Just wondering about other’s preferences when it comes to building a back yard, personal use, barn.
I built a pole barn for my back yard barn and I LOVE IT 
I got A LOT of building, at a per square foot price, and finished off the inside on my own.
My dimensions are 24x56 with plenty of room for ALL my horsey stuff, under cover.
I built 2 -12x12 stalls, a 12x12 tack/feed room, plenty of hay storage, a sitting area, and plenty
of room for my tractor & manure spreader, and a loft,., even room for more stalls if I wanted them.
That said, I’m always look at these Horizon barns and Amish built, deliverable barns, and they are very LOVELY as well.
They are also more expensive, for less square footage, IMO.
Wondering which others would choose if they built over again, or are considering building for the first time?
I think I would still build a pole barn ,., but thats just me
Thoughts, dreams, musings??
Thanks!
I went with a Woodtex barn, similar to Horizon, and I really love it. IMO, it is cooler in summer and warmer in winter than most pole barns, and I just love the look of it…especially the shingled roof! But, like you said, it was the same price, if not more than a pole barn of the same size and I don’t have as much storage as I’d like. The other issue is height, my barn isn’t as tall as most pole barns - drafts or xl horses would probably feel cramped.
I’m already planning my next barn for when we buy more land and will go with a pole barn instead, I want something bigger and with a lot more storage and to do that with a wooden barn would cost a fortune!
LOL, Thats funny SC, I thought if I ever downsized, I’d probably go with a Horizon barn
So simple, finished off, and DELIVERED!
Your barn sounds very nice.
I was just outside, in my barn, thinking how much I did enjoy the height of the ceilings.
Very funny!
It WAS amazing watching them unload and assemble it! The stalls were in one section, the wash rack and tack room in another, and they built the roof and overhangs on site - so cool! It was up in two days! Funny you say that…we only have 3 acres which is why we went with this small barn, definitely a good choice for someone wanting to downsize! But now I want something like what you have :lol:
I’ve done both types of construction. The ONLY difference between a “stick framed” barn and a pole barn is the cost by and large. A pole barn is easier and cheaper to build because it does not require a foundation and has less “parts”. The modulars I’ve seen still have to be built on some sort of foundation Yes, a modular can be put up faster than a pole barn. But a pole barn built by an experienced crew can have the finished structure done in a matter of days to a week or two depending on size and detail. The stall interior finishing adds time to both types.
IMO no question that a pole barn is the best bang for the buck. Very easy to modify and or add to at a later date also.
“I went with a Woodtex barn, similar to Horizon, and I really love it. IMO, it is cooler in summer and warmer in winter than most pole barns”
The “company” type has little to nothing to do with "cooler/warmer. This accomplished by design and more importantly “placement”, sighting. A pole barn can be pretty much designed to look like any barn you give the company a picture of to work with. Most if not all pole barn companies don’t charge for the design process. Hand them a picture and the dimensions and tell them you want “this”.
I’ve actually seen photos of those Horizon built barns (the larger barns - 24x36) set on skids,
thereby giving the appearance of not needing an actual foundation.
Altho, they definitely need a leveled site.
Perhaps the modular barns might need more site prep, but one thing I thought was interesting was
the fact that the bigger barns also sat on salt treated skids.
I bought my Horizon in 2008. I considered a pole barn, but I was boarding, and, if I waited to build, it would have taken months. Every month I boarded, I was losing about $500. So, the Horizon was more cost-effective. I am very happy with my three stall shed row.
I seem to remember watching a U-T video recently of one that was sold and moved to another farm, “single story” Anything attached to it like an overhang shed roof etc was torn off. They have to be anchored to meet code. But I am pretty sure they are not considered “permanent structures” for property tax purposes. So there could be a savings there. But I am pretty they will not add any “value” to the property when being a appraised.
