Need recommendation on House purchase for Studio please

[chipwits]

Hi,

I am going to be moving and purchasing a home fairly soon and haven't decided on what type of house I should buy. It will be out in the country and affordable; I can't afford homes here in California, so I might move Arkansas or Tennessee. Looking at a 3 bedroom home under the $100k range which are plentiful in the areas I am looking into.

Anyways, the home purchase will be my biggest investment ever as far as recording goes. I have heard that a good sounding studio and acoustics both for recording and mixing are arguably the most important aspect of what we do. So I could really use some advice as to what in general I should look for in a home for this purpose. I will use at least 2 rooms for this recording/mixing and the other room as my bedroom.

So I'd appreciate some advice in general of what I should get. I do have some specific questions, but with my limited knowledge, I am sure there are many other things I don't even know to consider. But here are some of my questions:

1. Should I go with all hardwood floors if possible? Cause I am thinking I can always roll out rugs if I need to, to dampen the sound from the floor.

2. How large of a room should I get for recording? I have heard that certain things sound much better in larger rooms such as violin. I could use two different rooms for recording that have different qualities, e.g. the main recording room and perhaps I could also record in the room in which I monitor/mix in. Concerned with the overall shape and size of the room (including the height of ceiling), and the materials the walls and ceiling are made of.

3. Do I need to buy a home in a commercial area if I ever want to make a little money recording others? I will be primarily using this for my own personal recordings and mixing; however there might be others that would like to pay me to record them. Can I do this from a home in a residental area?

I am thinking of a home with at least 1 or 2 acres around it to keep the noise down. Both incoming and outgoing (don't want to upset the neighbors).

I'd like to get everything I can possible with the home purchase without having to spend a lot of money upgrading the home for recording. I should be able to save a lot of money if I have some forethought.

I am sure there are lots of other things I am not thinking about. If anyone could give me tips or links to this type of discussion that would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,
James

[tomdarude]

really cool topic !! interested too

my first advice would be to get as much open space as possible!
acoustic isolation (mainly of the control room) is what makes studiowork really comfortable and "pro", and this rarely achieved by standart housing structures.

so something like a big shed where you can built an internal acoustical isolated CR-structure CAN sometimes be a cool option.

some people that feel & work mainly as a "producer" rather than an engineer, e.g. focus on songwriting, work with only 1 or 2 people etc. prefer the ONE-ROOM-STUDIO approach!
if you like it, this can create a truly inspiring and diffrent working atmosphere, especially in a private orientated facility. so there may only be the need for a middle sized drum/amps/vocal-booth in addition to a large combined control & tracking room.
(especially with the large variety of todays acoustical products a big room can have a pretty good mixing-"area" ....e.g. only separated with an ASC attack wall, and some well arranged realtraps/gik-traps....especially when the big room itself already has lots of basstrapping)

it´s always much personal preference involved, with a private place.
cheers tom

[djui5]

Make sure it has high ceilings, 10' or more (12 is nice). Also, make sure it has a big garage that you can use if you need to.

[toolskid]

GARK... three bedroom house for $100,000... I've gotta move outta london!!!!

[cosmos]

im on the same boat, looking for a house for me to live in and build my studio. i think it depends on your location of living and budget ...
if this helps ... what im looking for is a first floor, extreamly quiet neighberhood, 2 large rooms for studio with high ceeling ( 12 will be nice ) and ofcorse a living room and a big bed room for myself .

then you can allways work the construction yourself, ive been dooing alot of reserch regardind my place, area, dimantions etc...

look here : http://www.johnlsayers.com/ - cruise around the forums.

i think one of the major things that you have to take in mind that you will need to be in quiet place around you... for example : you dont want to be neer a highway ...

hardwood floor you can always build yourself.

to sum up. 4 large rooms in a quiet place to begin with ( if you need control room and recording room), plus if the rooms are large enogh, you can design your studio and divide it for another isolation both for vocals or drums, depends on your needs.

Good Luck hunting.

[cosmos]

Originally Posted by toolskid

GARK... three bedroom house for $100,000... I've gotta move outta london!!!!

in israel , LARGE 4 bedroom house will ba around 110.000 $ ...

this place is beutiful, atmosphere is huge !!!! this is where i do my recordings !!!

