Creating More Habitable Space In Your Home

Given the tight housing market, many people who want to increase the useable space in their homes with larger or additional rooms can accomplish this in one of three ways: Construct an addition to the structure, increase the attic space to create a new room, or excavate the crawlspace to create a habitable basement.

Constructing an addition to your home to create more living space is the most expensive approach and often the most time consuming. Building an addition to your home initially requires proof of proper setbacks from the property line, which often is a minimum of five feet from the side property lines, or ten feet or more from the front and rear property lines. A plan set for an addition to the home will require:

1) zoning approval, often difficult if you have critical neighbors, and time consuming given the architectural and engineering details for the plan set,

2) a review with several city housing departments that are not required to provide efficient reviews and approval, and

3) an addition to the home’s foundation and the structural connection to it, a new roof addition, and extensive structural connections to the existing structure’s framing that includes a multitude of critically important waterproofing details.

An addition to an existing home is the most expensive and time-consuming process for adding habitable space.

Creating a habitable space in the attic of an existing home requires code-conforming head room of seven to seven-and-one-half feet from finished floor to the ceiling in the area that constitutes the new habitable room space. Additionally, creating a room in the attic may often require upgrading of the joists to support the additional floor loads without deflection. Adding insulation to the floor and roof framing is important for energy efficiency regarding room heating. Finally, creating a stairway to the new attic room must conform to the building code with proper rise and run, headroom, and a handrail.

To create a new room in what may be a crawlspace and/or an existing utility basement requires compliance with head room heights of seven to seven-and-one-half feet. Often the existing foundation will need to be deepened with proper structural design and connections to the existing foundation. Extensive excavation beneath the first floor requires an engineered support system for the structure until the foundation work is completed. New deepened exterior drainage and waterproofing details for the deepened foundation and new basement slab floor are critical to ensure its ongoing habitability. And the stairway to the basement room must have the proper head clearance, and a code-conforming rise and run of the stair treads and handrail.