***Need help/advice with new home under construction***
My builder broke ground this week to dig and next week will be starting the foundation, I recently toured the same home as I'm building and realized that I didn't upgrade to an option that adds a 4' x 15' family room extension. The family room is very small (15' x 15') and an extra four feet would make a huge difference. The builder won't allow to make this change since the construction has started. I'm building a story and half home so the kitchen area is further extended 4' out then the family room bumps in for the 4' and the master bedroom is extended 4' out. I'm wondering what options there are to extended out that family room for the section that will be bumped in? I don't know if there is a way during the framing process to try to make this fix or even after the house is complete what options there are. Is there a way during the framing to extend across for the bump in to build on without it having a foundation below? I was also thinking of cantilever after construction but a cantilever on four feet probably won't be ideal, I was even thinking after construction knowing it will be a ton of work possibly demoing the family room wall and if the extension could be anchored off the kitchen and master bedroom framing to extended across or my last thought was to add a three season rooms and extend out past where the extension would be. Please help with thoughts or ideas?
Comments (15)
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5 years agoUser
5 years agolast modified: 5 years agoRelated Discussions
New home under construction. Foundation exposed 30 inches.
Comments (21)"why don't they simply dig a bigger hole and bring in a different kind of non-clay soil that doesn't need hydration?" When you dig a hole in clay soil, you end up with a hole that holds water. We use bentonite to build earthen dams. If you put other soil in that hole, all you get is a mud hole. Such a system works better in theory than reality. "We do that all the time for septic systems up here where you have bad soil." The drain field does not have a foundation to damage. The drain field is engineered to be able to handle a specific amount of water, and can handle the occasional 1" of water at a time during the rainy season without permanent damage. If you apply this strategy to the house foundation, you need to be able to pump out all the water that comes off the roof in a hurry, before it causes damage. This can easily be 600 gallons or more. Now, where do you put that water? You can not pump it over to the neighbor's lot, and a french drain will not drain fast enough in clay soils. You could add a 1500 gallon cistern and hope you never get that 100 year rain, and that that cistern doesn't crack like the foundation you are trying to protect. Such a system of putting other soils in a clay lined hole has a lot more maintenance than just watering the foundation. If the rain gutter downspouts do not go into a splash block that extends out into the yard 6', the water will find its way back to the hole you provided. You can't begin to imagine how many houses I have had to go back to to put the splash blocks back where they belong because the owner moved them because they were in the way of mowing the lawn. Or, where they add landscape edging that blocks the water from going out into the yard instead of back to the foundation. Now, if the pump that is supposed to drain the foundation doesn't work because nobody bothered to maintain it, you end up with a bigger disaster than if you never dug a hole for the water to go into in the first place. Clay soils wreak havoc on drain tile as the very fine particles eventually filter down and clog it. Read the link below, and you will see that the best practices are to build UP, leaving the natural drainage plane intact, instead of digging down into a hole, thus the reason for that much foundation showing. http://www.foundationperformance.org/projects/fpa-sc-01-0.pdf...See MoreNeed advice on new home construction - home office
Comments (5)If you decide you aren’t going to have the desk against a wall, put a floor outlet in now so that you don’t have cables running across the floor. I did a floor plan with my desk and rug then figured out where I would need sockets....See Morejumbo construction loan with new construction ADVICE needed!
Comments (19)My husband and I ran into a similar problem when we had our big addition/remodel. What my husband did was contacted both the bank and the appraisal company and showed them our building plans and asked that they base the appraisal on the prospective build out. The bank worked with us. The residential lending officers actually visited our home on three separate occasions to ensure that we were in fact upgrading the home to the level we proposed we would, understandably they needed to ensure their money was going where it should be. So about midway through the project they increased our construction loan by 25,000, and 3/4 into the project they gave us the final 40,000 they agreed to lend us. This was still about 25,000 shy of our desired amount. In addition to our discussion with the bank, we sat with the contractor and asked where we could cut some corners. He offered us the opportunity to do some “homework” throughout the project which included cleaning up the work site at the end of the day ourselves and preparing the area for the following day, drilling holes in the framing to save a ton of time that we would normally pay the electricians 125 per hour to do, and the biggest savings was painting the house ourselves. You may not have the time or desire to do this much hands on but I gotta day not only did we save enough to complete the project, but we came in under budget enough to furnish a few of the rooms. Best of Luck!...See MoreNew home construction, electrical backup power need advice
Comments (4)You don't really want a generator charging an EV. The outputs from small generators doesn't always work well (dirty a/c waves). Plus, it is a lot of power. Your other loads add up to less than a kw whereas EV charging can be 10 kw. You probably should always have a backup plan for EV charging that doesn't involve your own generator. You would have to live pretty rural for this to be a problem. If you do live that rural, it wouldn't hurt to keep a really old gas car for emergencies - and our household has been EV only for over 5 years. We have 100s of public charging within range (one 1/2 mile away) and 3 superchargers within 20 miles, 9 within 60 miles. And Mark has a good simple answer. You should have them involved early. Should have been earlier but the earlier the better. Planning battery and invertor locations helps a lot with wiring now....See MoreHU-7426698511838
5 years ago
mama goose_gw zn6OH
5 years agoIf the builder is that inflexible about the footprint, you might not have any latitude in floor plan, but if you opt for the slider, and no breakfast nook, you could have a much better kitchen. The range hood would be a focal point on the back wall, and you could prep while facing the family room.
The small cabinet in the top right corner of the kitchen could house a coffee/drinks center, or could hold dishes for easy unloading from the DW. In this plan a helper can load or unload the DW while someone else is prepping or cooking. If you find a way to extend the FR, the coffee/drinks station could be between the slider and the FR window, facing the front of the house. Sorry this is blurry:
Denita
5 years agoloobab
5 years agolast modified: 5 years agorockybird
5 years agolast modified: 5 years agoUser
5 years ago
Rebecca Hansen
5 years agoHU-7426698511838
5 years agoloobab
5 years agoRebecca Hansen
5 years agoloobab
5 years agomama goose_gw zn6OH
5 years agolast modified: 5 years agoNot sure if this is what loobab had in mind for the kitchen, but here's a longer, narrower DR, and enlarged FR, with a galley. I left the seating at the island, but you could omit the seating as suggested, and have a wider aisle, with a pony wall and high ledge to hide dishes and contain splashes from the sink.
If structurally possible, maybe you could use columns for support, to give the spaces a more open feel, so it would seem larger.
Kristin Petro Interiors, Inc.