7 Cheap Options to Build A Long Lasting Horse Barn

When building your own long-lasting barn, you can ensure that it has functionality, reliability, and style at a reasonable price with careful planning and budgeting. Regardless if you are a new horse property owner or someone with prior experience with barns, it’s always a good idea to start small and safe,  and opt for a lower budget design.

When building barns, there are many things you should keep track of. For instance, keeping an itinerary list of the resources required to create a barn is a good idea. Additionally, ensure that when you build the barn, make sure you keep in mind what it is supposed to accommodate. Are you building the barn solely for farming, for building an equestrian estate, or for holding a variety of animals? Or is it simply a horse barn? Once everything is in order, you can choose budget options to build your barn, like installing composite decking. Here are seven budget ideas to create a barn to get you started.

1. Modular Barn

Regarding barn building, there are two types of construction techniques, which result in either a traditional or modular style for your project. The traditional style requires you to build all pieces of the entire barn at the site, while the modular barn allows you to construct the building blocks in a workshop, allowing you to assemble them at a later point on your site.

Modular barns are far more accessible, more efficient, budget-friendly, and of higher quality than the traditional barn style, making it the best choice when building your own.

2. One-Story

Making your barn one-story instead of two or three is an easy way for you to save a lot of money. Sure, you have less space at the start, but you can always expand further down the line. A lot of times, the top floor of a barn goes unused. A one-story barn still has plenty of space to fulfil all your requirements

Keeping your barn one story will save a lot of time, material costs, and labour effort. While two-story barns have their own benefits, for someone on a more limited budget, it is wise to only stick to one.

3. Limit stalls

Another way to keep your barn under budget is to limit the number of stalls, only keeping as many as your initial plan requires. Planning your project thoroughly at the start can help you get a good idea of your specific needs to build stalls accordingly.

Once your design is finalized, you can build the stalls to match this plan. However, building more stalls may be required if you envision yourself having many horses in future, or you have extensive ambitions to grow and expand your farm.

4. Opt for wooden siding

Many barns have metal sidings, but if you are on a budget, it may be a good idea to choose pressure-treated wooden siding instead. Aside from it being cheaper, it also offers a natural, rustic aesthetic to blend into your space. Many companies offer high-quality sidings, so you do not have to compromise on quality.

5. Skip on the Feed Room

People tend to include dedicated rooms for storing hay and supplement storage for horse barns. However, you can easily skip the feed room if you wish your barn to be more budget-friendly.

Instead of an entire feed room, you can build a standalone feed room that is essentially just an extra stall for food storage. Doing this will save you a lot of costs, which can go towards maintaining your barn or focusing on materials.

6. Consider Shed row style

Once you have decided one the size of the overall barn, the next thing to consider is the style of shed row you may want to install. Centre-aisle and shed-row designs are popular styles for one-story barns. Shed row is the most cost-efficient style, as they have a more simple, stripped-down aesthetic.

7. Hire experienced workers

If you hire a set of experienced workers to maintain your barn, costly mistakes are less likely to happen. Experience and skills ensure efficiency; this way you do not have to worry about training someone up from scratch, and you can instead communicate your expectations for your timetable and budget. Experienced workers are more likely to understand the requirements of your space, and will more effectively work around them. They are also less likely to compromise on quality, especially if you hire from a reputable organization. This will ensure the lowering long-term costs and hence, a longer-lasting barn.

Taking care of a horse farm or property is not easy, as you need to both ensure your barn is long lasting, whilst not going over budget. Modular barns tend to be more efficient, requiring less labor, and as such, are more cost-effective. We recommend building a one-story barn to save more costs, because you are unlikely to need or use a second story. Limit the number and stalls and install wooden siding for the exterior. You can also save space by skipping the feed room, instead using an extra stall if you need an area to store the food. Finally, consider the shed row style for your barn, and hire experienced workers to get good work done by communicating your budget to them. We hope this article provided you with enough information on how to build a budget-friendly barn. Thank you for reading!