Garage Indoor Basketball Court

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Photographs by Christa Tippmann

Our garage basketball court connects to our house via a walkway.

Our Indoor Garage Basketball Gym Project

When we built our house 5 years ago, we already knew we wanted to add on by building a garage someday.

Originally, we wanted an open space with room for our kids to play and a place to park our boat in the winter.

After living in the house for a few years, things evolved as they often do.

Our kids were getting older and… wouldn’t it be nice for them to have a space to hang out in with their friends?

We also found ourselves hosting more and more team dinners for various sports teams at this point and… wouldn’t it be nice if we had space to just host everyone at our house?

What started as a simple garage structure evolved to fit our needs.

We raised the ceilings to 20 feet to accommodate the hoop and allow for onobstructed shooting.
Since our house doesn’t have a true guest bedroom, we added a small “party lounge” (take a tour here) to the floorplan that can flex as a guest suite if we ever need one.
We opted for a BIG garage door to allow us to park our boat inside if we ever decide to do that (so far, we haven’t- we use it too much!).

I’m planning to add to our hall of fame decal wall. Jordan’s next.

Details about our InDoor Garage Basketball Court

Here are the basic details about the court in our home basketball court.

Home Basketball Court Size

The total structure is 62′ x 30′ and the basketball court area is 45′ wide.
Ceiling height is 20′
This size was built to fit a half-court setup with a high-school regulation 3 point line.
We planned for some storage closets, which you can see in the photo above. These hold folding chairs and tables and I will eventually put doors on them I think. I just haven’t gotten that far!

Floor Details

We were planning to polish the concrete, but it turned out to be more expensive than we were hoping.

We compromised by doing a grind and seal.

The concrete company did a light grind on the foundation concrete, then cleaned it up and filled the joint lines. They painted on the court lines with this stencil we provided before topping it all with a clear epoxy topcoat. So far we are VERY happy with the floor. It does show some scuffs and scratches, but it was a cost effective way to get the look we want and it’s easy to clean.

Shop Our Basketball Court Accessories

Hoop Setup

We learned a few things in the hoop-department and this is a good place where you can avoid making the same mistakes we did!

We planned anchors for the hoop, but the first time we hosted, a high schooler hung on the hoop and ripped the whole thing out of the wall.

Apparently, we didn’t plan well enough.

So during the building phase, ask your framers to OVER ENGINEER the supports in the place where the hoop will go. Place supports everywhere in the framing!!!

We opted for an adjustable wall mount bracket but honestly, if I could go back I might just install a stationary version.

We have kind of just given up on adjustments and leave it in the same spot all the time- we could have just gone with the fixed version in the first place.

Basketball Court Wall Pads

These are important to protect your wall and your kids.

I started with 3, but I would suggest at least 5. You can do any color that fits your theme!

We tucked an old, very basic fridge/freezer into a recess and keep it stocked with water, gatorade, and popsicles for cooling off after a game.

How much did this basketball barn cost?

I’m not going to give an exact number for our project, because building costs vary so wildly and I really do think you need to check locally to have an accurate idea.

That being said… this cost way more than we expected.

I thought, “it’s just a garage, how expensive could it be?!?” As it turns out, pretty darn expensive.

High ceilings, a complicated deck connecting to our house, large glass garage door, and a large footprint (meaning large area to excavate, pour foundation for, and cover with a roof) means that this is NOT a particularly budget friendly project.

It may not be as fancy as a house, but it’s almost as big as one and a lot of the costs are the same regardless of what goes inside.

Would we do it again? Yes. But did we expect it to cost almost half as much as our house build? Absolutely not.

Just being real with you, here. Nothing’s worse than unrealistic expectations.

Unfinished Business

To be honest, there is quite a bit that is left unfinished in this space. See the above section, haha.

Luckily this is, ultimately, a GARAGE basketball court. So I didn’t feel too much pressure to finish everything at once.

A few examples:

We still don’t have any baseboards. I plan to install vinyl base molding like this soon. It will me my next project, because I think it will help with insects. But for now… not a big deal and we can live without it.
We did not paint the barn interior, just left the walls primed. Paint is expensive and… I just didn’t care too much at the time. But the walls are scuffing pretty badly and I probably will have a coat of paint thrown on the wall at some point.
We installed a toilet, sink, and kitchen sink but held off on installing the shower and the dishwasher. Know what else we skipped installing? A hot water heater! So far everything is just cold water- and it’s been working fine.
The plan is to put a glass divider wall up between the lounge and the court to keep the warm/cold air contained. I probably need to do this soon because our heat/AC bills are HIGH after adding this space. This is what I’m planning on installing in here.

The biggest Surprise about our indoor garage basketball court

Sometimes you complete a project you think will be worthwhile and it isn’t. For whatever reason people just don’t use it as much as you thought.

That was definitely NOT the case with this space.

We all use it WAY MORE THAN WE COULD HAVE EVER IMAGINED!

In the past 2 years I’ve hosted more than a dozen team dinners, two homecoming brunches, a homecoming dinner, birthday parties, emergency basketball practices when court space was scarce, and lots and lots of free play with friends.

If you’re a parent who wants to create a safe space for your kids to hang out with friends, be active, and gather with your people… this is a project that will make your family life better.