You are determined to expand your home. What solutions are available to you? What are the prerequisites for enlarging your house according to the different options? What budget to plan? Home additions can be a great way to maximize the space that you have. Read the information in this guide to learn about the benefits of extending your house.
Table of contents
- 1. The veranda to bring light into your home
- 2. The elevation if the space of your land is limited
- 3. The extension allows you to furnish any room
- 4. The attic layout to exploit the available space
- 5. The outbuilding in the garden for more privacy
- 6. You get more space at an affordable price!
- 7. You avoid moving and having to relocate the family
- 8. You increase the value of your property
- 9. You continue to benefit from your advantageous location
- 10. You avoid having to pay moving costs
- The Final Thoughts
1. The veranda to bring light into your home
The first solution is to build a veranda to enlarge your house. If it is elegant, bright and modern, it allows you to extend a living space such as the living room or the dining room, or even to install an office from which you can contemplate your garden. But beware, the veranda is not a solution for everything, because it does not allow you to arrange a more intimate space: bedroom, bathroom or even kitchen, because the back of the furniture will be visible from the outside the veranda.
2. The elevation if the space of your land is limited
You can raise the roof of the house in order to create or raise a floor in your house. This solution is ideal if you have little space available on your land because this extension of the house will have no footprint. The other advantage is the wide variety of parts that you can arrange: it can be bedrooms, bathrooms, an office or even a studio. However, it is impossible to enlarge a living room such as the living room or the dining room. In addition, note that you will need to dedicate a space to the staircase that will allow you to access the raised floor. Do not forget the administrative procedures inherent in your expansion project. Depending on the area created, you will have to either file a declaration of work or apply for a building permit.
3. The extension allows you to furnish any room
Extension from the side consists of creating additional space directly on the ground floor of your house. This solution allows you to envisage absolutely all the possible scenarios: enlargement of the living rooms (living room, dining room, kitchen), creation of one or more additional bedrooms or an office, even a bathroom. You must, however, have enough space on your land whose available size will be reduced and think about the access between the main living accommodation and the module that will be added. It would indeed be a shame to have to go outside to be able to access the extended part of the house.
4. The attic layout to exploit the available space
The attic layout allows you to exploit an already existing space in your house. You can plan to create bedrooms, an office, bathrooms, or even an entire studio. But this project requires usable roof spaces, whose height is much greater than 1.80 meters, and that the frame does not encroach on the surface of the floor. In addition, you will have to install electricity, or even the water supply, without forgetting to reinforce the insulation.
5. The outbuilding in the garden for more privacy
Developing an outbuilding in the garden is particularly suitable for certain cases. If you have to lodge your elderly parents, you want to benefit from an independent space but close to the accommodation for your teenager, or you want to rent a studio to a student or tourists: dependence is then indicated. It is, therefore, less suitable if you need to enlarge the living areas, or if you want additional rooms to accommodate your young children. In addition, you will need enough free space to install this dependency.
Adding floors should definitely be one of the best options available to you.
You do not necessarily need to move when your house starts to become too small for your family.
With current technologies and the right professionals, it is possible to expand your home at very attractive costs!
Adding a floor to your house could, therefore, be the solution to enlarge the living space of your house while offering you a host of advantages.
We have taken the time to put together for you a list of the 6 main advantages of expanding your home by adding an additional floor instead of moving to a new house.
6. You get more space at an affordable price!
Adding a floor to your existing house comes with one main undeniable advantage, that of offering you much more living space at a fairly affordable price.
You can indeed transform your 2-3-bedroom bungalow or 2-story house with 5-6 bedrooms simply by adding one floor.
You will then have space for all the children, and even often additional space to make an office, a guest bedroom, a playroom, etc.
It very often costs you less to add a floor to your house than to sell to buy a larger house in the same neighborhood.
For example, you own a $260,000 bungalow and hesitate between adding a floor or buying a 2-story house larger in the same neighborhood which sells for $380,000.
You make your requests for quotes and realize that your plan to add a floor would cost you $ 100,000. There is a difference of $20,000, which is not negligible.
Each house and each project are obviously different, but it is definitely worth looking at the figures because the addition of the floor can often allow you to save a lot of space at a lower cost, without having to move.
Tell yourself that buying a turnkey from an owner is often more expensive than doing the work yourself via a qualified contractor. It’s up to you to do your homework if your situation lends itself to such a project.
One thing is certain, we are convinced that adding a floor is an innovative way to solve your space problem and that it also offers you several other advantages.
7. You avoid moving and having to relocate the family
Nobody likes to spend hours in the traffic to get the simplest things done. Changing neighborhoods, sometimes schools can be difficult for children and moving can often cost thousands of dollars.
The stress of moving, packaging boxes, changes in children’s lifestyle and more can be avoided with the addition of a floor.
In addition, when you move, you are not guaranteed to find a larger house in the same neighborhood or sector.
Sometimes you will have to move away, which can cause children to change schools. Many things to think about to solve a space problem.
8. You increase the value of your property
During an addition project, the money you invest is almost immediately fully recovered as an increase in value in your property.
Adding a floor to your current home is therefore not an expense, but an investment that often turns out to be profitable.
The quality of the constructions is very important, and our team is precisely busy delivering projects of the optimal quality so that your house gains the most value possible.
The advantage of adding a floor is that it is an investment because the money you spend on work increases the market value of your home.
To ensure an optimal result, it takes you the right team!
9. You continue to benefit from your advantageous location
Many homeowners do not want to move because they love the location of their property.
Some areas are very popular, and it is sometimes difficult to find good houses for sale or even get their hands on them because of the popularity of the area.
If you lack space, instead of moving to another area and giving up your beautiful location, why not just expand your current property?
Our team will be able to set up a project with you that will solve your space problem without having to compromise on your location.
You can continue to enjoy the neighborhood you love so much. For many owners, expanding and thus being able to continue living in the same district is worth gold!
10. You avoid having to pay moving costs
Moving is expensive!
When doing the math, changing houses can cost over $20,000 in miscellaneous fees, not to mention the higher price of the house.
It gives you the advantage of avoiding all these costs and only paying for materials and labor to enlarge your property. In the end, you very often come out as a winner!
You also save TIME, because you don’t have to fill and unpack boxes, undergo visits to sell your current home, wait for buyers to be ready, etc.
If you add a floor, your contractor can take care of everything from start to finish and deliver your turnkey project.
You will avoid significant costs related to your move in addition to saving time.
The Final Thoughts
You will have the opportunity to customize your extension according to your tastes. Instead of moving into a new, larger house that has been decorated to the tastes of the former owner, you can choose the materials, finish, paint and all the details of your plan to add a storey. You will be able to choose the finishing materials and be 100% sure that the result meets your expectations!