How much would you spend for a greenhouse？

Lena - July 27, 2022

I will be setting up a greenhouse in my backyard right now and I am thinking about a portable greenhouse, a glass greenhouse, or something else.
A portable greenhouse doesn’t seem to cost much. Many portable greenhouses cost less than $300. However, I will need to purchase other equipment such as irrigation, ventilation, etc. I don’t know what is a reasonable budget range.

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Of course “it depends.”

A glass greenhouse would be neat. A single thickness of glass doesn’t have much insulation value but would transmit the most light. Double pane has more than double the insulation. R-values Also glass never gets cloudy over time. Obviously it is fragile.

If I were going to start seedlings and wanted it to look nice but didn’t have enough budget for glass I would probably pick a polycarb sheet (the rigid 4×8 doublewall) square house because it is very clear and transmits the nearly as much light but is twice as insulating as a single pane of glass —and is tougher and cheaper. It would still look good tho not quite as nice as glass. It will get cloudy over the span of years. Here is one.

If it is to be larger season extender, I’d pick a hoophouse. I had a 20 x 60 I think at one time, it was through a grant. It cost several thousand but you can make one as small as you like or can afford. If you double the poly then use a fan to keep the sheets from touch you can get better insulation —trading for InSOLation of course. I built doors big enough for a small tractor. It had roll-up sides for ventilation. I wanted to make it completely mobile so the whole thing would roll off the plantings but never got to it. This is not nearly as nice looking as the square panel kind

Another greenhouse I had was an old garage with the south wall and roof sheathing torn off and replaced with poly. I insulated the north wall and roof and fill some old barrels with water to hold some heat. We sold quite a few seedlings out of it. The downside was the 2×4 and 2×6 framing cast lots of shadows.

On the small end I’ve used row covers and old windows as cold frames to get a little bit of a head start. 

 

All the people around here have those hoophouse models and take down the plastic sheeting during the winter and the skeleton remains of the hoops are left over until next year. Those models should be fairly cheap if DIY’d with PVC. I’ve seen many YouTube videos showing how to do them.

 

Someone makes a big pipe bender that lets you turn electrical conduit into hoops—the problem with PVC is it gets brittle in the sun and breaks.

 

I didn’t know that about PVC, in that case conduit would be a more durable solution. 

 

We have a “new” hoop house, 12 x 40, and although it is DIY with mostly materials we had on hand, I think we’ve spent about $1000 on it so far. The frame is made from cattle panels (a type of welded rod, flexible fencing) and greenhouse film.  It’s purpose is for unheated winter and spring gardening, keeping excessive rain off plants and gardener in a reasonably mild climate.  Farmtek is a company that has a pretty broad selection of greenhouses and associated equipment.  It really comes down to what you plan to do with it.  The budget goes from row covers to scary expensive. 

 

We have a 40’ cedar framed glasshouse with toughened glass throughout. You don’t want to know what it cost to build.

 

That must look magnificent! 😍 And I can only imagine how much it cost.

What kind of plants do you grow in it?

 

Mainly figs and grapes but we also use it for starting seedlings off and as a space for potting on.