Barns are not always considered an asset to some potential buyers. More like a liability, especially on a small property. It is my understanding that most “modular” barns can be taken apart sold and moved. So this might be a bonus when it comes time to selling the property. That “time” maybe sooner rather than later for some new farm owners, lol. Too much horse infrastructure rarely gets ROI by and large. And can make it difficult to sell the property. I have known a number of people who had trouble selling their property because it had too much horse infrastructure. Not set up the way others wanted.
The site prep for either is pretty much the same. Though you could build a pole barn on uneven ground not sure why anyone would want to. A modular has to be or should be set on level prepped site. The interior footing, base in place. All of the grading should be done before the kit shows up. Open the box and in a couple of days you are mucking stalls.
As for my town, anything over 400 sq ft needed a foundation. We made the stalls, 12 X12, !2 X11, and 12 X10 so that we came in at 396 sq ft and avoided needing a foundation.
I have a Horizon that is 24’ x 25’ – two stalls, an aisle and a feed/tack room, no loft. It sits on 9 pre-cast footings and it’s a very cute, solid building for 19k (+10k in site work, including repairing the dirt road so the Horizon truck could get in.) I would’ve preferred a 36’ x 48’ pole barn and had a nice one drawn up that would’ve also housed my hay, shavings, Gator, and tools, but . . . the project got to be such a PITA (complying with conservation & local health regulations) I snapped and downsized/simplified to what I have now just so I could get my horses home a year faster.
It works well for 1 big horse and 2 minis. I love how bright the pine interior is and that I can fit 90 bales in the feed room in the winter. Yes, the doorways are a little low for my big Standardbred, but he just ducks. For such a small footprint, it’s a very usable barn. Over the next year I’ll need to add either a lean-to to house all the other stuff that goes with horsekeeping, or, build a few sheds. Local custom is to build 8’ x 10’ sheds like Hobbit houses around the property because it’s the only way to avoid the building inspector 
. I’d much rather have had one roof, but, maybe at the next farmette!
Local code required my 12x48 modular shedrow barn to be place on concrete piers and I’m glad that they did even though I grumbled about it at the time. The soil has eroded out so badly that if the piers weren’t there it would have settled unevenly and my doors would have trouble opening/closing.
Just saw this and wish I’d seen it earlier! That’s my barn and no, it’s not on skids. It’s on 12 concrete piers going down 4’ to our frost line. I don’t think it’s ever going anywhere - there would be a lot of deconstruction to do before the modular units could be unbolted from the piers and moved.
It’s 36x24 with 2 stalls on one side of the aisle and a tack room and open “extra” bay on the other. I’m still not using it for horses - we moved here to my childhood home this spring (right about the time this thread was posted) and we still have most of our household goods in there as we try to scrunch 2 overstuffed households together.
Here’s a Google album with all photos related to the barn, probably more than you want, as it includes historical, inspirational, and site planning photos, a series of time-lapse installation videos, and final interior shots (original distorted wide-angle and corrected). Someday maybe I’ll curate it but so far I just threw everything I found into an album:
https://goo.gl/photos/MDE3reBnDFQv2hAd9
And here’s a post I made here on another Horizon thread when my barn was new:
https://www.chronofhorse.com/forum/f…60#post8885960
Oh, also, the price listed was what we paid Horizon (for a basic but very sturdy structure; we will do the wiring ourselves at a later time); there was also just over $15K in site prep costs by an excellent local firm, to dig out some topsoil, dig & pour the piers, bring in gravel and stone dust for the pad and then later a gravel apron to close gaps between barn base & ground, and bring a water line (4’+ deep) about 16’ from our existing line to a frost-free hydrant in the aisle.
Hope this is useful to someone!
ETA: I had my barn built with 10’ high base units (the 2 stalls on the left, the tack room/open bay on the right), which I think is higher than their standard. This really means it’s more like 9’ under the joists since I have a loft. Maybe that would address the problem Frog Pond describes??
WOW AVJudge, thanks for sharing!! Small world that the very barn I pick out is actually a COTH poster’s barn.
