Starting a home shop?

On Tue, 27 Oct 2009 03:39:53 -0500, the infamous "Karl Townsend" scrawled the following:

Steve, Karl: Those sound like 2 perfectly good, on-topic stories to tell to the group here if you're willing to expand and expound, sirs.

With an added benefit.... you are having a good time, also.

(paraphrased) Whether you think you can, or think you can't, you're ght. - Henry Ford -

Roger - Maybe Lusardi is a failure, but it doesn't mean you will be. I turned my part time second job garage operation into a successful steel erection contracting business that made me a good living for ten years, then sold it for a healthy profit. IIRC, Xerox was started in a garage as a second business. Lots of people have done what you are talking about. The ones with negative attitudes, the lazy, the incompetent, and the unmotivated failed.

Go for those good paying specialty jobs, keep the overhead down, and don't listen to negative failures.

Steve

Most DEFINITELY.

Make that "right".

--Do the *biz* cards myself; did the webpage myself too. YP ad is more than I've made all yr, but it has occasionally paid a dividend..

There is a lot to be said for that aspect.

"Upon Roosevelt's death in 1945, H. L. Mencken predicted in his diary that Roosevelt would be remembered as a great president, "maybe even alongside Washington and Lincoln," opining that Roosevelt "had every quality that morons esteem in their heroes.""

Let the Record show that Yooper on or about Tue,

A not to be discounted element. Although, sometimes I want to do a "thing" for my own enjoyment. Doing it as a business takes the "joy" out of that. Now I _have_ to produce, on time and under budget.

pyotr

- pyotr filipivich We will drink no whiskey before its nine. It's eight fifty eight. Close enough!

When I was starting off, YP got me a call from a property manager that actually put me in business, spending $62,000 the first year. You get a lot of tire kickers, but you do get that occasional jewel.

Steve

So far I'm pretty sure I've made over $25,000 in my home shop, one job was $20K by itself. My home shop cost me the time it took to do the jobs but has paid off by the money I saved by making parts for myself. I agree it ruins the hobby to turn it into a business though. If I can do some select parts on the CNC machines for my employer it could make my monthly payments and only require I be present to stop the machine if something goes wrong. Other than that, I want to do fun hobby projects and perhaps sell parts to others that may be interested in the projects.

All I want in paying work is maybe 50 hours per year. I can be pretty flexible though, like Iggy mentioned, I can buy stuff and sell for a little profit. I once bought a lathe for $650, replaced the gear shaft, and sold for $1400. I bought a lathe at an auction for $65 and sold for $350. But if I don't make a dime off the shop it will be OK, I'd prefer it pay a little though.

RogerN

The use of the shop under this scenario, is testing, cleaning up, and fixing of the machines for resale.

"Ignoramus27237" wrote

AND, it is a deductible business expense.

Steve

This is very true and very important.

If you are counting on home shop work from the job, think again. Even if there is the remote sense of a conflict of interest, you could be tagged for the next round of layoffs. After all "you have a second job". There are probably company policies that address this if you were to dig deep enough.

I did do this for my employer once. I acted as a subcontractor to an existing vendor. It worked but I never did that again.

Bob