Everything we get asked, in one place

A kitchen with new cabinets, countertops, tile and paint is a job measured in weeks of on-site work, not days. The two items that most often set the schedule are cabinet lead time, which is decided the day you place the order, and countertop fabrication, which is set by the fabricator's shop schedule and runs from template day to install day because the slab cannot be templated until the cabinets are set and level. Structural changes, inspections and any rot or termite repair found during demolition add time on top of that.

Sometimes, but the slab decides. If the house is on a post-tension slab, the tendons have to be located before anyone cuts or cores concrete, and if a cable runs where the new drain needs to go, the drain does not go there. When relocation is not workable we either build the layout around the existing rough-in, or locate the tendons and cut and re-pour a section of slab for the new drain, which adds framing, concrete and schedule to the job.

It depends on the scope and on who has jurisdiction over your address. Replacing cabinets and counters in the same footprint is usually cosmetic, while new circuits, moved plumbing, and removing a wall are the items that typically require a permit and inspection. Inside the city, permits are issued by the Houston Permitting Center; in unincorporated Harris County the county handles it, and the surrounding counties and incorporated suburbs each run their own permit offices, so the process and the required drawings vary by address.

Running the floor wall to wall and setting cabinets on top is the cleaner method, and it is what we prefer when the flooring is going in as part of the same project. It keeps the dishwasher opening at full height, avoids a filler strip at the toe kick, and lets a future appliance slide in and out without fighting a lip of tile. Stopping at the toe kick saves material but locks you into that appliance height, so it makes sense mainly when the existing cabinets are staying. This overlaps with our flooring installation and tile installation work, and we plan the two trades together.

Usually yes, with some planning. We seal the opening with plastic and zipper doors, protect the path in and out, and keep the water off only for the short windows when the plumbing is actually being worked on. Plan a temporary kitchen somewhere else in the house with the refrigerator, a microwave and a coffee maker, because the range and sink are out of service for most of the job.

Layout changes cost more than finishes. Moving plumbing, adding circuits, ducting a hood to the exterior, or removing a load-bearing wall each pull in framing, rough-in and inspection work that a same-footprint kitchen never touches. After that, the biggest swings are cabinet construction and door style, countertop material and edge detail, and tile size and pattern, since large-format and herringbone layouts take far longer to set than a straight running bond.

A hall bath being refinished without moving plumbing generally runs a couple of weeks of active work; a primary bath taken to the studs with a relocated fixture, custom tile and frameless glass runs considerably longer. The schedule is driven less by labor than by three things: how early your selections are locked, inspection scheduling if the work is permitted, and shower glass, which cannot be measured until the tile is finished and then has to be fabricated. We give you a working sequence at the start and tell you when the room will be unusable.

It depends on the work and on the address. Replacing tile, a vanity, a toilet in the same location or a light fixture is normally treated as finish work, while relocating drains, adding circuits or altering framing generally requires a permit and inspections. Inside the city limits that goes through the Houston Permitting Center, in unincorporated Harris County through the county, and the surrounding counties and incorporated suburbs each run their own offices. On top of that, your deed restrictions or HOA may have their own requirements, since Houston relies on those rather than conventional zoning.

Usually yes, but it means cutting concrete, and on a post-tension slab the cables have to be located and marked before any cutting starts. That adds scanning, careful saw work, re-plumbing below the slab and a proper concrete patch, so it is real money rather than a small change order. Before committing, it is worth seeing whether an offset flange or a few inches of fixture movement gets you most of the layout you wanted without opening the floor at all.

The biggest levers are whether plumbing moves, how large the wet area is, and how much of the wall gets tiled, because tile is labor before it is material. After that come tile format and pattern, since large-format and herringbone both take longer to set than a straight lay, along with frameless glass, the vanity and countertop, and anything discovered behind the walls once demolition starts. We price from what is actually in the room rather than a per-square-foot average, and unknowns are called out as unknowns up front.