Such a lovely completed barn ,., CONGRATS!!
WOW!! AVJudge what a lovely barn ,., and small world ,.,
LOL, who would have known that the very barn I choose, belongs to a COTH member.
Such a pretty, completed barn ,., Congrats!!
We went through this last year when trying to decide what to build. I had a horizon garage delivered at my last house and was impressed with what you got for the price. I think it was around 20k for a 24x24 2 story garage at the time. When I went to price out a barn from them I nearly fell off my chair. We were looking for something around 24x32 with an overhead loft for hay storage. Prices were in the 50k range. The place we wanted to put it would have required about 3 feet of fill moved form the high side to the low side, and a proper pad built up of stone and screenings. The cost for that was going to be another 10k on top of the building cost. I also didn’t like the idea that if the building was sitting on just a compacted pad that any settling of the pad would translate into doors and windows also shifting and being hard to open and close.
What we did was ask around on the local horse facebook groups for builder recommendations. We found one guy that was recommended over an over again and had him work up a quote. We ended up with a 30x36 barn with a full loft (enough for around 600 square bales), a full foundation down to the frost line, all but the stalls finished with a poured concrete floor, and the whole building made out of large 4x6 and 6x6 beams. Total cost was right around 53k including all of the site and concrete work. To save on some of the work of moving dirt, we had one side of the barn dug 3’ into the side of the hill. The cost to make the concrete wall a little higher was far less than trying to move and re-distribute all that dirt to make a flat pad. You don’t have the same option with a modular or pole barn design.
My point is that you should not discount having a local builder or a stick built barn with a foundation as necessarily too expensive. We ended up wih a much bigger and nicer building than a pre-fab for almost the same cost. That may not be the same in all places but be sure to at least get some quotes.
Keith
“I also didn’t like the idea that if the building was sitting on just a compacted pad that any settling of the pad would translate into doors and windows also shifting and being hard to open and close”
This won’t happen with a properly designed, built pole barn because of the way it is constructed “on poles”. That’s the simplistic beauty of this type of construction. I’ve built enough to know what I am talking about.
Even with a properly designed and built foundation shifting can and does happen. Esp when one has to cut and fill. This can and does add a LOT to the construction cost. There’s more to the “engineering” for the foundation. Stick framed cost more in materials and labor. They can and do “shift” depending on how well it is designed and built. The quality of the materials play an important part. Barn builders can and do “skimp” on materials. Because it is a “barn” not a house.
Well made Pole barns should cost a fair bit less than stick framed. Less labor less materials. A lot easier to build. But builders take advantage of uneducated clients. A lot of “Builders” don’t like/want to work with me. I know too much, lol.
A lot depends on your budget and space available for a barn.
On our old place we had a custom 36x48 4 stall barn, it was really nice but cost a lot of $$ (for us anyway). We had the acreage and it was supposed to be where we staying forever. However, that changed and we moved. New place is considerable downsized and no budget to build another big barn so went with a 12x48 shed row type barn, 4 stalls, grills on the front and between stall, so it has the same feel as the old barn at least for the horses. Horses are just as happy.
Definitely. In the end, we didn’t go with Horizon to save on costs; I don’t think their modular barns are particularly cheap when site prep and floors etc. are added in. But it worked for us because we weren’t living here (where the barn is) at the time, so having much of the construction done off-site, and just having to be here a few days for the site prep, then again for barn delivery & assembly, was ideal for our situation.
We have a pole barn that we were able to do a lot of the work on ourselves. 36 x 48, seven matted stalls, 12’ center aisle and a tack/feed room. Upstairs is an office, restroom and storage. Also there is a deck off the front that faces the ring and one off the back to make hay storage in the top easier
The contractors set the poles and rafters, put the roof on and did the tin front and back. We did the sides and either did the rest ourselves or subcontracted it out. Fifteen years ago it cost about $10,000
