Metal Garage Buildings: Kit Sizes and Installed Costs

A metal garage is the building people ask this site to price more than any other, and it is easy to see why. A steel kit gives you a clear-span floor for trucks, a lift or a long workbench, and a crew can stand it up in days once the slab has cured. Choosing steel is the easy part. Choosing the size is where the money goes.

This page is for the buyer who wants a steel garage or workshop kit and has not settled on the size yet. It prices every metal garage size that has its own page here, explains what a kit includes and what it leaves out, and works one installed budget line by line. Every price comes from this site's metal building price guide. When a size looks right, follow its link for layouts and door plans.

Metal Garage Sizes, Square Footage and Prices

The table below covers eleven sizes, from a 20x20 single-bay garage to a 30x60 shop. The kit column uses the price guide's per-square-foot range for that size's own floor area, from $7 to $32 depending on the building. The installed column adds a concrete slab, erection labor, site preparation and a permit, at the guide's own rates. The installed-cost section below works that sum out for one size.

Read the last column with one thing in mind. Site prep and the permit cost about the same on any garage, $1,800 to $8,700 together. On a 20x20 that is $4.50 to $21.75 per square foot of floor. On a 30x60 the same money spreads to about $1.00 to $4.83. A small metal garage costs more per foot, and that is the reason.

Need a size the table skips? The 3D metal building designer opens at 24 by 30 and takes any width and length you type. The metal building sizes category lists the larger buildings too.

What a Metal Garage Kit Includes

The price guide describes what's in a garage kit as the primary and secondary framing, roof and wall panels, trim, fasteners, one walk door, one overhead door, basic insulation and the manufacturer's warranty. It does not include the foundation, site preparation or erection. A quote that looks cheap has often dropped one of those items, so ask each supplier for the list.

The kit price moves within one range, depending on frame type, panel gauge, roof style, color, trim and the wind and snow loads your address requires. Here is that range, with a 24x30 two-car kit as the worked example:

Across that range, the spread comes from panel gauge, roof style, color, trim and the wind and snow loads your address requires. The guide notes that typical buildings use 26-gauge wall panels and 24-gauge roofing. Moving up from 29-gauge to 26-gauge panels adds about $1 to $2 per square foot. Darker or metallic colors add $0.50 to $1.50, and two-tone wainscot adds $1 to $2.

On a metal garage, those upgrades are small next to the size decision. Going from a 24x30 to a 24x40 adds 240 square feet, which is $2,200 to $7,700 more kit at that per-square-foot range. Settle the footprint first and the options second.

From Kit Price to Installed Cost

A metal garage kit on a truck is not a garage yet. Here is a 24x30, the size the site's vehicle planner recommends for a standard pickup, priced line by line on a new slab:

Every installed figure in the size table above follows the same method. The kit and the per-foot lines scale with the floor. The site prep and permit lines do not.

Some costs sit outside that total because they depend on how you use the building. The price guide lists them separately:

Two habits protect the budget. Keep a 5–10% contingency, as the guide recommends, because steel moves. And act on a quote you like, since the guide says most are valid for only 7 to 14 days.

One note for business owners. A garage or repair shop used in a business is depreciated over 39 years as nonresidential real property, according to IRS Publication 946. Section 179 can cover the equipment inside it, not the building shell. Ask your tax advisor how it applies to you.

Sizing for Trucks, Bays and a Workbench

Start a metal garage plan with the vehicles, because they decide the width. The site's vehicle fit planner sizes a standard pickup at about 19 feet long, 7 feet wide and 6.5 feet tall. It asks for at least 2 feet of clearance on each side and recommends 3 to 4 feet, so doors open and you can walk past a tailgate.

Work the width first. Two 7-foot pickups side by side take 14 feet of a 24-foot wall. The other 10 feet split into 3 feet at each wall and 4 feet between the trucks. That is why 24 feet is the working width of a two-car metal garage.

Then work the depth. A 19-foot truck in a 30-foot building leaves 11 feet. In a 40-foot building it leaves 21 feet, which is room for a bench, a tool chest and a compressor behind the tailgates. Three bays need more width again. Three 7-foot trucks take 21 feet of a 36-foot width, and four 3-foot gaps take 12 of the 15 feet left.

Height matters as much as floor. The planner suggests an eave of 8 to 10 feet for cars and standard trucks, 12 feet for lifted trucks, travel trailers, small RVs and tractors, 14 feet for Class C motorhomes and 16 feet for Class A. It also advises about 2 feet above the door for the header and the door mechanism. Planning a car lift? Tell the supplier before the eave height is fixed.

Long vehicles change the plan entirely. The planner puts a 28-foot travel trailer and a 25-foot boat on its trailer at a 30x40 minimum with a 12-foot eave, and a Class A motorhome at 30x40 with a 14-foot eave. The metal RV garage page covers those buildings in depth.

Garage Doors and the End-Wall Math

Door size follows the vehicle. The vehicle planner pairs a 9x8 door with standard cars and small trucks, a 10x10 with lifted trucks and travel trailers, a 12x12 with Class C RVs and large boats, and a 14x14 with Class A coaches. Then the doors have to fit the wall they sit in.

Some plans do not fit. Two 12-foot doors need all 24 feet of a 24-foot end wall, with nothing left for the frame. If you want two tall, wide doors, go to a 30-foot width or move the doors to the sidewall. The supplier's engineer decides how much wall each opening needs, so treat the table as a starting sketch.

