Store cars in the attic?

[navin in KC]

Here is my situation:

I've got a 50 y.o. house that I don't want to move out of. It is perfect with one exception: the garage.

I've got two cars and will soon have three, but the garage is so small that I can't even open the passenger door on the Porsche. I have to back out for someone to get in.

What I really need to do is to move to a bigger house.

But I thought of something this morning...notice that I did NOT say "something good".

I once heard of a guy who had a lift in his garage. He could pull a car into his garage and then lower the lift and drive the cars into his basement. What a great idea.

I have no basement. I don't think I could dig one very easily (joke).

What about adding considerable support to the floors and expanding the house to a two-story. Then I could use a lift to raise the cars and park them on the second floor. I don't think it would be feasible in a 50 y.o. house, but I'd love to hear about it if someone has ideas. If you think I'm crazy, then lets chalk it up to being up late and getting up too early (for work).

[70Sixter]

Yup, ya mighta got up too early. I guess you already ruled out expanding your garage or building a new one for some really good reason? <_<

Good luck with the garage!

[navin in KC]

I promise that I'm not smoking anything.

My garage can't be expanded towards the property line, or into the house.

I think I just need to move.

Here is what it looks like now:

[Mother]

I promise that I'm not smoking anything.

My garage can't be expanded towards the property line, or into the house.

I think I just need to move.

Here is what it looks like now:

If you give me your pcar then your problem is solved!

[Richard Hamilton]

Not a dumb idea at all - how about this:

http://sotar.it/eng/home.htm

[Hroussard]

Porsches LEAK!!

[navin in KC]

Not a dumb idea at all - how about this:

http://sotar.it/eng/home.htm

yeah, I thought of putting one or both of the cars on a lft. But that seems to be too much of a hassle:

You pull it on the lift just right then you get out and press a button and it goes up, then you very carefully put another car right under it.

The beauty of the attic idea is that you have one big lift that you can just pull onto and you raise it up. Then you drive it further into the attic wherever you want to park it.

I've thought about it and I realize that it wouldn't work.

It would probably be easier and less expensive to dig a basement under my house and use a lift to get cars into the basement. Anybody ever heard of digging a basement under a house that is already built? (Ha!)

[Mother]

Not a dumb idea at all - how about this:

http://sotar.it/eng/home.htm

yeah, I thought of putting one or both of the cars on a lft. But that seems to be too much of a hassle:

You pull it on the lift just right then you get out and press a button and it goes up, then you very carefully put another car right under it.

The beauty of the attic idea is that you have one big lift that you can just pull onto and you raise it up. Then you drive it further into the attic wherever you want to park it.

I've thought about it and I realize that it wouldn't work.

It would probably be easier and less expensive to dig a basement under my house and use a lift to get cars into the basement. Anybody ever heard of digging a basement under a house that is already built? (Ha!)

Anything is possible with enough money, but maybe just extending a covered area the 3rd car would be exposed but covered.

[rattles]

I promise that I'm not smoking anything.

My garage can't be expanded towards the property line, or into the house.

I think I just need to move.

Here is what it looks like now:

If you have some space at the front between the house and the street a gable carport may work, would have to be cheaper than a 2nd floor and lift.

[Guest]

Not a dumb idea at all - how about this:

http://sotar.it/eng/home.htm

yeah, I thought of putting one or both of the cars on a lft. But that seems to be too much of a hassle:

You pull it on the lift just right then you get out and press a button and it goes up, then you very carefully put another car right under it.

The beauty of the attic idea is that you have one big lift that you can just pull onto and you raise it up. Then you drive it further into the attic wherever you want to park it.

I've thought about it and I realize that it wouldn't work.

It would probably be easier and less expensive to dig a basement under my house and use a lift to get cars into the basement. Anybody ever heard of digging a basement under a house that is already built? (Ha!)

Anything is possible with enough money, but maybe just extending a covered area the 3rd car would be exposed but covered.

Are you anywhere near a place where you can rent space. How many cars can you drive at a time? :)

[navin in KC]

I'm just going to have to move when I can.

My neighborhood won't allow carports. It looks like I'll have to store the Porsche for a month or two this winter so I can get the other two cars in the garage. I drive the X5 and my s.o. has a car as well. (In answer to the "how many cars can you drive at a time".)

Thanks for all of the help.

[PorschePRH]

How about putting all the junk on the side of the garage in the attic? that's why you can't get a passenger in there.... You can also try parking at slightly angles to give more room for the doors.

[Izzy]

Navin,

Some old neighbors of mine did have a similar situation, and extended the garage "backwards", almost having a double deep garage. It was architectured too look like the house, and no neighbors complained. It actually looked very nice, you can put more junk back there too. They ended up heating that room and it was sort of a workshop/garage for winter. It gets cold in KC.

Izzy

[wrljet]

A friend of mine (who's really loaded) has a couple of those garage parking lifts.

I'm not sure how much height you need to use one. He puts leaky British

cars on them, so they are equipped with dril pans.

Attached are two pics showing their use. My 996 is the one in the middle

of the one pic. :-)

Bill

[Long Islander]

A friend of mine (who's really loaded) has a couple of those garage parking lifts.

I'm not sure how much height you need to use one. He puts leaky British

cars on them, so they are equipped with dril pans.

Attached are two pics showing their use. My 996 is the one in the middle

of the one pic. :-)

Bill

Bill, It looks like your friend's garage is at least a 4-car garage, maybe even bigger. How many cars can he fit in there with the lift?

[wrljet]

The garage is in the shape of an "L". One wing has two double doors, the shorter wing

has one double door. This creates six native parking places. There are two of those

parking lifts on the longer wing, adding two more spaces. So that makes eight.

Additionally, if you drive in the door on the shorter wing and turn left, you come to the

dual post service lift. And usually something is up in the air there.

On the back wall of the larger wing there's another double door so you can drive

through to a parking / working pad behind the building where the car trailer lives.

He got lucky and sold a company to Cisco back in the dot com boom.

Bill