A buddy and former fellow vintage racer is living in a downtown condo due to circumstances. His Mothers car has the only spot in the garage and working on cars is strictly forbidden. No he is not allowed to use her car.
His race car, trailer, and truck are in a small town more than 2 hours away. Currently to work on it he needs to take the light rail to the airport, rent a car drive out there. spend more than an hour moving things around. Work a bit. Reverse everything, and a Ten hour day is likely to only allow a few hours of actual work.
What he actually needs is a three car working garage. Preferably on a bus line or near the light rail.
Anything approaching that is way more than he can afford on Social security. He’s been looking for over a year at this.
I came up with nothing. What say the Hive?
Sounds like a job for social media. He needs to cultivate a friendship with someone who has the facilities he needs and form a mutually beneficial relationship. Maybe someone with the desire to dabble in motorsports but who doesn't want to go all in buying and building car/truck/trailer but has space and wants to share the experience.
One of the jobs I can remember was doing a power steering pump on a 1976 Cutlass (showing my age here) parked on a residential street in Richmond. In the winter. During a light, bone-chilling drizzle. Not fun, but it was my daily. Take it apart on Saturday and hope it's ready to go by Monday morning.
Assuming your car is driveable when you start, get all your parts and tools together (don't forget jack and jackstands), drive to the spot of your choosing--say a quiet, somewhat nice light industrial area that's very quiet on weekends, and go to it. Best attempted with a good friend who can take you to the auto parts store when things don't go as planned. Weather is hit or miss. Usually, the more dire your circumstances, the worse the weather will be. 
mtn
MegaDork
11/15/18 11:01 a.m.
if he really needs a 3 car garage he either needs to move or he needs to sell the car and get a cart.
The best bet for a situation like that is to find an individual with their garage for rent. I've seen it on Nextdoor and on Craigslist, for a few hundred a month he could get a 2- or 3-car garage. He's got to be paying something for where the car is now, right? Just get something closer and more suited to his uses.
When I lived downtown, I used my parent's garage to work on cars. Living in a condo downtown just means you need to acquire work space somewhere else.
When I was in Austin, I was part of a co-op. Some guy bought an old storage facility and you paid a monthly membership and got a storage unit. It was brilliant. You were surrounded by other car guys with different tools, experiences, and backgrounds.
In L.A. my parking lot was big enough that I had a 40' storage unit dropped in it and that was my garage. It wasn't big enough to work inside, but the weather meant I could almost always work outside.
Right now I have a 0.2 acre plot with a house and a 1-car garage in the back, so driveway maintenance is what I do but it's not ideal in PA. It's either hot, cold, or raining.
I lived in an RV for many years and traveled. That was tough. I could do light maintenance but I couldn't really transport a whole shop worth of stuff.
I suspect the bottom line is, "your buddy cant afford a race car."
Why is he keeping his truck at the same place as the race car and the trailer and then taking the train/rental car to get to the truck? Why not just bring the truck to Mom's house and park it on the street?
How much racing can he really be doing?
Drop that race car, truck and trailer and regroup to just a daily driver that he can afford.
If he still needs to scratch that "racing" itch then work on someone else's car. Maybe do it for free. Maybe do it to supplement that SS income.
For the DD if it was drivable it would go to my parents house to work in their driveway. If it wasn’t then we worked in the street. This was always fun. Someone always had to stay the car or else tools and parts would walk away and once someone sideswiped my friend’s Caprice and knocked it off the jackstands. For race cars we were pretty lucky finding space advertised in local classifieds or word of mouth.
In reply to John Welsh :
John's right on. If he just has to race, drive someone else's car. I've done a ton of arrive and drive races in Lemons and one in AER, all were in the $500 - $850 per weekend range for ~4-5 hours of track time, and I doubt your buddy spends less than that per weekend if he's honest. Dump the car, trailer, truck, race someone else's car, and he'll save money over all.
Robbie
UltimaDork
11/15/18 1:08 p.m.
Does he like vintage motorcycle racing?
Sans 2 wheelers, maybe there is a shared workspace he can link up with. These guys advertised in GRM a few times and I've swapped a few emails with the owners. They seem like cool people and i'm trying to swing by someday.
http://gearheadworkspace.com/
How big is the race car? Is it a covered trailer?
Around me at least garages can be had for $250 a month easily im sure there is someone somewhere that wouldnt mind renting space to an older gentleman who wants to work on his car for cheap
John Welsh said:
I suspect the bottom line is, "your buddy needs a different hobby"
Fixed. He isn't in a situation where owning or operating a race car is practical, period.
