Lee and Sue Allison raise alpacas on seven acres near Sanger, Texas. They wanted visitors to be able to take home something made from their own animals' fiber, and that meant they needed a store. Instead of building one from the ground up, they ordered a 14x32 cabin shell, had it insulated and wired at our plant, and finished the inside themselves. It opened in the spring of 2025 as Lydia's Boutique & Yarn at Goshen Meadows.
Here's what that took, and what it cost them to get a shell to store-ready.
The Allisons — he's a retired engineer, she's a former university librarian — bought their land in 2019 and had a home and barn up by the end of 2020. Their first alpacas arrived in October 2021. Sue had first encountered alpacas back in 2013, at a craft fair.
Alpacas produce fiber, and fiber is only worth something once somebody turns it into yarn, or a blanket, or a pair of gloves. The Allisons had the animals and the fiber. What they didn't have was four walls to sell it in.
A cabin shell arrives as a finished building on the outside and an empty room on the inside. Pressure-treated skids and floor joists, 2x4 walls at 16 inches on center, LP SmartSide siding over house wrap, and your choice of a 30-year dimensional shingle or a 40-year metal roof. It's weather-tight the day it lands.
What it doesn't come with is insulation, wiring, plumbing, or any interior finish. That's the point. You're buying the structure and keeping control of everything inside it, which is exactly what you want when the inside has to look like a specific place rather than a generic room.
Shells run from 12x20 up to 18x54 in gable, dormer, and lofted configurations. The Allisons took a 14x32 dormer — 448 square feet of floor with a 12-foot dormer for headroom and light.
The exterior was straightforward: LP SmartSide panel and trim painted SW 0047 Studio Blue Green, a black metal roof, a standard ridge vent, and a 9-light walk-in door painted a contrasting color.
The windows are where they departed from the standard build. A cabin shell ships with two 3'x4' insulated windows. They took three, set as transoms to pull in the western light.
The interesting part of the order is everything you can't see. Two inches of closed-cell spray foam in the walls, an inch in the floor, three and a half inches of open-cell in the ceiling — the whole envelope, sealed. Then a basic electrical package upgraded well past basic: a 200 amp breaker box, nine outlets, five four-foot fluorescent fixtures, two exterior lights, two weatherproof plugs, and a 220 plug to run a mini split.
That combination is what separates a shed from a room you can work in through a Texas August.
The shell itself ran about $16,000. The options they added on top came to roughly $9,000, and insulation and electrical were about $7,900 of that.
The split surprises most people. Spray foam was the biggest share of their options bill — more than half of it, once you add walls, floor, and ceiling together. Electrical was second. The door, the extra window, the paint upgrade, all the things you actually look at, came to a fraction of what the invisible work cost.
If you're budgeting a shell for anything other than cold storage, that's the number to plan around. The building is the predictable part. Conditioning it is where the money goes.
Those figures are from their 2024 order and aren't a current quote — see our cabin shells page for today's pricing.
They ordered in March 2024. The building was finished on July 10, against a promised date of August 8 — about a month early.
That turned out to be earlier than they needed it. Their site wasn't prepped yet, so the cabin sat on our lot until they were ready to receive it. We'd rather hold a finished building than rush a customer into taking delivery on ground that isn't ready.
Delivery itself was straightforward: one semi truck. Install is included at no charge — we set the leveling blocks and we don't leave until the building is level and you're satisfied with where it sits. Delivery is free within the first 150 miles.
The Allisons did the inside themselves, and it doesn't read as a shed. Whitewashed shiplap on the walls. A cedar countertop built from leftover fence material. Track lighting, ceiling fans, and a chandelier.
They also weren't shy about asking for changes during the build. "They even added special touches like custom transom windows to bring in more western light," Sue said. "We also worked with them to adjust the standard window setup to fit our vision."
"Quality took great care of us and made sure everything was built exactly how we envisioned it," Lee said.
Lydia's Boutique & Yarn opened in the spring of 2025 and now carries yarn, cardigans, ponchos, scarves, hats, gloves, blankets, rugs, dryer balls, purses, and plush toys — built around turning the farm's own fleece into handcrafted goods. The farm's website now points visitors straight to the shop.
That's a working retail business operating out of a building that showed up on a truck.
Yes. Goshen Meadows did exactly that. The shell arrives weather-tight and finished on the outside; what makes it retail-ready is insulation, wiring, and the interior finish-out.
Texas has no statewide permit rule for accessory buildings — cities and counties set their own. Most codes exempt small storage structures under about 200 square feet, and a 448-square-foot building open to the public is well past that. Retail use also raises questions that storage use doesn't. Call your city or county before you order, not after.
It might, and it depends on your land and your use. Denton County's is a 1-d-1 Open-Space valuation administered by the Denton Central Appraisal District. Ask the appraisal district directly before you order — it's a quick call and a bad thing to get wrong.
We can do both as options on a build-to-order shell. The Allisons had spray foam in the walls, ceiling, and floor and an upgraded electrical package with a 220 plug for a mini split, then handled the interior finish themselves.
Theirs was ordered in March 2024 and finished on July 10, ahead of an August 8 promise date. Build times move with the season and with how many options are on the order, so treat that as one example rather than a quoted lead time.
We deliver by semi truck and install at no additional charge, which includes setting leveling blocks. We don't leave until the building is level and you're satisfied. Delivery is free within the first 150 miles.
Start with the size and how you plan to condition it, because those two decisions drive everything else. Then call your city and, if your land is ag-valued, your appraisal district.
You can see the full range on our cabin shells page, or read the earlier Goshen Meadows case study from while the build was underway. If you want to talk through a build-to-order spec, call us at (254) 687-9209.