3 mintes and you are in the city . ( im showing off alittle ... )

[axisdreamer]

I bought a place in the country in Pa for way under 100,000 "as is" that has 4 buildings on it.It has a metal pole building that was a wood work shop that I use as the studio now.I put new walls over top of the one's that were already there so I have good R-value for heating and cooling and sound.In the big tracking room my ceiling is at least 12 feet,great for drums.I put a wall in with a window to make a control room and it already had a small room built that I use for guitar amps and storage and repair.I also put a big wide window in that room and the doors on all my rooms have glass windows so you can see throughout the entire studio from one room to the next. I've had studio's in houses for years and like it much better now that I have a building just for the studio. My property also has a small summer house that I fixed up and rent out to a friend.I'm now working on the kitchen in my house.It's an old log house that I'm going to restore.I found this property myself on the net the first week it was listed and jumped on it.This is my first property purchase.A few others looked at it and thought it needed to much work,but since I can do most of the work myself it was perfect.I have a nice big yard with tree's going around the entire property.I even have some fruit tree's and will put in a greenhouse next year.

I'm also thinking of building a strawbail storage building behind the studio,you might want to think about building a strawbail studio building,they are fantastic insulation R-value and cheap to build !

Just a thought.

You might even find a property with a bunch of buildings like I did if you look hard enough.

Good luck !!
Stace

[drBill]

You don't want a house on a raised foundation with hardwood floors. They will act as a resonator. not good. Look for something on a slab. Hardwood flooring is OK then. Minimum 10ft ceiling. You can make due with less, but why? You're buying a new house at this point. Keep looking until you find something that will actually work good. 8 ft ceilings suck. 12 ft is good. For tracking, even higher is better.

Your best bet is to get someplace with a barn and build a "room inside a room". Then you can make the ceilings higher, make is so there are no paralell walls, etc. You know....build a studio. You can record anywhere, but in your post you said that you understood that "good sounding" was perhaps one of the most important things you could invest in. Well said. You're going to have to do some build out if you want to achieve that. Small rooms with parallel walls (what houses generally are all about) are death to good sound. Think non parallel walls and high ceilings.....

[max cooper]

Originally Posted by cosmos

in israel , LARGE 4 bedroom house will ba around 110.000 $ ...

this place is beutiful, atmosphere is huge !!!! this is where i do my recordings !!!

3 mintes and you are in the city . ( im showing off alittle ... )

Listen, Cosmos... I've decided to become an intern all of a sudden...

[chipwits]

Ok so I need a property with a small house and a large outbuilding/barn that is like at least 15 feet tall. Then I just build the walls inside it for a couple recording rooms and a control/mixing room. Slab, not raised foundation gotcha. No parallel walls .. so this means I want a very large pentagon shaped room for recording? pentagon, 15 foot ceiling, perhaps 15 feet per wall (5 walls) ?

James

[cosmos]

Non Parallel walls will be hard to find in a standart construction house . theres alot of solution for this matter, it all depends how much you willing to invest in construction.

dont forget that you live in the US, country of "do it yourself" and cheap ...

like this:



or somthing like this :




you get the idia ...

[chipwits]

Nice pics thanks. Did you design those yourself? If so, what program? I need to draw my own too! =P

Thanks,
James

[cosmos]

i dident draw these myself, but i do others, its very easy when you learn the software.

its called "SketchUp" either version 4 or 5, the higher the better. emule it ( but shhh.... ) we never download cracked software ...

[Dave Peck]

Originally Posted by chipwits

Hi,

I am going to be moving and purchasing a home fairly soon and haven't decided on what type of house I should buy. It will be out in the country and affordable; I can't afford homes here in California, so I might move Arkansas or Tennessee.

Something that occurred to me when reading this part was that you should verify that such a place (affordable and out in the country) has decent and reliable electrical service. Sure, you'll need power conditioning anyway, but if the location is prone to frequent blackouts / brownouts / surges / dirty AC waveforms / etc. it may be best to look elsewhere.

DP

[midnightsun]

Another consideration is the incidence of home burglary in the area you are considering. This data should be available.

