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Hangar home

scout88305

SPONSOR
Northern Minnesota
Anybody here live in a hangar or have apartment in same building as airplane? Looking to pursue this in a tax friendly state and lose the wingbat lefty's in the process. Would like 2 bedrooms, seen Dr. Randy's in MN. Need more of a house.
 
I do. Empty nesters so 2 bed, 2-1/2 bath ranch with a big airplane garage attached and a runway in the front yard. Really enjoy it.
 
Anybody here live in a hangar or have apartment in same building as airplane? Looking to pursue this in a tax friendly state and lose the wingbat lefty's in the process. Would like 2 bedrooms, seen Dr. Randy's in MN. Need more of a house.

Easy, just depends on the weather you want. thats the catch.
 
Yep, 1 bed, 1 bath 720sf with French doors opening into the hanger along with the kitchen window. If I had made it a 500sf bigger I doubt we wouldn’t be starting a house...
 
Neil Salmi in Townsend, MT just said they're putting their hangar/home up for sale. It's a really nice place, right on the Townsend airport.

I can PM the info.

MTV
 
We do. Wife and I... 800sf apt, 1 bedroom,1.5 bath. 4100sf hangar attached. 2000' pvt. turf/gravel strip. We were going to build a house on the view lot above but decided to stay put......works real well for us.
 
Love the idea. Just a word of caution. Be sure to check the local ordinances before buying the land. When I built my house and hangar (20 years ago), the county I live in (in NC) would not allow living quarters in a hangar. The adjoining county required living quarters in a friend's hangar built about the same time.
 
If the hangar is heated and finished off with say office, utility room, shower stall, etc... Are taxes assessed on the hangar as a garage and then the living area as dwelling? Assume one can homestead a hangar if it's living space. Anything else to consider from lessons learned?
 
A couple of thoughts, and yes I am in the process of building a hangar with living quarters. No, not going to give up the house for a while as our view is spectacular and only 1/2 mile to the hangar.

things to think about:

My wife is very sensitive to breathing fumes. I have to warm her sled up and get it to where it quits smoking, then move it 20 feet or shut it down for a bit to allow the air to clear before she can get near it... so when designing the apartment part of the hangar we opted to have NO opening direct from the hangar to the apartment. We will need to go outside and walk 15 or so feet to come back into the apartment to keep any smells out of the living space; (carb cleaner, paint and chemicals really bother her). Consider how you will use the hangar and how that will affect your living areas with smells and noise. I plan to use mine for some aircraft maintenance.

FAA Grant Assurances have many restrictions on 'Hangar Homes' on airports. If you are looking at going to a federally funded airport it is rare the FAA will allow 'LIVING QUARTERS'. However, PILOT QUARTERS are allowed. Sounds like semantics, but essentially Pilot quarters are not designed for "permanent" housing, kids and pets... beware of these rules when looking at buying because the FAA may decide your home is not within guidelines and must be removed.

Oldcrowe's place is spectacular!! If you were going to build a place and that size fit you, it is worth the trip to check it out. It is worth the trip just for the hospitality also, but be sure to say hi to Mike S. and Uncle Eaton also when down there!!

Lastly, it is much harder to hide that extra airplane in a hangar the family comptroller lives in than if she does not go there very often. I found out that I can have sleds in the shop for months and she does not notice them... bring it to the garage and I get the third degree... might be part of the reason I don't want to live in the hangar:p
 
There's no bad way to live with your airplanes but in my world? I absolutely love wandering out the kitchen door into the hangar with bare feet in a robe with a cup of coffee in the morning. I wish I'd done the hangar house thing a lot sooner.
 
Neil Salmi in Townsend, MT just said they're putting their hangar/home up for sale. It's a really nice place, right on the Townsend airport.

I can PM the info.

MTV

It's a great setup, extremely well thought out, and Townsend isn't yuppified, or millienified, yet. Good one MTV.
 
