Around the Bay Area, a significant remodel typically means leaving a few key walls up and demolishing the rest, keeping your existing foundation, expanding your foundation, and likely adding a second story. Having built a house as a significant remodel and having built a few houses from scratch, I can tell you that there are benefits both ways.
Here are the benefits of doing the “remodel”:
- You might get to keep your existing setbacks that may not conform to current standards.
- You won’t have the cost of concrete for the portion of the foundation you are keeping.
- You won’t have the cost of the subfloor for the portion of the floor you are keeping.
- Likely an easier Planning Department process. In San Carlos, where I will soon be building my new house, the Planning process is expected to take 4-6 months on new construction and the requirements of notification and process are quite onerous. However, in Redwood City and Menlo Park, the additional work/time going through Planning for a new construction vs a remodel was minimal.
- You might be able to get away with not doing fire sprinklers if your addition is small enough (e.g. addition of less than 400-500 sq. ft. and not tearing out drywall in the existing structure).
- Currently, you would not be required to add solar panels.
- Currently, you would be able to keep a gas furnace and gas water heater. Most Bay Area cities are now banning these on new constructions.
Here are the benefits of doing a new construction:
- You’ll save significant labor (and maybe time) by not retrofitting the existing foundation that will likely need significant upgrades for seismic loads and the added upstairs because it can be done mostly with machines.
- You’ll save yourself the unknown of doing exploration on the existing foundation to find out its condition and how much rebar is in there.
- You’ll have a brand new foundation that will last for another 100 years.
- You won’t have to deal with a possibly less optimal layout.
- You can go higher on your ceilings.
- You may not have to use rigid insulation to meet Title 24 requirements because you’ll have 6” walls. Title 24 compliance is still required on significant remodels.
- You don’t have the risk of your contractor knocking down walls they are supposed to keep and potentially causing you to go through the new construction permitting process (I’ve heard it happen before).
The main reason that I hear that people typically go through the “remodel” process instead of new construction is that they believe that they are going to save significantly on property taxes. This is typically a myth and an issue that I address here.