[mltamisin]

Actually, a concrete floor makes drums sound like shi!t....unless you want to float the floor! I'd personally get a crawl space house. The floor naturally floats and requires no excessive remodeling. Your kick drum will immediately have a huge sound. That's why people float their floor. Avoid a garage due to the concrete floor once again. Unless you do want to float your floor. If you don't believe me try it yourself. Place a kick & snare in a room with a crawl space and listen...then do the same in a slab house with similar room dimensions. You'll be amazed at the difference. Again, try to invest in a home with vaulted ceilings in your drum room. The bigger the rooms the better as this will give you room to offset some walls if you so desire to avoid parallel walls. Try to avoid square rooms for your control rooms. As someone stated previously you may need to keep in mind large window placement between your tracking room and control room so you can see your band and they can see you. This is always a help to see whether or not your mic stand is slipping, the kick is moving or someone is excessively salivating on your brand new $3000 vocal mic.
Hope this helps - Matt

[Ziggy!!]

Originally Posted by mltamisin

Actually, a concrete floor makes drums sound like shi!t....unless you want to float the floor! I'd personally get a crawl space house. The floor naturally floats and requires no excessive remodeling. Your kick drum will immediately have a huge sound. That's why people float their floor. Avoid a garage due to the concrete floor once again. Unless you do want to float your floor. If you don't believe me try it yourself. Place a kick & snare in a room with a crawl space and listen...then do the same in a slab house with similar room dimensions. You'll be amazed at the difference. Again, try to invest in a home with vaulted ceilings in your drum room. The bigger the rooms the better as this will give you room to offset some walls if you so desire to avoid parallel walls. Try to avoid square rooms for your control rooms. As someone stated previously you may need to keep in mind large window placement between your tracking room and control room so you can see your band and they can see you. This is always a help to see whether or not your mic stand is slipping, the kick is moving or someone is excessively salivating on your brand new $3000 vocal mic.
Hope this helps - Matt

I tend to disagree with this... The reason people float the floor is for isolation. A room within a room won't provide isolation if everything shares the same flooring. A lot of studios that are built from stratch have two foundations poured, one for the live room and a seperate one for the control room with each slab isolated from each other. The biggest probably with floors with crawl spaces or floating floors that aren't done properly is resonance, particularly in the low end.

I'd choose a house with a concrete foundation and use a drum riser before I'd ever consider using a floor with a construction grade (ie no acoustic consideration) crawl space or high "stilt" foundation wooden floors. Hell, Id take just a plain create floor without a drum riser before those.

[joeq]

Originally Posted by Dave Peck

Something that occurred to me when reading this part was that you should verify that such a place (affordable and out in the country) has decent and reliable electrical service.

Originally Posted by midnightsun

Another consideration is the incidence of home burglary in the area you are considering. This data should be available.

How about considering if there are any potential CUSTOMERS in the area you are moving to in the middle of nowhere?

high ceilings and favorable zoning will only get you so far...

[numrologst]

I just went through the same thing.

1) Obviously you have to make certain of the zoning. I am in a zoning where I can operate my studio. But the studio has to be less than 50% of the floor plan, only a certain amount of employees etc. So make sure you figure out if it's legal to run business from your home.

2) I wouldn't get too caught up in the construction, live room construction, control room construction. My studio is relatively small, but sounds phenomenal. I didn't do much special construction.

tracking room 1 is 15x12x10. Tracking room 2 is 20x10x10. My iso room is in the back and is 5x8. Obviously they are properly treated. The walls are wood and the floor is thin carpet. Everything sounds fantastic and there was no special construction. My control room is 12x10x10. It has wood walls and concrete floor, again sounds perfect no special construction.

3) Also consider power. I don't know what to advise you on this. I lucked out and my house is technically considered 2 habitations. There is a main house, which is connected to the back house. The back house is the studio. Which is around 1500 square feet. It is connected to the main house, but has it's own power meter and 100 amp service. This was important to me because I have 40 amps that run hvac/lighting/tvs/radios... then i have another 60 amps that is isolated and balanced power which feeds the control room and tracking room. This cost me $500 or so to do. The main house has its own 100 amp service, with separate hvac.

I really lucked out on this one.

4)Make sure you don't piss of your neighbors. Stock, my rooms were pretty good in the isolation area. Inside the control room was 90db, outside the control room was 65db.. At my property line it was 60db. The tracking room was similar. 100db in the tracking room translated in to about 60db outstide and 55db at the property line. This still pissed off my neighbor at 4am. And after 2 cop calls in one week, I had to close off a few windows and doors, and I can now hopefully bang on drums and no one will hear it.

5) Don't track with mics in the control room. Never rely on tracking in your control room, unless you are tracking something that is di'd... Or you have a guitar player in the control room, amps in the tracking room.