There's a house with hnagar for sale for $280K at Diamond Point airpark near Sequim WA.
Belonged to a friend of mine who passed away last year.
Listing sez it's a foreclosure, it was a reverse mortgage.
Needs some TLC but a pretty cool small home with a lot of potential.
 
"FAA Grant Assurances have many restrictions on 'Hangar Homes' on airports. If you are looking at going to a federally funded airport it is rare the FAA will allow 'LIVING QUARTERS'. However, PILOT QUARTERS are allowed. Sounds like semantics, but essentially Pilot quarters are not designed for "permanent" housing, kids and pets... beware of these rules when looking at buying because the FAA may decide your home is not within guidelines and must be removed."

Ditto on this. If you end up looking at an airport that is owned by a public body (city, state, etc), carefully read all the documentation associated with it, including the (almost without exception) restrictions on the leasehold that you'll end up "owning". My experience, however limited it may be, has been that the FAA's rules and requirements are not the critical issue: it is usually either another public entity's (i.e. city, state) enforcement of those FAA rules or the supplemental rules that the city/state generate that end up being vigorously enforced and which cause conflict with hangar owners.

Experiences vary, of course.
 
My Wife and I live in a hanger 1400 sq ft 2 bed rooms 2 baths in Wilsonville Alabama been there 10 years wish we had done it 40 years ago
EV
 
Finished Hanger with D855BE6F-F24B-402D-A42B-6B7621A566F4.jpgapartment and 3800ft strip in WI. D855BE6F-F24B-402D-A42B-6B7621A566F4.jpg
 

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Well right there you are in violation of the building code nazi's! That door needs to be fire rated and self closing.....and on and on. 5/8", not 1/2" drywall between the living quarters and the planes, plus fire breaks in the attic. I split the difference, and just built my home NEAR the hangar, I mean "the farm's equipment shed", 30', and avoided a lot of BS I have no patience for, while still staying on the good side of the powers that be (fooled them). More power to you if you can get away with that where you are, I'm on your side.
 
Well right there you are in violation of the building code nazi's! That door needs to be fire rated and self closing.....and on and on. 5/8", not 1/2" drywall between the living quarters and the planes, plus fire breaks in the attic. I split the difference, and just built my home NEAR the hangar, I mean "the farm's equipment shed", 30', and avoided a lot of BS I have no patience for, while still staying on the good side of the powers that be (fooled them). More power to you if you can get away with that where you are, I'm on your side.

Hmm. 40 years in the fire door business. Intertek certified wood and steel door fabrication. NFPA member. Very familiar with code requirements. I've got this. ;)
 
Hmm. 40 years in the fire door business. Intertek certified wood and steel door fabrication. NFPA member. Very familiar with code requirements. I've got this. ;)

Ha ha, good on you, got me! You can teach the local building inspector no doubt. Good to know for others without your background still, who may try and just hang a hollow core and run it by their inspector, or even a more common regular entry door.

Speaking of people in the door biz: (a bit of thread drift coming) I saw this Just Aircraft Super Stol this weekend, it is powered by a 180 hp Lyc., and came in at a very low weight of 940 (may have been 960, either or) pounds. Oratex covered, and the entire project by a first time plane builder, who happens to operate a high end door shop, doors and more I think, in the Sun Valley Id. area, so very high end. His build quality was fantastic, he has an award winner I'd say. When I asked how many hours on it (it was pristine), he said 0, Sunday morning was probably going to be the test flight! That was yesterday, and I asked him to text me how it went, and no word yet. He's a pilot, but is still getting checked out in TD's.
 

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Mine is a tasteful but modest house attached to a really nice big garage. The point I was trying to make is that to me? The attachment is a key feature. My wife is also very chemical and exhaust smell sensitive and we haven't had a whiff of any hangar smells inside the house. My home insurer took no exception to anything when they inspected the property, and they did come out and look. Even with a big fuel tank in an attached lean-to. That was a pleasant surprise.

