Garage Conversion

This was a garage conversion that changed the house from a two bedroom 1.5 bath house into a 3 bedroom 2 bath house.

We removed the designated parking in the garage, and zoning laws prohibited us from relocating it to the front yard setback. A parking space had to be added on the alley in order to get around this requirement. With the lack of on-street parking in this area, it is understandable that the city would encourage parking on the alley.

We put a new primary bedroom and walk-in closet in the garage. We also removed a DIY bathroom addition in the back of the garage, and added a new bathroom with double vanities and a tub/shower combo.

This scope of work also included remodeling the smaller upstairs bathroom, and fixing a leaking front porch.

We started with the front porch, since it was leaking. It was remodeled the year before and didn’t make it but a few months into the rainy season. You can see why from the pictures.

The previous homeowner enclosed an open entry deck without doing any waterproofing. This seemed to have been done for the home sale the previous year.

The decking was put down on OSB plywood, then painted. Below that, there was a little insulation, then drywall and a light fixture. This was built to last around 6 months, and it didn’t make it that far.

In addition to the lack of waterproofing, they added the CMU walls below the deck with little mortar, and to a height below ground level. You can see the original post and footing in this image, as well as the dirt level above the concrete block. All of these things contributed to this area being wet and moldy, just a few months into the first winter.

Here are some pictures of the repair, insulation and waterproofing. This was all inspected and approved as part of the permitted work for the garage conversion.