have been dashed. 😀 But that’s okay. I wasn’t scammed out of $2000, and I can now put that money towards a nice workshop with a real local company with very helpful employees who are able to answer all of my questions. Just beware of Facebook Marketplace. For all of the good deals you can find there, you can find an equal amount of creeps and scammers who are just out to separate you from your money. Y’all be careful out there!
Addicted 2 Decorating is where I share my DIY and decorating journey as I remodel and decorate the 1948 fixer upper that my husband, Matt, and I bought in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do physical work, so I do the majority of the work on the house by myself. You can learn more about me here.