Do you want to start an animal shelter business and you want to know the cost? If YES, here is an estimated cost breakdown to build an animal shelter.
An animal shelter or pound is a place that stray, lost, abandoned or surrendered animals, mostly dogs and cats and sometimes sick or wounded wildlife, are kept and rehabilitated. The cost of building an animal shelter may vary a great deal because of some factors especially as it relates to the size of the animal shelter or the contractor handling the project.
The cost of building and maintaining an animal shelter can be daunting. These costs typically include grass, fences, roofing, garbage removal, lawn maintenance, drinking water, field drainage, lighting, benches and a pet waste station.
Although it might be expensive to construct a standard animal shelter facility, but you can reach out to people or organizations who can sponsor the project. In response to the high volume of animal rescues each year, many animal welfare advocacy outreach programs have managed to secure funding for many nonprofit shelters, further benefiting the industry.
Note that the construction of a successful animal shelter requires a great deal of planning and effort. But your involvement and dedication will hopefully lead to the ultimate reward – the joy of creating and maintaining a special place where stray animals (pets) can reunite with their owners or be adopted by new owners.
Estimated Cost of Building an Animal Shelter Facility
Animal shelter facilities can be relatively inexpensive to wildly luxurious. Below is the estimated cost of building a animal shelter facility in the United States:
1. Choice of Location and Construction: $42,000 – $180,000
When building an animal shelter facility, the first thing you should consider is the location. If you have an apartment building or complex, an animal shelter can fit anywhere within the land. No doubt, finding an ideal location that falls within the zoning requirement for animal shelters can be somewhat difficult but you can always come across a good location to construct your facility.
Whatever location you choose, pedestrians should be able to walk to it or it should have a good-sized parking lot for cars. Although there are animal shelters built within city parks which are already owned by the city, people also donate tracts of land for the sole purpose for them to be used as public animal shelters.
Please note that the location you choose should be big enough to accommodate administrative blocks and a vet clinic; this should be included in the facility planning (architecture drawing).
2. Utilities and Amenities: $29,000 – $131,000
Basic necessities to construct an animal shelter would be a 5ft fence and a double – gated enclosure. You will also need dog and human water fountains along with dog waste stations. After that, you can start getting extravagant with dog wash stations and custom designed benches and leash poles.
Also note that some high – end dog parks even have rubber surfacing in certain spots. You can also consider developing a partition that will separate the enclosed dog park into two sections, one for large dogs and another for small dogs. There should be sufficient bags dispensers and trash cans to encourage owners to pick up after their pet.
Generally, you just need a safe, accessible location with adequate drainage and a grassy area that is mowed routinely, and signs that specify park hours and rules. In calculating the cost of equipping the animal shelter, you should consider all that is needed in the administrative building like computers, office furniture, telephone, printers and photocopiers and CCTV.
Vet Clinic is still an important part of an animal shelter because once the rescued pets are in the shelter, a vet doctor assesses the pet to know if they are ok and the necessary treatments to administer. During this period, they provide animal euthanasia and carry out spraying and neutering where necessary.
They also go ahead to administer the necessary pet care services; they give the pets vaccinations and medications and finally arrange or put the rescued pets up for adoption or reunite them with their owners for a fee. Equipping the vet clinic is part of the expenditure grouped under amenities.
In Conclusion,
Please note that this is a rough estimate and we usually advise our readers who are interested in constructing an animal shelter to go to the market or directly contact wholesalers and suppliers of the major materials they need in order to get the real time prices of these items. The truth is that if you are a good bargainer, you can get a better deal that will help you beat down the estimated price as listed above.