Club Lexus

1SICKLEX · 02-10-11, 07:25 PM

It just seems like most new homes you get to the garage and its painted "kill yourself" beige or some boring color with 20 watt bulbs in the roof, a thin garage door and a 1/30th hp opener. Then some places have exposed HVAC and some at least cover it. The floor is always cement with lines like someone got murdered inside and cracks are not uncommon.

As of late there seems to be more thought in a garage with storage space and compartments where available but for the most part, you walk around a beautiful model home and open the garage and it looks like some place you hide the bodies.

I guess no builders are car guys.

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neurocity · 02-10-11, 07:43 PM

Coolest place I saw, was a guy that did a 3.5 car garage that was 1.75 cars deep. Had a workbench built into the wall, shelves and racks everywhere, two closets that were huge and a nook with a half circle couch/bench and center table table. 220 and 110 outlets in the walls. Lights above and running vertical on the sides in between the windows. The best part...hard air lines in the walls and on down center of the ceiling. Massive compressor was outside in a hidden build out/shed looking room on the back side of the garage. 46" LCD mounted angled facing the workbench couch area. Three Cat5e and Coax plates in the work area wall. Two doors going into the house. One that entered the kitchen area, and the other entered the bathroom off the laundry room.

Of course he had a fridge and frozen pizza oven out there.

I cant remember what the rest of the house looked like.

Dlewbell · 02-10-11, 08:50 PM

When we were house shopping, I saw a 3-bedroom ranch with an attached garage where the garage was literally a frame with fiberglass siding, no insulation, no interior wall, nothing. You could see the sun shining through out there. Our house we ended up in has a detached 1-car which barely fits my wife's Mazda3 plus our yard equipment, but at least it's fairly well-built.

mlee21 · 02-10-11, 09:34 PM

I'm pretty sure many people have seen these already, but why not post them again.

http://www.luxury4play.com/automotiv...d-50-pics.html

http://www.teamspeed.com/forums/gara...-100-pics.html

RA40 · 02-10-11, 09:43 PM

All the new homes we'd looked at, is nearly as you describe. Many of them are barely wide enough to open the car door once you pull in.

Speaking of a 2 car sized with two cars pulled in.

Best garage I saw was a tandem in Vegas. 2 wide but deep for 4 cars...I was

but that tract sucked. The ceiling was ~14' so I could have potentially installed a lift, have a workshop on one side and still put 4 cars in.

rominl · 02-10-11, 11:14 PM

hahaa i think it's more like most people don't care about garage. a lot of people just treat it as a place to put 2-3 cars and bunch of garbage, or in some case, 0 cars with tons of garbage. in that case, why would anyone bother to pay a dime more for "nice" finish?

i was the first one in my community to have painted garage floor and some decors, my neighbors all asked me and some started to follow. i think a trend can spread

a lot of builders now also offer options to upgrade wall and floor finishes

IXI187IXI · 02-11-11, 05:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RA40

All the new homes we'd looked at, is nearly as you describe. Many of them are barely wide enough to open the car door once you pull in.

Speaking of a 2 car sized with two cars pulled in.

Yea thats my problem. they say "2 car" garage but its damn near impossible to park to cars in there. its really best for 1. my gf dad has a pretty sweet setup. 3 car garage (all with their own garage door) and a lift on one side.

DonCorleone · 02-11-11, 07:45 AM

Ugh tell me about it. The house I'm living in now has 3 outlets in the garage. Ones on the ceiling with on plug occupied by the garage door opener. Another is on the far wall, occupied by the sprinkler system and FIOS box. That leaves one free outlet. Power strips and extension cords. Next place I'm buying is going to be set up properly.

Lil4X · 02-11-11, 08:42 AM

My old townhome's 20X20' garage came with unfinished studded walls, a concrete floor, a thin door and a badly drywalled ceiling and front wall. A typical suburban builder's mess. Thankfully, the most egregious shortcuts your builder took can pretty easily be remedied with a few DIY projects that don't cost a lot of money.

Determined to fix things, I began by painting the floor a light gray with brick red trim, and continued those colors up the front wall, then painted the ceiling a bright flat white. Next, I paneled the side walls with a light birch woodgrain vinyl finished plywood, and insulated the walls on either side of the door before paneling them as well. We fabricated gaskets out of strips of indoor/outdoor carpet screwed to the frame of the overhead door and added a rubber seal to the bottom of the door to keep cold drafts and blowing dirt out.

The next project was to build freestanding framed workbenches down both sides bracketed off the walls by 2X4 knees screwed into studs to keep the floor clear for washing down. - one bench for use for my home and auto projects, the other, a narrower bench on the other side for my gardening efforts.

