Last spring an overland builder in the Des Moines metro walked into a decision most people put off for years: he had a 30×40 pole building with a fresh slab, a half-finished 4Runner build, a project truck waiting on rocker panel and floor pan metal work, and no way to get either one off the ground. He wanted an autolift garage he could actually restore vehicles in — not just store them. What follows is that job, start to finish, including the part nobody writes about honestly: how he paid for it, what the monthly payment looked like, and which deposit and delivery milestones the money moved on. We installed it, so the details are ours to share, with his name left out.
Four-post storage and service lifts sized for home shops and restoration builds across the Des Moines metro. Call 800-674-9302 and we will quote the lift, the freight, and the install as one number so nothing surprises you.
The Shop and the Work: What He Was Actually Building
The building was a 30×40 with 12-foot sidewalls, four-inch slab, no in-floor heat, single-phase 200-amp service in the corner. Two vehicles in progress. The 4Runner was getting a lift kit, sliders, a rear bumper, and a drawer system — all work that happens underneath and from the side, with a welder running. The project truck needed cab corners, rockers, and a partial floor, which means grinding, cutting, and welding at very specific heights for hours at a stretch. And he wanted to keep a third vehicle stored so the driveway stayed clear through Iowa winters.
Those three demands pull in different directions. Storage says four-post. Full-underside metal work says two-post so nothing blocks your torch path. Suspension and armor fabrication says whatever holds the vehicle rock-steady while you’re leaning on it with 40 pounds of bumper. We spent a good hour on the phone before we ever named a model, because the wrong choice here means a lift that technically works but fights the work every single day. That is the whole reason we do site visits in the Des Moines metro rather than shipping a box and wishing people luck with a manual.
Why the Four-Post Won This Autolift Garage Build
We ended up on a four-post with a set of rolling bridge jacks, and here is the reasoning. Metal work on rockers, cab corners, and floor pans happens above the runways, not below the frame rails. Standing on the shop floor with the truck at chest height, the runways were never in the way of the actual repair area. For the floor pan sections he needed, the runways sit inboard enough that he could still reach the pan edges from underneath. Meanwhile, storage capability came free — that third vehicle lives underneath all winter.
The rolling jacks handle the suspension work. Raise the truck, roll a jack under the axle, and the wheels come off just like a two-post. It’s an extra step, but for a builder who is not flat-rate and not fighting a clock, that tradeoff was easy. Stability was the other factor. A four-post on four columns with a vehicle sitting on runways does not move when you put your shoulder into a bumper bracket, and that matters more than people realize when you’re tacking heavy steel. A two-post is perfectly safe but the vehicle hangs on four arms and there is a bit of flex. For fabrication-heavy use, we lean four-post most of the time. In a mixed-use autolift garage like this one, it was the clear winner.
Capacity, Runway Length, and Getting the Sizing Right
He asked about 7,000 lb, which is what most people land on when they think about a passenger vehicle plus margin. For a loaded 4Runner or a half-ton, that number is honest. But we pushed him to 9,000 lb, and I’d give the same advice to anyone. Overlanding builds gain weight relentlessly — steel bumpers, a rooftop tent, drawers, a fridge, water, a full-size spare on a swing-out. A truck that weighed 5,400 pounds stock can push past 7,000 fully kitted. Buying capacity you don’t need yet is cheap. Replacing a lift because the build outgrew it is not.
Runway length was the other spec worth arguing about. Standard runways handle most trucks, but a crew cab long bed with a swing-out rear bumper will hang off the end. We measured his longest vehicle, added the bumper, and specified extended runways. Total footprint still fit the 30×40 with room to walk both sides and swing the overhead door. Ceiling height was the last check: 12-foot sidewalls gave us plenty of rise to stand under the truck at working height, though he can’t go to full lift with the tallest vehicle and the tent on. That is a normal compromise in a residential-scale autolift garage and it has never bothered him once. We wrote all three numbers on the quote so there was no ambiguity later.
