Charn beat me to it, about setting up below ground. I just wanted to add the obvious.

My take. Even by yourself you will want storage for important items you need secured, and a workspace for particularly bad weather.

I would build as follows: According to your picture I would locate a container lengthwise right at the french door and create usable space that way. I would have my bedroom down this wing, not at the end but in the middle, mostly for security reasons. Kind of hard to explain but hey...I'm a bit of a kook.

Second I would prepare the site for the containers by digging down 6 feet, installing drainage tile and then covering that with whatever is code for drainage. It should be obvious to place your containers on the highest part of the property. I would then set the container partially below ground. The reasoning is to reduce elemental exposure and self regulate temperatures in the summer time. If you really wanted to make this interested you could stack containers on top of each other and bury one of them all the way down, but I should tell you this requires modification to the bottom container for structural purposes. At least then you'd have a basement.

Some things that come to mind...coat the containers...skip paint. Probably think more along the lines of basement waterproofing. I say that because not very many containers are or CAN BE totally water proof. Other things to think about...I know you can by what used to be military containerized housing units pretty cheap...and also there are companies that retrofit for overseas contractors working in Afghanistan and formerly iraq. They make them here and ship them there....I bet you can find a few of these containers stateside.



Lastly...think about water production and water waste. How are you gonna get it, how are you going to get rid of it...

This is probably the most excited I've been about a post on smf in a good long while.