Home Building Materials: Shipping Containers To Aircraft Wings

September 2, 2008

The great American dream of building and owning a home is stronger today than ever before. And the vision of what that ideal home should be is as widely varied as the dreamers themselves. For example, some innovative persons are creating homes from shipping containers. Yes, some of those big strong-gauge steel containers used primarily for shipping products worldwide via ships, rail, trucks and cargo planes are finally ending their travels and finding a home, literally. They are being converted into very creative and low-cost homes.

Straw bales is another material being used in the construction of unique homes. It’s a surprisingly sturdy home building material and serves as a great insulator. It also rates high in noise reduction. Again, it’s a low-cost option for building a home, and it saves on utility costs. One builder reported his construction cost was only about $10-per-square-foot. He pointed out that his use of straw bales as a home building material was a lot better use of straw than burning it as agriculture waste, thus creating lots of air pollutants.

Then there are those who want to reach even farther for a unique home, like a lady in Malibu, California, who is using the wing of a Boeing 747 jet aircraft for the roof of her new hillside residence. That 2,500-square-foot wing that has traveled many thousands of miles has found a permanent home. The wing now floats on simple steel brace frames, attached to mounting points on the wing where engines were previously mounted. The huge wing was delivered to the site via helicopter.

Posted in Real Estate, Things of Interest