Debunking Popular Myths About Steel Buildings

If you’re considering a building project – a garage, home workshop, home office or storage building, among many others – you may be staying away from steel buildings because you believe one of the many myths that exist about them. If you’re avoiding the thought of a metal building for your property because you think they’re ugly, too much work or are poor quality, these myths could be keeping you from choosing the best possible option for your needs. Do you believe one of these myths about metal buildings?

Myth #1: Steel Buildings Are Expensive

A lot of homeowners start pricing wood at the local lumber yard and think that a wood frame building will be less expensive than a precision-engineered steel building. They couldn’t be more wrong. In fact, steel is usually the least expensive building material available for making garages, barns and other steel building projects. In addition, wood requires a lot more preparation for use in building – you’ll need to cut it to size, drill it and frame it – all of which require specific tools for the specific job. If you hire a contractor, his crew will spend considerably more time (at a high cost per hour) building your project – and that doesn’t even count the cost of fasteners like screws and nails or the cost of digging a foundation for a wood-frame building. In short, steel buildings generally cost considerably less per square foot than most other types of construction.

Myth #2: Steel Buildings Are Flimsy

A lot of people fear that steel buildings won’t stand up to the elements well. After all, they’re just held together by screws, nuts and bolts, which might rust or loosen over the years. In fact, every steel building is precision-engineered to meet the local building codes for your county or city and is rated to withstand the most extreme weather events for your area. And because they’re engineered to fit together precisely, it’s almost impossible to put them together the wrong way so you know they’ll be put together right.

Myth #3: Steel Buildings Are Hard to Put Up

You may think that you’ll need special equipment to put up a steel building. After all, those walls are heavy, and you always see heavy equipment erecting skyscrapers, right? Actually, smaller steel buildings can be assembled by a few friends with nothing more complicated than a power drill to secure the nuts and bolts. You don’t have to worry about cutting parts to the wrong size or drilling holes in the wrong places – it’s all pre-cut and pre-drilled for you. All you have to do is put all the pieces together.

If you’ve been hesitating about choosing metal for your building project, put aside all the things you’ve heard about steel buildings and talk to a supplier. What you learn just may surprise you.