Charming Quonset Hut Home in North Carolina

When Hope S. and her husband, Allen, purchased a Quonset hut from SteelMaster, they didn’t plan on using it for a home.

“Originally we bought the building for our barn,” Hope said.

After discovering the older home on the 8.5-acre property they purchased was infested with termites, they came up with another plan.

“I remembered I saw on your website that people turn Quonset huts into homes and told my husband,” Hope said. “With some research, we decided that’s what we would do.”

However, the couple hit a bump in the road at the start of their project.

“It is certainly a labor of love because once we began building, Allen became ill and delayed completion for a year and a half. He wasn’t able to do as much work himself as we originally were going to do, so we had to hire the help of some friends and other contractors we knew.”

Despite the setback, the home was completed and the couple moved in just before Thanksgiving 2020. Hope says they’re extremely pleased with how their home turned out.

Cost and Energy Efficient

“It’s been very economical,” she said. “We did the closed cell spray foam insulation and it really sealed everything. I feel like the most expensive heating and cooling bill we’ve had is $160 and that’s with it being 100 degrees outside.”

Self-Supporting and Spacious

The arches of a metal Quonset hut are self-supporting, which means there’s no need for beams and trusses inside of the structure. This gave Hope an open floor plan with 100 percent usable space to design an efficient, functional, and stylish home.

 “The open floor plan is really good. When you walk in, we have the main room and there’s also a loft area.”

Unique and Eye Catching

Hope says the house often catches the eyes of passersby. 

“We’ve had people just pull in our driveway and ask to take a picture of our house. We’ve had people stop off the street and ask us about it,” she said. “They want to know how we put it together, how hard it was, and how we had to go about it.”

Hope says there are a few things people should keep in mind when building a Quonset hut home. 

“First of all, invest your money where it counts, on things like insulation. Allow more time than you think you’ll need. A lot of [the project] is custom, so you have to remember when you’re building a home like this a lot of things have to be custom. You can save a lot of money because a lot less lumber has to go into it because you’re only doing the interior. It’s a give and take.”

Hope says she’s very happy she chose SteelMaster for her Quonset hut home. 

“SteelMaster has been a very good company to work with. Travis [Ashley] was very easy to get a hold of every time I called and needed something or had a question, he was always there,” Hope said. “I would recommend if someone was wanting to do this that they would use SteelMaster as the company.”