How To Prepare for a Room Addition

There are many reasons why a homeowner would choose to increase the size of their property. Those reasons could involve a new addition to the family, space for an office, or the homeowner may require extra space for some other reason. Additional rooms involve demands, a goal and a list of requirements that should be met before the project gets underway. The first thing on the agenda should be to figure out how much money you will have to work with before you can get started.

Finalizing your decision

An addition can be a costly exercise and the responsibility involved can become a little overwhelming if you don’t think the whole thing through. Before jumping off the deep end, make very sure that there is no way to get around this addition, if only for the fact that it is going to require some juggling of funds. Financing can be attained through a personal loan from the bank or dipping into your savings if you happen to have it.

Qualifications are key

Unless you plan on doing the job yourself; you need to think in terms of what sort of a contractor you require to handle the task. This is not like replacing some pipes, or a window that the neighborhood kids broke with a ball; this is an entire room, which usually comes with walls, a ceiling, electrical wiring, and everything else that comes with a house, so make certain that your contractor has done this work of thing before.

A design that makes sense

There may be certain things that you may be able to get away with as you plan on your room addition, but a good set of blueprints should not be one of them. This may just be a few walls, a ceiling, and a floor, however, depending on what you need the addition for you will have to think in terms of how many electrical outlets you need, and if you plan on using a window AC unit or try to extend the ductwork from the central air.

Shop around

Keep in mind that this is not necessarily a small job so the average contractor would be only too happy to do it for you. Rather than let your fingers do the walking, consider calling a few reputable contracting firms and let them put a bid in order to handle the job for you. This will give you more than one option as far as a contractor is concerned and in addition to that, you will have a few prices to choose from.

Making it legal

Most general contractors will usually remind you that building permits are required, in fact; some will actually apply for the permits for you. If you don’t have a permit work cannot begin and considering the fact that it is your home, at the very least you will need to make sure that the permits are in hand. In addition to that, whatever contractor you end up with, double-check that they are licensed and insured before they get started.