On price, the guide's package includes one overhead door. Each extra door or window adds $800 to $5,000, and commercial overhead doors run from $1,200 for a basic 10x10 to $8,000 or more for an insulated, high-cycle door. Sectional doors are specified to ANSI/DASMA standards, including DASMA 108 for wind pressure. Ask for a wind-rated door where your code requires one.

Tube Frame or Red Iron: Which Frame You Need

Two different frames are sold under the same name, and the difference is real. Most residential metal garage kits use cold-formed, galvanized steel: square tube or C-channel, rolled from sheet. Tube frames are sold by gauge, and the lower number is the thicker steel. A 12-gauge member is about 0.1017 inch thick, against about 0.0713 inch for 14-gauge.

Red iron is the frame of a pre-engineered building. The primary frames are hot-rolled or welded-up I-beam sections, coated in a red oxide primer, which is where the name comes from. They are designed for the specific building and bolted together in the field. The Metal Building Manufacturers Association describes the system as primary structural steel frames, cold-formed purlins and girts, and roof and wall cladding.

A tube frame is usually enough for a two-car metal garage or a hobby shop at ordinary widths and eave heights. Red iron earns its cost in four situations:

• A clear span wider than a tube kit is engineered for
• Tall eaves for an RV, a lift or overhead storage
• A bridge crane, hoist or mezzanine hung on the frame
• A commercial shop, where business-occupancy code and heavier loads point to a fully engineered frame

The price guide puts commercial buildings at $28 to $45 per square foot and industrial buildings with crane systems at $32 to $60 or more. Our red iron buildings page covers those larger frames. Either way, the frame must be engineered for the wind and snow loads at your address.

Insulation, Panels and Condensation

An uninsulated metal garage sweats. Warm, damp air meets a cold panel, and water drips onto whatever is parked below. Insulation and a vapor retarder on the right side fix most of it. The general building-science rule is to place it on the warm-in-winter side of the insulation.

Steel framing also carries heat straight past insulation packed between the girts. That is why current energy codes generally call for a continuous layer over the framing, not just batts in the cavities. The DOE Building Energy Codes Program tracks which energy code your state has adopted. Ask your building department whether a heated shop has to meet it.

Those are the price guide's rates. Ask each supplier whether their per-foot figure means floor area or insulated surface, because walls and roof together cover more than the floor. For panels, the thicker steel of a lower gauge resists dents from a ladder or a swinging door better than the thinnest options.

Permits, Loads and the Slab

Nearly every jurisdiction requires a permit for a two-car metal garage, and the threshold is set locally. The price guide puts permit fees at $500 to $3,100 and review at anywhere from two weeks to three months. Most departments want engineer-stamped drawings, and the guide lists the zoning checks to make first: setbacks, height limits, lot coverage, appearance rules and permitted uses.

Codes follow the model codes of the International Code Council, amended locally. The wind, snow and seismic loads are not one national number. They come from ASCE 7 for your exact address, and the free ASCE Hazard Tool returns them. Give those numbers to every supplier so the quotes match. Our metal building permits and codes guide covers the process step by step.

The slab is the first line a kit price leaves out. The guide prices it at $6 to $12 per square foot, depending on soil and thickness. Footings must reach below the local frost line, which runs from about 12 inches in the South to 42 inches or more in the North. They must bear on undisturbed soil, engineered fill or rock, never loose fill.

Pour to the manufacturer's anchor-bolt plan, not a generic one. A slab poured before the drawings arrive can mean drilling or cutting later.

Doing It Yourself or Hiring a Crew

Erection is the line you can save. The price guide puts professional erection at $5 to $12 per square foot, so building a 24x30 yourself saves about $3,600 to $8,600. It calls DIY workable for simple buildings under 2,000 square feet, and it recommends a professional crew for frame erection above 1,500 square feet.

Plan on 2 to 4 capable helpers, a rented lift or scaffolding, and an honest look at your skills. A botched frame costs more to fix than a crew costs to hire. Some owners split the job: a crew raises the frame, and they handle the site prep, trim and interior themselves.

Timing is easy to underestimate. The price guide puts order to finished building at 8 to 16 weeks, with 3 to 6 weeks of that for manufacturing and delivery on a standard building. Permits and the slab should be done before the steel arrives.

If you are weighing a metal garage against a stick-built one, the guide puts metal buildings at 20% to 40% less than comparable wood-frame structures. Our comparison of pole barns and metal buildings covers the wood-frame side in detail.

The right metal garage starts with what you park and what you build. Two pickups need 24 feet of width, a workbench needs length behind them, and an RV needs a 30x40 and a taller eave. The kit runs $9 to $32 per square foot depending on the building, and a slab, crew, site prep and permit bring a 24x30 to about $16,200 to $48,900.

Pick two or three sizes from the table, check the door plan against the walls, and decide between tube and red iron. Then ask for quotes that list the kit, the slab and the labor separately. That is how you spot the fair price.

Related Resources

• Metal Building Cost: Prices by Size & Per Square Foot
• Metal Building Sizes: Every Size Priced
• Will My Vehicle Fit? Building Size Planner
• Metal RV Garages: Pricing and Size Planner
• Metal Building Permits and Codes