What should you check when your shipping container is delivered?
Before the driver leaves, walk the outside, open and close both doors, step inside with the doors shut to look for daylight, and walk the floor for soft spots. Photograph anything wrong, note it on the delivery paperwork, and tell the seller the same day.
Outside and doors
Walk all four sides and look at the roof from a ladder if you can. Dents and surface rust are normal on a used box, but holes, rust-through and a roof that dips enough to hold water are not.
Open and close both doors. They should swing, latch onto the locking bars and seal. If they bind, the box may just need leveling; see how to level a container. Check the rubber door gaskets for tears.
Inside: the daylight test and the floor
Step in, have someone close the doors, and look for pinpoints of light in the walls, roof and corners. Light means a hole, and a hole means water. Then walk the whole floor. Soft spots or delaminated plywood are worth noting.
Check that the box matches the grade you paid for. A wind-and-watertight box should pass the daylight test. A one-trip box should look near-new inside. One-trip vs used says what each grade promises.
If something is wrong
Take photos with the date showing, write the problem on the delivery paperwork before you sign, and contact the seller the same day. A small leak at a seam is often a patch, and leak patches are on the accessories page.
Do the inspection before you load anything in. Once it is full, problems are harder to see and harder to fix. Prepare for delivery covers the day itself.
Buying a container?
Longleaf sells used and one-trip 20ft and 40ft shipping containers, delivered by tilt-bed across the Pine Belt. Enter your ZIP for the delivered price — it comes straight from the supplier feed and already includes the haul. Locks, vents, shelving and lights are on the accessories page. We sell; we do not rent.
Keep reading
- How do you prep the ground for a shipping container? — How to prep the ground for a shipping container: gravel pad or corner blocks, drainage, what to avoid, Yazoo clay in the Jackson metro, and the truck's run.
- How to level a shipping container on pasture, sand, clay or a gravel pad — How to level a shipping container with a bottle jack and blocks on pasture, Pine Belt sand, Jackson clay or gravel, how to tell it is off, and when to re-level.
- Which accessories make a shipping container usable: locks, vents, shelving and more — Which shipping container accessories to buy first: a lock box and padlock, vents, solar lights, no-drill shelving, a leveling jack and ramps, in order.
- 20ft vs 40ft: which container should you buy? — 20ft vs 40ft shipping container: how much each holds, why the 40 is the better value per square foot, and why the 100 feet a 40ft needs usually decides it.
- Where to buy a shipping container in Mississippi: dealers, depots and delivered online sellers compared — Where to buy a shipping container in Mississippi: local dealers, depots and delivered sellers compared, plus the questions that show the real delivered cost.
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