Why Survival Bunkers Are So Expensive | So Expensive

[Music] buying a survival bunker used to be just something for doomsdayers and survivalists but this factory in texas can't keep up with demand because of the pandemic people want these like yesterday they want them so bad they'll pay up to get them right now the most basic habitable bunkers start at 50 000 not including installation but if you want to include a movie theater pool and rock climbing wall you can spend as much as 4.5 million dollars so why do people spend this kind of cash on something they might never use and why are bunkers so expensive meet ron hubbard not the founder of scientology just ron the founder of atlas survival shelters so how do you get prepared well you get your food and water but once you have all that you're going to need a bunker and that's when i come into play he sells bunkers out of his 10 acre factory in sulphur springs texas first and foremost we want to make sure that the bunkers are airtight because god forbid any kind of airborne plague or smoke chemical warfare biological warfare whatever ron says he builds about 24 bunkers a year that are the size of homes as well as hundreds of smaller storm shelters he says there's a real demand for an underground escape pandemic and politics aside conservative or liberal you just got to be concerned for the safety of your family in case this country ever ends up into any kind of revolution civil war or if we go into some kind of world war the craze for bunkers is not exactly new a new housing development near denver colorado shows the nation's first model homes with built-in fallout shelters thousands of americans built their own nuclear fallout shelters at the height of the cold war in the 1950s and 60s they were made out of steel to protect against radiation larry hall converted a cold war nuclear missile silo in central kansas into a 15-story inverted skyscraper the government decommissioned the silo and larry bought it for three hundred thousand dollars in 2008. whether it was kim jong-un before this or iran with the previous threats or when barack obama was elected as president or when donald trump was elected as president i mean people have a variety of fears the survival condo project has 12 apartments some costing up to 4.5 million dollars each so far he's sold all but two of the condos we have residential level 5 6 7 8 9 10 and 11. then there's a librarian classroom a theater and lounge exercise and spa we also have a sauna complete with different colored mood lighting after all if you're going to spend a serious amount of time trying to survive underground and if you can afford it you may as well thrive in recent years personalized disaster prep has grown into a multi-million dollar business at least 13.2 million americans say they have plans and provisions in place to survive a month or more without power running water or transportation prepping can simply mean storing a number of items to help cope during a blackout or having a storm shelter to survive tornadoes and hurricane force winds since the start of 2021 storm shelter sales are up 30 that's on top of a 35 increase the previous year possibly part of what has driven that increase in sales is that 2020 was such a traumatic year for all of us so putting a storm shelter in place for their family was something they could control they could actually impact and have have some control over the safety of their family but bunkers are in a different league ron sells bunkers with a variety of add-ons like escape tunnels and hidden doors so this typically will have a secret passage leading to a secret hatch going down to a secret room this isn't our grandfather's bomb shelter they have all the bells and whistles that you would have in a house i mean if you if you can have it in the house you can have it in the bunker this model costs about five hundred thousand dollars and fits three private bedrooms two bathrooms a kitchen dining room living room and a game room ron says he has over a year's worth of back orders even though prices for the materials to build the bunkers have gone up between 15 and 20 percent since last november the cost of wood is tripled the cost of steel's triple the cost of gas is doubled everything's gone through the roof some people decide to build their own shelters about 60 miles outside of dallas a doctor in his 40s built his own 1200 square foot bunker he asked to remain anonymous about his labor of love i look at this as kind of like life insurance and disability insurance it's something that you have if you can afford it so far he's spent around a hundred thousand dollars on the bunker that sits underneath his home and has yet to actually use i don't advertise it um i don't mind when i have family or friends over them i'll give them to her show it but publicly i don't want everyone to know about it but what makes a bunker so costly the pretty things like the stainless steel appliances and nicer furniture and the higher ceilings are all really relatively low cost the things that are the cost drivers are the life support systems those are tremendously expensive bunkers are made of steel and concrete it took the doctor about a year and 22 thousand dollars worth of materials to plan and engineer his bunker he paid an excavation company twelve thousand two hundred dollars to dig a hole 80 feet long and 50 feet wide and about 16 feet below ground then he built the bunker quickly because he was afraid rain would ruin the excavation work he poured a concrete foundation walls and filled in the dirt around and over it he paid more than twenty thousand dollars for concrete twelve thousand dollars for styrofoam and two thousand dollars for this single door he said he'll invest another thirty thousand dollars to build out a kitchen in other rooms of course he's already stocked the bunker with thirty thousand dollars worth of guns and ammunition pandemic fears are likely to stay strong for years after it's over and the truth is there's always something to fear nobody knows what the future has so the attitude is it's better to have it not need it than to need it not have it [Music] you

Channel: Business Insider

Views: 2,323,252

Keywords: Business Insider, Business News, survival bunker, storm shelter, home, property, pandemic, steel, wood, sytrofoam, build

Id: 82KfhJ3u45g

Length: 7min 10sec (430 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 26 2021