The biggest user of Barndominiums by far are people with land that want a protected place to park their RV, cars, toys and a shop on one end and a beautiful home/living quarters on the other. For people in the process of retiring that still want a nice place and somewhere to store what they have accumulated over the years, without a huge mortgage to go with it, these are ideal options for living on the road in a motor home, or having another house built.
A 2 story living area with a raised deck off of the 2nd floor area are popular as are patios that don't require going up and down stairs. And if you don't want a full 2nd floor, but might want another bedroom for guests to use, it's a made to order place to add a guest bedroom and bathroom up above. Most all of these designs are tall enough to allow upward expansion, if only for additional storage.
The designs for Barndominiums are as varied as your imagination. Another advantage of this system is that you can greatly reduce the costs for design work by drawing it up yourself. Architects are fine, and if you have to retain one to finish your project then do it. But this way instead of the architect handing you HIS plans, you get to hand him yours. This process alone will save you thousands, and you get to create your dream, not what someone else thinks is attractive. Again, architects are fine, but they get paid based on how expensive the thing they design costs. So cost savings is not normally an area that they get too concerned with. Rapidset has been helping our customers with designs and construction advise for years. Large windows to take advantage of nice views of the mountains, a lake, a river or whatever you'd like to see are easy to install in steel buildings. As are porch roofs, overhangs and just about any other amenity you'd like to include.
A typical plan is for the garage/shop portion to be insulated well, but the home section to be insulated to a greater extent. This will definitely save you on heating and cooling costs. Due to improvements in the type of material used now, steel buildings can be insulated as well as any house. R-40 factors and up are now easily attainable.
The other type of barndominiums are the multi unit designs that tend to be built nearer large cities, where people want more garage room than their present living situation will allow. These designs vary greatly, depending on the architect and what the local covenants will allow. And these typically lack some of the living amenities of the single unit styles.
Whether your looking at the city multi family design or something on your own out in the country, the bottom line is this. Rapidset Steel Buildings will give you more cubic footage for your money than any other type of a permanent building, and it's not even close. With our on-line pricing guide and our minimal mark up, you can design your own place and see how much barndominium your investment will buy. Our website is the only free site out there that will actually allow you to design it yourself and get a price without ever having to talk to anyone. We're always here to help if you need us, but if you just want to shop on your own, please do so.