Shipping containers, recycled foam used to build Ozarks dwellings

Home building isn't just about bricks and sticks. Innovation is the name of the game for some dwellings going up in the Ozarks.

From metal boxes to foam walls, ordinary products are being repurposed to create some unusual homes.

Thinking inside the box

Marti Montgomery is close to her dream of a modern home - a 1,300-square-foot house built from recycled shipping containers.

Montgomery's vision began to take shape in mid-2007, when she approached the designers at theworkshop 308 about designing a house on 47 acres of land in Webster County between Northview and Rogersville.

Montgomery said she and theworkshop 308 designers Michael Mardis and Jason Mitchell had a lot of ideas for the home but couldn't meet her $150,000 building budget - until she remembered seeing a Web site about a home made from shipping containers.

"The builders we talked to had no idea what we were talking about, but about an hour later (the designers and I) had gone down the street to see a container that was set up for Artsfest," Montgomery said. "About two days later, they had a house plan for me to look at, and that's how it started."

Mitchell, project manager on the home, said that during five weeks of construction, four shipping containers have been cut and placed on a concrete foundation and piers at the waterfront property. Insulation and the radiant-heat floors have been installed, and heating, air conditioning and plumbing work is under way.

According to Montgomery's blog, www.8747house.blogspot.com, the containers came from ConGlobal Industries in Memphis, Tenn. That company is a retailer for new, used and refurbished shipping containers.

The speed of the project, Mitchell said, is a huge advantage compared to traditional construction.

"We ordered the containers on a Monday, and they literally had them for us 24 hours later," Mitchell said, adding that general contractor Keyway Construction hopes to have Montgomery in her new abode by April.

He also noted the cost savings. In addition to reduced labor costs due to the faster assembly, the containers themselves are inexpensive. Mitchell said the group of containers cost $1,950 plus a transportation fee, significantly less than the estimated $7,500 cost to build a similar structure from scratch.

The difficulty in the new construction method is mostly in convincing contractors.

"The biggest challenge is getting people on board - when I call a subcontractor and try to explain to them what we're doing, they're a little skeptical," said Keyway Construction co-owner Chris Kennard. "But it hasn't been an issue once we get it fully explained. We have yet to do anything that is not a conventional construction practice; we just might be using them in different ways."

Foam home

Meanwhile, Lavern Ulesich is creating buildings, in part, from recycled foam cups and coolers.

Ulesich's company, Willard-based EnviroHomes, can build wall panels from expanded polystyrene foam - the same material used in foam cups and packing peanuts - held together with galvanized metal studs made from recycled car bodies.

Ulesich is not the first to make significant use of foam in construction; Scott Kisling of Up-Tyte Construction has used insulated concrete forms - foam shells filled with concrete - for several years.

While Ulesich's company hasn't yet built any homes from the panels, which are built off-site and measure 8 feet wide, Ulesich has built a nearly 800-square-foot storage building for Willard High School from the panels and said construction of the building shell was done in one day.

"It took us three hours to put the walls up, and it took us six hours to put the roof on. In nine hours, we were working in the dry," he said. He estimates that a typical home could be built and ready for moving in furnishings in 30 days.

In addition to the recycled content, the foam panels have other green features. The panels are highly fire-resistant and have an insulating value of R-21, about 50 percent more than average fiberglass insulation.

"We've got to have people living in houses that aren't a millstone around their neck. They're paying $100 or more every month for utility bills," Ulesich said, noting that a single-family home using the panels could cut energy bills by 50 percent.

Ulesich added that using the EPS panels can actually reduce construction costs; since the panels are built in the shop and transported to the site, overall construction costs average about 10 percent less than traditional building because of savings on labor.

Among some of the new building techniques that could be coming in the near future, according to information from the National Association of Home Builders 2009 International Builders Show, are polyurethane structural insulated panels that offer better insulation, motion-sensitive ventilation fans and solar-assisted heat pumps.[[In-content Ad]]