“What if we design and build a bonus room that could be delivered to someone’s backyard?”
That’s the question that Canadians Landon Sheck and Morgan Seeber asked themselves, and that’s the question they answered by founding aux box.
What is Aux Box?
An aux box is a pre-fabricated 106 square-foot cube with a door, windows, and a large glass front. It is, essentially, an extra room for your house that you can have delivered and installed in one day. Need a workout room? No problem. Home office? Aux box has you covered. How about an art studio? A writing den? A teenage-friendly hangout space? With ten-foot ceilings and 84 square feet of floor space, aux box can be all that and more.
Why 106 square feet? Therein lies the magic of aux box. At those dimensions (and with no plumbing or kitchen hookups) an aux box can be installed at your house no building permits. Usually. The company is careful to acknowledge that building codes vary from place to place, but aux box dimensions were carefully chosen to be permit-free in most places.
No fuss. No muss.
Think of the hassle one of these little rooms can solve. No contractors. No weather delays. No mess. No additional fees or budget overreaches. With an aux box you know exactly how much money you are spending, upfront. The aux box team is in-and-out in a day. If you are still having nightmares about the last time you had your kitchen remodeled, then the aux box might be for you.
Not needing building permits means you can get away with not pouring a foundation, if you really wanted to. But aux box has a commitment to building projects that stand the test of time. They give you a choice between two foundation types, and always complete a site analysis before selling an aux box. Each box is built in a climate-controlled building, so your aux box never sits out in the rain in an unfinished state (like your house very likely did before it was complete).
Like we said, aux boxes don’t have plumbing. But they do have electricity, with plenty of space in the electrical box to hardwire an AC unit if you decide to go that route. Windows, a door, and two slots opening to the outside provide the rest of the ventilation.
As for heat, each aux box comes with a recessed wall heater linked to a digital wall thermostat. That should be all you need for such a cozy space, especially considering aux boxes utilize R-20 spray-in foam insulation. You can order heftier insulation at an additional cost.
A Cozy Cabin Interior
If you look at the pictures, you can see that the interior of each aux box is finished with beautiful pine planking. Aux box doesn’t use drywall because it can crack during delivery, and they don’t like generating waste. Pine planks are easy for aux box to source and install into their modular buildings, and have the added benefit of being super-easy for you to hang things on once you start turning your empty aux box into the bonus space of your dreams. As a final bonus, this finished pine interior reminds us of a cozy cabin way up in the woods.
The Buy
The base aux box model starts at around $28,000, not bad for adding another room to your house! Aux box is working towards a murphy-bed option as well as custom cabinetry. They are even brainstorming some ideas around modular exterior kitchens.
We know we’d add one to our tiny space if we could. Maybe you can!
