The Plan & Budget section of the website is all about important aspects of project management. Finding and managing the resources needed to design and build effectively is not the most exciting part of a container project, but it’s one of the most important.
Assembling and coordinating the labor, materials, and equipment necessary for successful project execution is a skill set that you can develop. Below are a few different areas in which to focus your learning.
Contract Management
Most prospective container home owners are going to need a least a little professional help when building their project, even if it is primarily a DIY project. And in many cases, you may be outsourcing the entire design and construction phases to a single company.
Before spending thousands of dollars, you have to understand how to find good companies to work with, and how to ensure you’re getting what you want and what you paid for. Shipping Container Home Contractors & Builders: What to Know tackles this is subject that is vitally important for anyone moving forward with a container build.
Cost Management
Cost is often at the top of mind for many people interested in container construction given that it is usually seen as a lower-priced means of building. But it’s important to have visibility into where the costs come from.
Some aspects of container homes can actually be more expensive than traditional construction, while others are much less. And you have quite a bit of control over the cost depending on the decisions you make. Our Shipping Container Home Cost Breakdown and Can I Afford a Shipping Container Home articles are good places to begin understanding the costs of smaller pieces and how they affect your overall budget.
Risk Management
Given that container construction is a bit non-conventional, there is performance and execution risk in completing a project. Even those that have a lot of experience in traditional construction can help themselves by understanding the Mistakes to Avoid With Container Homes.
From maintenance and livability perspectives, there are other risks to keep in mind as well. Take a look at Container Home Rust and Corrosion Treatment as well as Shipping Container Flooring and Pesticides for important information to consider early on in your project.
Schedule Management
No one wants to be involved in a project that drags on forever and seems to never end. And in many ways, time is money when it comes to a large project like constructing a shipping container building.
Therefore, a proper understanding of how to create and manage a project schedule is a crucial thing to know for both your budget and your sanity. Our article on Work Breakdown Structures is a good precursor to understanding how to think about a large project in terms of smaller activities. And Project Scheduling for Shipping Container Homes addresses the overall development of a project schedule.
Construction Site Management
Even the best-designed container building will never come to fruition without an accessible and properly prepared construction site. You need to think through not just the best final placement of your containers, but the movement routes and equipment needed to get them there.
In addition, how to handle important needs like power, water, and sewage treatment need to taken into account as early as possible in your project. In Shipping Container Site Preparation, we discuss all of this and more.
Material Management
It should go without saying but a building is nothing but a dream without the physical building materials. And on a shipping container project, by far the most important material to consider is the empty shipping containers themselves.
We do a deep dive into sourcing your shipping containers in How and Where to Buy Shipping Containers. Then afterward, we recommend reading Shipping Container Delivery and Offloading Costs to understand how to think through getting your container from a dealer’s yard, onto a truck, and finally onto your project site.
Other Plan & Budget Articles
While we covered some of our favorite Plan & Budget articles above, that certainly isn’t all of them. Continue reading below to see all of the important topics we discuss in this corner of the website.