Who Wants To Live In A Shipping Container?
Home?
Planning on following in ex-Morgan Stanley CFO Ruth Porat's footsteps and ditching Wall Street for a piece of tech? Stunned by how far or not far your money will get you with regard to housing out in San Francisco? Simply prefer the womb-like feeling one gets by living in small spaces? Consider today your lucky day.
Luke Iseman has figured out how to afford the San Francisco Bay area. He lives in a shipping container. The Wharton School graduate’s 160-square-foot box has a camp stove and a shower made of old boat hulls. It’s one of 11 miniature residences inside a warehouse he leases across the Bay Bridge from the city, where his tenants share communal toilets and a sense of adventure. Legal? No, but he’s eluded code enforcers who rousted what he calls cargotopia from two other sites. If all goes according to plan, he’ll get a startup out of his response to the most expensive U.S. housing market...Iseman collects $1,000 a month for each of the 11 structures parked in the 17,000-square-foot warehouse he rents for $9,100. Tenants include a Facebook Inc. engineer, a SolarCity Corp. programmer and a bicycle messenger.
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He bought his metal box for $2,300, delivery included, then cut out windows with a plasma torch and installed a loft bed, shower and bamboo flooring. He estimates his all-in cost at $12,000, and plans to sell refashioned containers for about $20,000 through his company, Boxouse.
This Wharton Grad Wants You to Live in His Shipping Containers [Bloomberg]