A Guide to Room Additions

There isn't a bigger investment you're likely to make in your entire life than your home. Taking care of and improving this investment should be one of your highest priorities. And, while you cannot change the location of your house, you can change the size with room additions. Room additions make it possible for you to add serious value to your home - if it is done right. Room additions are notoriously tricky and difficult, but you'll find that room additions can be one of the most satisfying and financially rewarding improvements you can make to your home.

While room additions are certainly appealing, they can be extraordinarily tricky. In most cases, room additions are more difficult than building a small house. Room additions need to "match" existing construction in several ways - least of all the foundations, flooring and roof line and pitch. In other words, room additions are not do-it-yourself jobs. You absolutely need a contractor for this job. In fact, picking the right contractor is beyond crucial for this difficult and tricky job.

Room additions are most likely to fail in the lining up of the floors. Invariably, most room additions are prone to humps or dips where the addition meets the existing room. It's usually a mistake in calculating the floor height. To ensure correct calculation of the foundation height, it should be measured where the connection point between the addition and existing room will be. Ideally, your contractor will have a cross-section cut right where the room will be added or expanded, so that every layer of the floor, subfloor and foundation are exposed. Here then, the proper measurements for your room addition can be made.

Additionally, having the proper roof line is another tricky step in room additions. Again, removing the exterior wall treatments to correctly identify the size and height of rafters, overhang and roof pitch are all crucial in matching your room additions to your home - not to mention the treatments.

Finally, room additions put an unusual strain on your plumbing, electrical and heating and cooling systems. While plumbing and electrical are certainly obnoxious, it is in heating and cooling that room additions are especially irritating. Probably, your furnace or air conditioner was installed to accurately heat and cool your home at its present site - the room additions will weaken your system substantially, raising heating and cooling costs.

Room additions are an excellent way to increase value on your home, but the path to this particular remodel is full of problems and issues. Having an excellent contractor (and even more patience) is integral.