6) It would be nice for you to have 2 ac units. One for the house, one for the studio. AC's ruin reordings. I am lucky to have main ac in the main house. I use Portable ac's and window ac's for the studio. This way I can keep the house cool or warm and I can blast the ac/heat in the studio until mics are hot, then turn it off and on when necessary. This is definately a clutch feature.

All in all home studios kick ass. You have all the benefits of not having 2 mortgages. That is key. It only costs me $1700/month to live and operate my studio. That includes utilities, phone, cable, internet, dvr, etc... That is definately the biggest plus

But also be aware of the downsides.The whole home studio stigma. Every kid with an mbox and an sm57 has a home studio. So when you tell people you have a home studio, that is typically what they expect. I have a cool studio in my house, but people have no idea how cool it is until they walk in. The always expect like a digi002 and a small rack... But when they walk in and see my console, huge racks of gear, and my 37" lcd screen, they usually freak out. It's quite humorous actually. They never expect it. Which is finally the best thing, to see the look on their faces when they walk in, and their expectations are totally surpassed/

[Jim Williams]

Originally Posted by cosmos

in israel , LARGE 4 bedroom house will ba around 110.000 $ ...

this place is beutiful, atmosphere is huge !!!! this is where i do my recordings !!!

3 mintes and you are in the city . ( im showing off alittle ... )

Best part is the location. Last time I saw the news there, the sky was falling.

Jim Williams
Audio Upgrades

[Berolzheimer]

The first thing I'd recommend getting is- more experience. You're going to uproot yourself, spend a bunch of money, buy a house & try to set up & run a studio, yet you admit (and it's apparent from your inquiry) your knowledge & experience is very limited. I'm not trying to be negative here, just to save you a lot of frustration. It's going to be a lot of work and the results are very likely going to be disappointing- & then you'll find you're stuck out in Arkansas, & you're spending so much time trying to figure out why things don't sound good that you don't have any time or energy to think about your music.

There's a reason for actual professional recording engineers- so we can do the recording and use our many years of study & practice to making things sound good and dealing with all the inevitable equipment anomalies, and the musicians can focus on making great music.

[chipwits]

Originally Posted by Berolzheimer

The first thing I'd recommend getting is- more experience. You're going to uproot yourself, spend a bunch of money, buy a house & try to set up & run a studio, yet you admit (and it's apparent from your inquiry) your knowledge & experience is very limited. I'm not trying to be negative here, just to save you a lot of frustration. It's going to be a lot of work and the results are very likely going to be disappointing- & then you'll find you're stuck out in Arkansas, & you're spending so much time trying to figure out why things don't sound good that you don't have any time or energy to think about your music.

There's a reason for actual professional recording engineers- so we can do the recording and use our many years of study & practice to making things sound good and dealing with all the inevitable equipment anomalies, and the musicians can focus on making great music.

I am actually moving out to arkansas (or somwhere else) regardless of recording. I just figured I could get some tips on what type of home I should look for to save money in the long run on upgrading it later for recording. Of course I will learn more and more as time passes, but I might as well learn some of the basics now since I a going to be investing in a house right now anyways. For example, the excellent tip regarding slab versus raised foundation: I didn't know this; now I do and will save much money later because of it. Also to buy a home with taller ceilings if possible etc. I am buying a home anyways, so I am saving money by asking now.

If I can buy two different homes for $50k, one with raised foundation and low ceilings, or one with slab and high ceilings.. now I know which one to buy, with the help from people here. Or if I can buy a property with a large out buildign with very tall ceilings etc, for the same price. This is why I am asking now. Later on, as I research more and with practical experience, I can decide how then to upgrade the more easily upgradeable home to more suitable standards for recording.

Thanks,
James

[GPl]

Around here, out of town there are a lot of lots with a seperate "shop" on the property. This is what I would be looking at. I know a few people who have bought property and found suitable homes with a shop on the property, one guy who somewhat "retired" from Universal. Most of these shops have very high ceilings(12-18') depending on what they were used for. Like what an independent truck driver would have for working on his rig.

[drBill]

Originally Posted by cosmos

Non Parallel walls will be hard to find in a standart construction house . theres alot of solution for this matter, it all depends how much you willing to invest in construction.

dont forget that you live in the US, country of "do it yourself" and cheap ...

like this:



or somthing like this :




you get the idia ...

