I've been a member of Gold's Gym for almost 2.5 years now and highly recommend it. It's been great to me over the years and the only addition I'd of loved to see would be a pool for laps, but hey you can't win them all. About 6 months ago though, I moved to an apartment a little further away. As a result I haven't been spending as much time in the area, so making the extra long drive hasn't been as appealing. I know I could look for a gym that's closer, but I've been mulling over the idea of converting my single car garage into a home gym.

What I don't want is one of those all in one home gym machines. Too many moving parts to fail, also not a fan of the strict range of movement limitations. A bowflex would probably solve that, but I'd still rather be loading up the barbell or doing squats. I'd like to shoot for around $1000 as well.

What I'm looking at right now is:
Body-Solid Multi-Press Rack
Body-Solid Flat / Incline / Decline Bench
Powerline Vertical Knee Raise / Chin up / Dip Station
300 lb Olympic Barbell Set

This gives me options for chest, shoulders, back, triceps, biceps (woo curling an olympic bar), abs, and legs - in other words, I think I've got all my muscle groups covered - as well as allowing me to do lifts such as cleans or deadlifts. A dumbbell set would make this even more versitile, but that'd cost me over half of what I've already got easily.

Poking through ebay I was able to find the body-solid and powerline equipment for a total of about 200 dollars less (buy it now + shipping) than what is displayed on the site.

My garage space for all of this is somewhere around 10x12 feet as I've got a few things I'm storing in there eating up a bit of real estate.

Now here's where it gets a little tricky for me.

I'm renting.

I love the space, and am by far the happiest I've ever been where I am right now. But do I really want to invest in something like this with a location I don't own? If for whatever reason I had to move I'd then be limiting myself to finding another place with a private garage, or at least an extra room for me to then convert. I'm living in the Los Angeles area by the way, so I'm not sure how many more places like this exist without driving an hour in for work (I'm currently close enough to safely ride my bike, which is ideal).

I'd also like to lay down some sort of protective mat I think. The best I was able to turn up from google comes out at roughly $1.70 / sq ft for 1/4" thick rubber (I think it was 1/4"). eBay gives me some New Daytona high density foam tiles that I could probably score for less although I'd have to win the auction. Overall we're looking at 120 square feet, although I may end up cutting that in half.

I'm a little concerned about the possibilty of rust since I'm potentially purchasing a lot of steel and storing it all in a garage. We don't see much rain here most of the year, but I live maybe a mile or so inland from the ocean. So as far as humidity goes, maybe enough to be concerned? Preventive measures such as marine jelly, powder coating? Or just not worry about it?

As far as saving me money from membership fees, this system wouldn't pay for itself for about 5 years, unless you factored in gas money in which case it would be a lot sooner, so that really isn't my motivation for the purchase.

So my main questions are - Any suggestions on cheap protective gym flooring? And should I worry about rust or not?

I'm also interested in hearing thoughts on the proposed setup. If I should swap equipment, or even just suck it up and make the commute to Gold's / find a closer gym.

Thanks guys.