If the house has only one tub, it is usually worth keeping a tub somewhere in the house, both for resale and for families with small children. A tub-to-shower conversion in the same footprint is straightforward; a curbless entry is not, because the pan has to be recessed into the floor, which on a slab means cutting concrete and on a pier-and-beam house means dropping or sistering the framing. If you want a low-threshold shower without that work, a low curb with a well-designed slope gets you most of the way.

Ask which waterproofing system is being used and whether it is a bonded sheet or liquid-applied membrane, then ask to see photographs of the corners, the curb and the drain flange before tile covers them. Ask for the flood test described above, and ask to see the result yourself rather than being told it passed. A remodeler who waterproofs properly will have no problem showing you either one, because that stage is the part of the job worth photographing.

Sometimes, but it is rarely the better answer. Tile can be installed over sound, well-bonded tile, and vinyl plank can float over tile once the grout joints are filled flat, but both raise the finished floor, which affects door swing, appliance height under a countertop, and every threshold in the house. If the existing tile sounds hollow when you tap it, there are voids or a failing bond underneath, and those areas should come out rather than be built over. Removal is dusty and adds labor, but it lets us see and correct the substrate instead of building on top of an unknown.

We test it rather than assume. Relative humidity probes drilled into the slab and read after they equilibrate give the moisture condition inside the concrete, and calcium chloride testing measures what is coming off the surface. Taping a square of plastic to the floor overnight will show you obvious moisture but tells you nothing about a slab that is marginal. If the readings come back above what the flooring manufacturer allows, the choice is a floating floor, a different product, or a moisture-mitigation system under the adhesive.

A straight crack running through multiple tiles almost always follows a crack in the slab underneath, and new tile set the same way will crack in the same place. Installing over an uncoupling or crack-isolation membrane separates the tile from small slab movement and is the standard fix for a hairline shrinkage crack. If the slab crack has vertical offset, is still widening, or comes with sticking doors and separating door casings, have the foundation evaluated first. New flooring cannot hold a moving slab together.

Both handle humidity well, so the decision usually comes down to water, comfort and substrate condition. Porcelain tile is the right call for bathrooms, laundry rooms and entries where standing water is likely, and it is the more durable surface under dogs and grit. Rigid-core vinyl plank is warmer and quieter underfoot, installs faster, is more forgiving of a hairline crack in the slab, though a click-lock floor actually wants a flatter substrate than standard-size tile does. A common approach is wood-look porcelain in the wet rooms and vinyl plank through the living areas, matched closely enough that the transition reads as intentional.

For a floating floor, yes, or at minimum a shoe molding has to be added. Vinyl plank and floating engineered wood need a quarter-inch expansion gap at every wall, and that gap has to be covered by trim, never filled with caulk or grout, or the floor will bind and peak. Pulling and reinstalling existing base works when the trim is in good shape and the profile is worth saving. Many homeowners use the opportunity to replace short base with taller stock, which is trim carpentry work we do at the same time, and it is a good moment to handle interior painting while the room is already empty.

A floating vinyl plank floor can be walked on and loaded the same day it is finished. Tile is slower: light foot traffic after the mortar sets overnight, grout the next day, and heavier furniture and appliances after the grout has had a couple of days, longer in a humid house where curing slows down. Keep the air conditioning running during and after installation, because that is what actually pulls the moisture out. Silicone at the perimeter and change-of-plane joints goes in last and needs its own cure time before the room gets wet.

Usually yes for sprayed textures like orange peel and knockdown, which we sample on scrap board and adjust before touching your wall. Hand-applied textures from the 1960s and 1970s are harder to reproduce, and a wall that has been repainted several times has a different surface than fresh compound. When a spot match will not hold up in the room's light, we texture the full wall or ceiling corner to corner, which is more labor but is the only way the repair actually disappears.

