Dive Brief:

• Two part-time residential landlords in Washington, D.C., are moving 18 decommissioned shipping containers onto a lot where they used to own a house and they're hoping that knocking down the house was the right choice.
• Matthew Grace and Sean Joiner work together at a financial services company, played football together at nearby Catholic University, and decided that an architect they know at Catholic might not be crazy when he suggested the containers because the cost of renovating their rental house was more than they could afford.
• Architect Travis Price says the goal is to create pleasant spaces that do not feel like living in boxes, but to do it without extensive and expensive changes.

Dive Insight:

The partners are not disclosing what they paid for the big boxes, which can go for $2,000 each. The plan is to sit the 18 containers on a basement, six containers to a level above it, to create four apartments with six bedrooms and six bathrooms each. A plastic-encased staircase will be external.