I'm either gonna spend the weekend driving to Columbus or empty out the storage cage in the basement for a tool shed then work out front on the street from here forward. I might well dump the SVT to get rid of the $150 garage bill . Unless I can monetize the space somehow especially now as I'm half an hour closer to it.
mtn
MegaDork
11/15/18 2:00 p.m.
Yeah, I have to agree with ProDarwin. If he can’t afford the storage, he can’t afford the toy. That’s a very real part of the automotive hobby cost. Can’t ignore it, can’t get around it. You’re paying for it one way or another, whether that is time (distance to an affordable spot) or money.
I have friends (DC) who go in together and rent an industrial space. probably close to two dozen cars in there, plus tools and everything.
I replaced brakes under cover of darkness while living in a townhouse.
Most people; move to the suburbs and get a garage.
Low buck in the city answer? Get into karting or motorcycles and a large van. Work in back of van.
John Welsh said:
I suspect the bottom line is, "your buddy cant afford a race car."
Why is he keeping his truck at the same place as the race car and the trailer and then taking the train/rental car to get to the truck? Why not just bring the truck to Mom's house and park it on the street?
How much racing can he really be doing?
Drop that race car, truck and trailer and regroup to just a daily driver that he can afford.
If he still needs to scratch that "racing" itch then work on someone else's car. Maybe do it for free. Maybe do it to supplement that SS income.
Mom’s Condo is smack dab downtown. Only on street parking is extremely limited and 2 hour max plus not at all a lot of time. The truck trailer and race car/s are all that’s left from a lifetime of work. He kept them through all his trouble because no one thought they were worth anything. But he owned one ( the midget) since he was a kid and the Devin since the late 1970’s
He can’t have a daily driver for the same reason he can’t keep his truck.downtown.
Apexcarver said:
I have friends (DC) who go in together and rent an industrial space. probably close to two dozen cars in there, plus tools and everything.
I replaced brakes under cover of darkness while living in a townhouse.
Most people; move to the suburbs and get a garage.
Low buck in the city answer? Get into karting or motorcycles and a large van. Work in back of van.
That’s what he’s looking for. A shared industrial space or a suburban garage that is secure but on a bus line. In over a year he’s found nothing.
Antihero said:
How big is the race car? Is it a covered trailer?
Around me at least garages can be had for $250 a month easily im sure there is someone somewhere that wouldnt mind renting space to an older gentleman who wants to work on his car for cheap
They are in a covered trailer. One’s a Devin. The other is a mid 50’s Offy midget. It has a derick to lift it over where the Devin was. Where they are now he has to hook up the trailer, pull it outside unload the race car he wants to work on , Get what tools and parts he’ll need and then close the garage door to warm up the garage.
KyAllroad (Jeremy) said:
Sounds like a job for social media. He needs to cultivate a friendship with someone who has the facilities he needs and form a mutually beneficial relationship. Maybe someone with the desire to dabble in motorsports but who doesn't want to go all in buying and building car/truck/trailer but has space and wants to share the experience.
That’s why he contacted me. He’s got feelers out to everybody he can think of. I’m not far from the bus line. A little over a mile. But my garage is packed. ( I’ll be posting pictures.)
Unfortunately garage rental space, at least in south Minneapolis where I live, is very limited and expensive if you can find it. The duplex next door to me rents out a tiny one car for I think $200/month. I have a big garage and I'm just a couple minutes from downtown by bus, but it's already jam full of my stuff so I can't help. He may be able to find something more reasonable on the north side, but security may be an issue there (I just saw on the news last night where there's been a rash of garage burglaries, someone is simply ramming a pickup through the overhead doors.)
In reply to stuart in mn :
I went through my contacts already without any answers. Decades ago I used to work in an old fire station. The deal was, no spraying, ( even a can of WD40 got us a written notice) no welding, cutting, or anything that produced sparks. All work had to stop @9:00 pm and couldn’t start before 10:00am The car had to be buttoned up enough to be secure before 9:00 A minute late got a written notice
The cool thing was we shared the space with a fire engine collection and he was a nice guy. We were allowed to use any fire engine ( as long as we cleaned it after use) and a few Porsche’s, Ferrari’s, and an Aston Martin.
In reply to Apexcarver :
I've been afraid to ask but do they have space and what is the cost approx.? I just had a conversation with a local and this is GTA central down here according to him so working curbside under a car could get hairy and I'll admit the other locals do seem to have a certain level of disdain for stop signs lights that kind of thing. I still have the garage so I'm not pressed.