Financing: How the Money Actually Worked
This is the section people email us about. A four-post with rolling jacks, freight to the Des Moines metro, and professional installation lands in the mid four figures to low five figures depending on brand and options. Most home and prosumer buyers we work with do not write one check for that. Roughly half finance it, and the two common paths are equipment financing through a lender who specializes in shop equipment, or a home equity line if the building is on the property.
Equipment financing on a lift typically runs 24 to 60 months. The longer the term, the lower the payment and the more total interest — standard math, no surprises. On a mid-range four-post package, a 36-month term usually puts the payment in the low-to-mid hundreds per month range, which most builders find easier to justify than a single large withdrawal. Approval is generally fast, often same-day, and for a personal-use build the lender is looking at personal credit rather than business financials. If it’s a business purchase, Section 179 depreciation is worth a conversation with your accountant — many shops write off the full equipment cost in the year it’s placed in service, which changes the real cost of an autolift garage meaningfully. We don’t originate the financing ourselves and we don’t take a cut of it. We just tell people what the options are and hand them a clean, itemized quote the lender can actually work from, because a vague number gets applications kicked back.
The Payment Schedule and What Each Milestone Covers
Here’s the sequence on this job, which is close to standard for us. A deposit went down at order to lock the price and release the unit from the distributor — typically a portion of equipment cost, not the whole package. That deposit is what gets a serial number assigned to your order instead of you sitting in a queue. Lead time on a common four-post at that point was a few weeks. On longer-lead or special-order configurations it can stretch, and we say so up front rather than discovering it later.
The balance on equipment came due at delivery, when the freight truck put it on his slab. Installation labor was billed separately after we finished, tested, and walked him through operation and the lock check. Splitting it that way protects both sides. He wasn’t paying for labor before it happened, and we weren’t floating a five-figure piece of steel indefinitely. If a customer is financing, the lender usually funds at delivery, so we coordinate the freight date with the funding date to keep everything clean. One thing we tell every buyer: get the electrical done during the lead-time window, not after. Waiting on an electrician after the lift is sitting in your autolift garage is pure wasted time, and it’s the single most common delay we see across the Des Moines metro.
Install Day in the Des Moines Metro
Install on a four-post is generally a one-day job with two techs, and that’s how this one went. We laid out the runway spacing to his longest vehicle, checked the slab for thickness and cracking near the column locations, set and shimmed the columns to level, ran the cables, plumbed the hydraulics, and filled and bled the system. Then cycle testing: full rise, full lower, lock engagement at every position, and a check that all four locks drop together. Uneven lock engagement is the number one thing we correct on lifts other people installed.
The slab was good — poured the previous year, four inches, no visible cracking, no radiant tubing to worry about. Where jobs get complicated in the metro is older attached garages with three-inch slabs poured in the 1970s, or newer builds with in-floor heat where we have to scan before drilling anchors. Neither applied here. He had power run to the corner ahead of our arrival, which is exactly what we ask for, so we plugged in and lifted a vehicle before we left. He was welding on the project truck that weekend. That’s the outcome we want from an autolift garage install: the customer using it the same week, not troubleshooting it.
One Year Later, and What We’d Tell the Next Builder
We checked in about a year out. The 4Runner build is done, the project truck has fresh rockers and floors, and a third vehicle winters underneath. He has raised and lowered the lift several hundred times. The only service item so far was topping the hydraulic reservoir, which is completely normal after the system settles in during the first months. He bought a second set of rolling jacks because one set meant repositioning for every axle, and that’s the one thing he says he should have ordered day one.
Advice for anyone in the metro planning something similar: buy more capacity than your current vehicle needs, measure your longest vehicle including bumpers before you pick runway length, run the electrical during the lead-time window, and don’t skip the rolling jacks if you’ll ever pull a wheel. On financing, get an itemized quote before you apply so the lender sees equipment, freight, and labor as separate lines. And if you’re weighing four-post against two-post, tell us what the work actually is rather than what capacity you think you need. Related reading: 4-post vs 2-post for a home garage, how to choose a lift for your garage, and ceiling height requirements. Call us and we’ll spec your autolift garage against the work, not a catalog page.
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