Is Your Residential Property a Good Place for Your Contracting Business Workshop?

An aerial view of a residential neighborhood with well-maintained houses.

If you happen to own a lot with a fair bit of room to move, you might wonder if you can just run your business there. While a lot of contracting business owners take this route, there are a few things you should know first. Keep these considerations in mind as you make a decision.

Research Guidelines
Before evaluating your property for use as a construction workspace, you first have to determine if you’ll be allowed to do so. The way that certain properties can be used is dictated through zoning guidelines, usually set by the city or county. In many cases, properties are zoned for one purpose only, including:

In some cases, you can use a residential property for a home business. It depends on the zoning guidelines and the work you intend to do there. For example, if you want to do administrative tasks from home, your property may allow it. But if you want to perform construction work like modular assembly or repairs, you may need a different zoning or special licenses to do so.

Evaluate Storage Needs
Once you determine that your property zoning will permit you to run your business from home, you can begin to figure out what you need to make it work. Start by evaluating what you will need for storage. Keep in mind that most home business properties will be used as a residence more than they are a business, so you need places to put equipment and materials when you’re not using them. If you have a small lot, consider how you’ll get rental equipment in and out when you need it. Equipment will be an important factor in storage for almost any field, but supplies and inventory may take up even more room. Plan for times when you’ll have the most supplies, so that you can be sure you will have space for it.

Estimate Workspace
With an idea of where you will keep equipment and supplies when they are not in use, you can start to build the concept of the workspace. Get a rough layout of your property as it is right now. Mark off areas that you must keep free for other members of the household. Remember that you may need to build a fence or other protection to keep children and animals from entering the workspace. Determine how much square footage this allows for you to complete work. If it’s not enough, try a few different combinations to make storage more efficient or create multi-use areas.

Consider Seasonal Limitations
When you’re thinking about running a construction business, it’s easy to plan to do most of your work outside. After all, that is the default condition for many construction fields. On the other hand, the place where you intend to do most of your offsite work should offer some protection from the weather. Climate considerations are even more important in regions with very hot summers or heavy precipitation in winter or spring. If you don’t have a shop or shed in which you can work, you may need to build one to provide an extra layer of protection for yourself and your equipment.

Be Realistic
In an ideal world, you would have plenty of room to build a separate workspace that would leave your home life free for other pursuits. But unless you live in parts of California with a lower population density, this can be difficult to achieve. It all depends on the type of work you’re trying to do on your property. If these considerations make it feel like you could do work from home but you’d be hating every minute, it may be worth considering alternatives. After all, the last thing that you want is to try to combine your work and home spaces and end up with an arrangement that doesn’t suit either of them.

Choosing a workspace is one part of running a successful contracting business. Getting the right preparation for the contractor licensing exam is another. To find out how CSLS can help, contact us today!