One bit of advice? Pay attention to homeowner or user fees for the runway maintenance. They may be part of a homeowner association fee or they may be in addition to. My neighbors get wound up about that. To me the fee is less than I was paying the State to park one airplane at Lake Hood so I'm not unhappy, but fees are fees and you ought to know how they're determined and how they're spent.
 
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My 30' separation between the house and my shop/hangar, can be brutal at times. My walk path makes it more like 45'-50', with a set of steel stairs. In the winter, there is no walking over with a cup of coffee and wearing slippers, ha ha. I'm on a mountain side with lots of wind etc. I do like to think that if one structure caught fire, maybe the other wouldn't, but who knows...and that's what insurance is for anyway. I built both the shop/hangar and then the house out of pocket, about a year in between, so two separate structures helped me there, two smaller costs instead of one large one. I REALLY wish I had engineered in a underground passway, a tunnel, between the two structures. On this mountain, anything outside creates drifts, and problems. A tunnel with the roof flush with the ground level would work...then I could do the slippers while carrying a cup of coffee thing! But doing it now, I'd be digging up all my utilities, my entire electrical panel, and my well line, so it's easier to just have an old coat and pipe mover boots by the door and tough it out. Sure beats driving 20 miles to a rented hangar at the towered local airport though! Probably even easier to just buy a big all in one home/hangar combo someone else has built!

Neal Salmi's place in Townsend Mt. is the most deluxe I've ever seen, someone needs to jump on it.
 
There's a neighbor up the strip with a nice house and detached hangar. Nice place. I could adapt. Last night the wind howled at my place. Any hangar is better than no hangar in that situation, right? I'm still pretty new to this and I love not worrying about the planes in the wind. But I did do a barefoot in my robe lap around the hangar this morning. :)
 
20190920_112925 (002).jpgWe have a house on private strip in Carefree,AZ called SkyRanch.
It is first class setup. Hangar attached to the house. My office looks into the hangar and stairs from second level to hangar from office, or from ground level. Big toybox! I am a lucky guy, wife lets me have toys.
John
 

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Neil's place is sold.


My 30' separation between the house and my shop/hangar, can be brutal at times. My walk path makes it more like 45'-50', with a set of steel stairs. In the winter, there is no walking over with a cup of coffee and wearing slippers, ha ha. I'm on a mountain side with lots of wind etc. I do like to think that if one structure caught fire, maybe the other wouldn't, but who knows...and that's what insurance is for anyway. I built both the shop/hangar and then the house out of pocket, about a year in between, so two separate structures helped me there, two smaller costs instead of one large one. I REALLY wish I had engineered in a underground passway, a tunnel, between the two structures. On this mountain, anything outside creates drifts, and problems. A tunnel with the roof flush with the ground level would work...then I could do the slippers while carrying a cup of coffee thing! But doing it now, I'd be digging up all my utilities, my entire electrical panel, and my well line, so it's easier to just have an old coat and pipe mover boots by the door and tough it out. Sure beats driving 20 miles to a rented hangar at the towered local airport though! Probably even easier to just buy a big all in one home/hangar combo someone else has built!

Neal Salmi's place in Townsend Mt. is the most deluxe I've ever seen, someone needs to jump on it.
 
I REALLY wish I had engineered in a underground passway, a tunnel, between the two structures. On this mountain, anything outside creates drifts, and problems. A tunnel with the roof flush with the ground level would work...then I could do the slippers while carrying a cup of coffee thing!

Like this?
f295110582ada3bb0a59aebc4a61cf86.jpg

The tunnel doesn’t lead to my hanger....leads to the powerhouse. Couldn’t BBQ outside...-20 plus the wind brought the temp down to more than 50 below.. the powerhouse has an automated temperature control...simply turned it down and blocked off the air inlet...that sucked the smoke out of the tunnel...plus the powerhouse smells good for a few days.. think if I were to do a tunnel to my hanger...doable.. I’d use culvert pipe...maybe 8’ in diameter..


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