Most of that time is drying, not working. Compound goes on in three coats and each has to dry through before the next, which in humid Houston air can mean overnight even with the air conditioning running. Setting-type compound shortens the first coats, but the finish coats need real time, and rushing them is why seams show through paint a few months later.

It can be repaired properly, but nothing in a drywall repair stops the slab from moving with the seasons. The right fix cuts the old tape out, re-tapes with paper tape bedded in compound, and treats the corner or wall-to-ceiling joint as a flexible joint with caulk rather than rigid tape. If the crack is wide, still growing, or paired with sticking doors and sloping floors, have a foundation engineer evaluate the house before spending money on the wall.

That depends on the scope of the work and on which office has jurisdiction, so confirm with the local permit office before work starts. Permits attach to what is behind the board, such as removing or altering structure, adding circuits, or moving plumbing, and in those cases the rough-in has to be inspected before drywall covers it. Inside the city that goes through the Houston Permitting Center, in unincorporated Harris County through the county, and the surrounding counties and incorporated suburbs each run their own permit office.

Patched areas are primed as part of the drywall work, because fresh joint compound absorbs paint at a different rate than the old painted wall and reads as a dull halo if it goes straight to color. Painting the room itself is a separate scope, handled under our interior painting service. It is worth doing at the same time, since a repaired wall rarely disappears under a spot coat of the original color, especially on a sheen above flat.

It can be scraped, but test it first. Textured ceiling material in homes built before the mid-1980s can contain asbestos, and a lab test on a small sample settles it before anyone disturbs the material. If it comes back clear, the ceiling is misted, scraped, skimmed flat, then re-textured or finished smooth, which is considerably more finishing work than most homeowners expect from the word scraping.

A single bedroom with sound walls is usually a day. A full interior on an average three-bedroom home, including ceilings, walls, trim and doors, generally runs most of a week. Prep is what moves that number: heavy patching, texture matching, cabinet finishing or a dark-to-light color change each add days, and humid weather adds more because every coat needs its full recoat window.

For normal wall, ceiling and trim work, no. The job is staged room by room so you keep a bedroom and a bathroom in use, and today's waterborne products are far lower in odor than the oil-based enamels they replaced. Cabinet spraying is the exception, since the kitchen gets sealed off with plastic and stays out of service for several days while the enamel hardens.

Sometimes, on a clean wall in the same color and sheen with no repairs in it. Any color change, any sheen change, and any area that was patched or primed needs two finish coats to build an even film and bury the repair. Going from a dark color to a light one usually needs a tinted primer plus two coats, and deep reds and blues can need more.

Yes, if the boxes are solid and the doors are wood or MDF with a finish that is still bonded. The process is the same one described above: degrease, sand to dull, bonding primer, then sprayed enamel on the doors and drawer fronts off the boxes. Peeling thermofoil, water-swollen sink bases and boxes coming apart at the joints are not worth finishing, and that becomes a kitchen remodeling conversation instead.

Those are movement cracks, not paint failure. The clay soil under most of the Houston area swells in wet seasons and shrinks in dry ones, the slab moves, and drywall opens at its weakest point, which is the corner above a door or window header. Cutting out the tape and rebedding it lasts considerably longer than filling the line with caulk, but no surface repair stops what the slab is doing underneath, which is why these can reopen after a wet or drought season.

Paint the ceilings and walls first, install the floor, then set and finish the baseboards or touch up the existing base afterward. That order keeps roller spatter, caulk and sanding dust off a new floor, and it lets the trim be scribed and finished against the surface it actually sits on. When we are handling both the flooring installation and the painting, we schedule it that way from the start.

A roofed structure attached to a house is normally permitted work, and where you apply depends on your address: the Houston Permitting Center inside city limits, Harris County for unincorporated areas, or the city's own office in incorporated suburbs. Requirements differ between those jurisdictions, so we confirm which one covers you before the design is finalized. A permit is also separate from deed restrictions and HOA architectural review, and it is common for both to apply to the same patio.