That may be cheap and "do it yourself", but there will be serious standing waves if those side walls in the CRM are not heavily dampened and dead as a doornail or unless the floor to ceiling wall is angled 8-15 degrees. I'd suggest a primer on acoustics and room design for the original poster. you can find lots of good plans online. Why build something that sucks when it's just as easy to build something right. These days, I prefer to angle the walls vertically. Saves on floor space and is not quite as "strange" in a normal house setting. Good luck.

[drBill]

Originally Posted by mltamisin

Actually, a concrete floor makes drums sound like shi!t....unless you want to float the floor! ....snip.... Your kick drum will immediately have a huge sound. That's why people float their floor. Avoid a garage due to the concrete floor once again. Unless you do want to float your floor. If you don't believe me try it yourself. Place a kick & snare in a room with a crawl space and listen...then do the same in a slab house with similar room dimensions. You'll be amazed at the difference. - Matt

Matt sorry. I view this as typical internet dis-information. The reason studio's float their floors is to de-couple them from the walls - not to make drums sound huge. How many ground up built pro studios are built on raised foundation buildings with wood joyced floors and wood flooring.....um....none that I have ever been in. Your k/sn may sound huge, I won't argue that, but it's due to the nature of your drums and how they react to the exact room finishings and size more than to the floor floating. To say that the room is a part of the drum set equal to the other parts would not be an exaggeration. The room is critical to the sound of drums. And I stick by my original thought - a raised foundation wood floor can be a nightmare - it depends on the room size and other variables. The additional problems that it will add to the studio will not be worth it. Again, just my opinion, but I would suggest chipwit consult with a studio designer rather than take internet opinion - either Matts or mine.

There is no doubt that building a room inside a barn or other structure is absolutely the best way to maintain control over your sound and results - you make the decisions instead of the room making them. If you have to be in an existing building, high vaulted ceilings and a slab floor - you can float it if you want - is the way to go.

[moosemoostafers]

Hey all, first post but long time reader. I was hoping that I could but in and get some comments that might be helpful to the original poster as well. I'm currently building a garage with an apartment above that will be used as a private studio. Exterior dimensions of 30x24. Second floor will be built on TJI's. It will have 9 ft. walls with vaulted ceiling at a 5/12 pitch. apartment will be one room ( no separate control room ), just a bathroom that will double as an iso booth. My main question deals with the floor (can't be a slab). Any suggestions. Thanks, Moose

[mwagener]

My 2 cents:

If you need to make a living with it:

* get a house with a separate building for the studio, keep it away from your home/family/distractions.

* get a place where the atmosphere is inspiring for recording

* get a place that is at least twice as big as you think it should be

* get a place where you can start with minimal investment and then expand and built up as you make money with it.

If it's just a hobby, get any place that feels right.

[thejook]

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

Best part is the location. Last time I saw the news there, the sky was falling.

Jim Williams
Audio Upgrades

Not so much. That's Eilat. Couple hundred miles south of where things were going down.

It's a vacation/resort city on the Red Sea bordering both Jordan and the Sinai (Egypt)...Saudi Arabia is in sight as well. Really good scuba, etc. 'bout a 4 hour drive from Tel Aviv. The way he's setting things up, you can record some tracks, then drive out 15 minutes into the desert and smoke nargila in a Bedouin tent. Now *THAT'S* vibe.

GOT-DAMN I GOTTA GO DOWN TO EILAT.

[chipwits]

If I couldn't get a home with an outbuilding that had 15 foot high ceilings, would it still be beneficial to get a home with one or rooms having vaulted ceilings? It wouldn't be parallel then with the ground (if this helps), and adds more air space. I don't know how good vaulted (angled ceilings) are for recording applications.

James

[Rufuss Sewell]

Hey, check out Texas. Cheap property. Lots of big land. Lots of musicians. Recording equipment is tax free!!! No income tax. Zoning in the country is almost always "No Restrictions." Lot's of country just outside of big cities. Low crime rate due to the fact that you're allowed to shoot and kill intruders pretty much no questions asked. I'd think twice about robbing someone in Texas.

I moved here from California. It's been an interesting change. I'm just outside of Austin running a studio in my house basically just like you're describing and it's been pretty great. I paid $132K and have a nice big house with plenty of rooms for recording on 2 acres. My house also has tons of stone tile everywhere which makes for some nice reverb. But, with convolution reverbs at hand, most of my tracking takes place in the dead room. Either way, it's nice to have options.

Good luck!