Several 1X12's built into simple box cabinets served as shelving for storage, and a few pegboards and a lockable tool chest held a collection of hand and power tools. The shelves and benches were sanded, filled, and shellacked to preserve their natural light color while sealing them from the worst stains.

Because there was some scrap lumber left over, I built a pair of "barstools" that would fit under the workbench - a design I copied from one my Dad built in the '40s that had a 4X4X1" tongue protruding from one side at the top, making a handy anchor for a clamp or portable vise, while still providing comfortable seating at the bench.

I scavenged a few old tabletop parts bins and found a used metal kitchen cabinet, painted it and tucked it into a corner for storing paint and garden chemicals, topping it off with an old TV and stereo to keep me entertained while fooling around the garage on weekends.

The lighting needed a serious upgrade from the single bare bulb, so while rewiring the garage for power outlets to the workbenches, we added additional task lighting over the benches, a central fluorescent fixture and a droplight in the middle of the room. By finishing the room in light colors, we kept our need for additional illumination in the windowless space to a minimum.

The resulting space was attractive, easy to keep clean, still roomy enough for my company car and Suburban, and even could be pressed into service as additional entertaining area when the patio barbecue got rained out. The project added a bit of value when it came time to sell it several years later. I believe I recovered a good bit more than my $1200 budget . . . although there was a fair amount of "sweat equity" invested by my daughter and I in the project over four or five weekends.

Quote:

"If the women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy."
- Red Green

DriftGirl · 02-11-11, 03:05 PM

I recently had a custom house built and the garages are always left unpainted (exposed mud/tape jobs) and hvac exposed unless you have an exact plan for the space...all new houses are like this. Makes it easy if you want to install cabinets, shelves or need that 220v line to run ur tools n stuff.

This is how they pretty much left it at closing:

I was going to have them wall in hvac stuffs but decided against it.

Ive got a friends biz from L4P installing new tankless heaters, so im glad I didnt makeit permanent

lamar411 · 02-11-11, 03:07 PM

I have a neighbor with a garage and since it can only fit two cars but has a very high ceiling he installed a hydraulic lift to hold his Challenger and keep his Avalance underneath. It's really cool and been extremely helpful if I want to do my own oil changes or something. My garage is pretty average, just needs a good cleaning.

Enigma8246 · 02-11-11, 05:30 PM

When we bought our house they advertised it as a two car, finished garage. We went to look at the house and the owner had so much stuff in the garage you couldn't really tell the size. When we moved into the house, all of his stuff was still in the garage. By the time he got it out a week later, it was pretty clear there was no way we were fitting two cars into it, unless we both drove Mini's. It is barely deep enough to park my SC in. I have about 1' in the front and 1' in the back. Oh well, we got a good deal.

The nicest shop I've ever worked in is my friends dads. The house has a two car garage and there's a detached shop. The shop has four bays, a paint booth, air connections in every bay and the paint booth, an office area (with full kitchen), more than sufficient lighting in the whole shop, a 100 gallon compressor out back, 3-phase electric and mounts for a frame puller. The only thing he's missing is a lift. The best part is the price he got. He got both for the price of just the house. The guy he bought it from was getting a divorce and had to split whatever he got for the property with his ex-wife. He had it listed at about 60% of the market value.

MrG4Life · 02-11-11, 06:07 PM

The builders of these new homes are more interested in getting prospective buyers to upgrade to optional items within the home. Off hand I don't recall being told that I can do this or upgrade that within the garage. It was just a garage.

DriftGirl · 02-11-11, 06:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lamar411

I have a neighbor with a garage and since it can only fit two cars but has a very high ceiling he installed a hydraulic lift to hold his Challenger and keep his Avalance underneath. It's really cool and been extremely helpful if I want to do my own oil changes or something. My garage is pretty average, just needs a good cleaning.

you can get smaller lifts for pretty cheap these days.

Ive been debating a lift in the house garage. Its a 3.5 car setup: 2.5 Tandem on one side...nice size till I start filling it up with junk.

caddyowner · 02-11-11, 07:33 PM

When I was planning the building of my house 14 years ago, I only owned a SUV and wasn't really into vehicles. However, I knew the garage needed to bigger than those offered on most homes. My garage is about 24 x 20 with a workbench alcove and an 8' tall door. I now wish it was biggger, but I can get both vehicles and my John Deere 318 inside with enough space between the cars to fully open the doors so my wife can transfer from her wheelchair. The garage floor is also on the same level as the house so there is no need for a wheelchair ramp.

I wish I had more depth (20' front to back is tight for most trucks), room for a 3rd vehicle, and enough height for a lift in one bay. A heated wash bay would be nice, too.