It is inevitable that you will need to repair your garden shed at some point or other. If you have a cute old shed with character, that time is probably nearer than you would like. I would say that typically a well built shed will last 10 - 20 years before it's in for some major updates.
When faced with a aged and decrepit garden shed the question is "Do I replace my shed or rebuild my old shed". There are pros and cons to both approaches. The answer depends on your budget, your taste, and your ability to swing a hammer.
This summer was the summer of sheds for me - I had to make the decision to stay or go for 2 sheds. My own tiny double door lean-to shed, and my mothers much larger 1 1/2 storey 8 by 12 foot garden shed. The decision about my mothers shed came first. It is a picture perfect cottage garden shed, but it had some serious water and rot issues. It would have been quite expensive to replace, so repairing was definitely the way to go. The only questionable part was whether the floor joists were gone, which would have made this job really quite extensive. As it turns out, we completely replaced the roof, and having solved the water problem, discovered that there was vapour barrier between the rotted floor and the joists. So a new sub-floor made the shed just like new. The total bill was under $600.
My shed, although much smaller, was so far deteriorated that I almost couldn't imagine a repair job being worth the effort. On top of that, my partner and I had always wanted a bigger workshop sized shed, rather than the lean to tool storage shed that we had. Although we loved the look of lean-to and it suited our current needs, we considered an upgrade. A quick calculation put this idea way out of our current budget range, and I still had the basement workshop. So back to figuring out the pros and cons of a repair or replacement.
Our first step was to price out the cost of a building a replacement. We made a list of all of the material we would need and it came to $550 plus 13% tax. One of us a remembered seeing a really cute shed at 50% off in the same price range. We figured we might as well save the time and buy new if that was at all a possibility. After a bit of searching we learned that we could get a smaller ugly resin shed for $650 plus tax. The idea of buying new was shelved.
After thinking for a bit more, we decided that perhaps with a bit of extra work, we could save money and also save the old character, by recycling the siding, and building the structure new. As it turns out, this was quite a bit of work, but we saved over 50% on the original material estimate, and we ended up with a brand new old shed, which won't start sagging for many more years. We are both quite pleased with the final look, especially saving the old aged board and batten siding.
Both of these sheds required some thought as to whether repairing or replacing was the best solution, and in both cases we ended up saving the sheds, and saving money as well. In both these cases the sheds were already perfectly suited for their purposes, and they also had exactly the right character to match the century old homes they belonged to. In our case, repairing was the right solution, even though one was almost falling down, we still decided the pros outweighed the cons. You'll have to figure out what the important factors are in your decision before deciding whether your old shed will stay or be replaced. - 29954
When faced with a aged and decrepit garden shed the question is "Do I replace my shed or rebuild my old shed". There are pros and cons to both approaches. The answer depends on your budget, your taste, and your ability to swing a hammer.
This summer was the summer of sheds for me - I had to make the decision to stay or go for 2 sheds. My own tiny double door lean-to shed, and my mothers much larger 1 1/2 storey 8 by 12 foot garden shed. The decision about my mothers shed came first. It is a picture perfect cottage garden shed, but it had some serious water and rot issues. It would have been quite expensive to replace, so repairing was definitely the way to go. The only questionable part was whether the floor joists were gone, which would have made this job really quite extensive. As it turns out, we completely replaced the roof, and having solved the water problem, discovered that there was vapour barrier between the rotted floor and the joists. So a new sub-floor made the shed just like new. The total bill was under $600.
My shed, although much smaller, was so far deteriorated that I almost couldn't imagine a repair job being worth the effort. On top of that, my partner and I had always wanted a bigger workshop sized shed, rather than the lean to tool storage shed that we had. Although we loved the look of lean-to and it suited our current needs, we considered an upgrade. A quick calculation put this idea way out of our current budget range, and I still had the basement workshop. So back to figuring out the pros and cons of a repair or replacement.
Our first step was to price out the cost of a building a replacement. We made a list of all of the material we would need and it came to $550 plus 13% tax. One of us a remembered seeing a really cute shed at 50% off in the same price range. We figured we might as well save the time and buy new if that was at all a possibility. After a bit of searching we learned that we could get a smaller ugly resin shed for $650 plus tax. The idea of buying new was shelved.
After thinking for a bit more, we decided that perhaps with a bit of extra work, we could save money and also save the old character, by recycling the siding, and building the structure new. As it turns out, this was quite a bit of work, but we saved over 50% on the original material estimate, and we ended up with a brand new old shed, which won't start sagging for many more years. We are both quite pleased with the final look, especially saving the old aged board and batten siding.
Both of these sheds required some thought as to whether repairing or replacing was the best solution, and in both cases we ended up saving the sheds, and saving money as well. In both these cases the sheds were already perfectly suited for their purposes, and they also had exactly the right character to match the century old homes they belonged to. In our case, repairing was the right solution, even though one was almost falling down, we still decided the pros outweighed the cons. You'll have to figure out what the important factors are in your decision before deciding whether your old shed will stay or be replaced. - 29954