Attached is the usual choice because it gives a continuous roof line with no gap between two roofs to collect leaves and water, but it means opening into the existing roof or wall and flashing that joint correctly. Freestanding makes sense when the existing eave is too low to get comfortable headroom under a roof tied beneath it, when the wall is not something you want opened, or when the structure needs to sit out in the yard. The deciding factors are almost always eave height, existing roof pitch, and where the cover has to land.

Often yes. Often the existing surface stays. When a paver field is sound it can remain in place, with the new posts set on their own piers instead of bearing on the pavers. What disqualifies an existing surface is settlement, heaving from the clay underneath, or a slope that runs water back toward the house. Note that posts should never sit on a paver field or a thin slab, because that is a concentrated load neither surface was built to carry.

Yes, and it is the most common regret when nobody brings it up beforehand. A solid roof over a back wall full of glass cuts the direct light reaching the adjacent rooms, and the effect is worst with a low plate height and a dark-painted ceiling. It can be managed with a taller plate, an open gable end, a light-colored ceiling, or a section of translucent panel, but those are framing decisions, so they need to be made before the rafters go up rather than after.

The structural risk on an open-sided roof is uplift rather than weight, because wind gets underneath and pulls the roof up. That is why each rafter is tied to the beam with rated metal hardware, the beam is capped or strapped to the posts, and the posts are anchored to concrete piers, so uplift is carried into the concrete by hardware instead of by nails in end grain. No one can promise a specific outcome in a specific storm, but a fully connected framed roof behaves very differently from an awning fastened to a fascia board.

Yes, and the decisions belong in the framing stage, because blocking and box locations have to go in before sheathing and ceiling material. Fixtures and boxes under a patio roof need to be rated for damp or wet locations depending on how exposed they are, and exterior receptacles are GFCI-protected. We frame and block for the layout you want, then coordinate the connections with an electrician.

Often yes, if the job is phased so there is always a working bathroom and some form of kitchen, but phasing makes the schedule longer because crews work in sections instead of everywhere at once. A full gut with the kitchen, the bathrooms and the flooring open at the same time is usually easier to live out of than to live in. The phasing gets planned before demolition so you know in advance which weeks a bathroom or the range is out of service.

A single-room remodel runs on a scale of weeks; a whole house runs on a scale of months, and the honest drivers are how much of the work is permitted and inspected, how quickly selections are locked, and what the demolition uncovers. Cabinets and special-order material set the schedule more often than labor does, because counters, tile, trim and paint all queue behind them. Inspection scheduling and material lead times are the two things nobody controls, so they get reported as soon as they are known rather than absorbed quietly into the calendar.

It depends on the work and on which jurisdiction the property sits in. Cosmetic work such as paint, trim and replacing flooring generally does not require one, while removing a bearing wall, altering or relocating plumbing, adding circuits, changing mechanical work or building a roofed patio cover generally does. Inside city limits that goes through the Houston Permitting Center; in unincorporated Harris County it runs through the county, and the neighboring counties and incorporated suburbs each have their own offices. The permit list is part of the written scope, so the job is not stopped partway through to go get one.

Usually yes, but the first question is whether it carries load from the roof or a second floor, and that is answered by what sits above it and which way the joists run, not by how the wall looks. If it is bearing, the load has to land somewhere else: a header or beam across the opening, sized by the span and by what sits above it, with the load path continued down through posts to a footing or slab bearing point, and that design is what the permit and inspection are about. Wiring, ducts and any plumbing inside the wall have to be rerouted before it comes out, and the ceiling and flooring have to be patched into the opening afterward, which is why the patch is planned before the demolition.

Three things, roughly in order: what is found behind the walls, changes to the scope after work has begun, and selections that move up a grade. Rotted bottom plates, termite damage, undersized drains, aluminum or unpermitted wiring and a slab that is not flat all cost money to correct, and none of them are visible during an estimate. Of the decisions you control, moving plumbing and removing bearing walls have the largest effect, because both pull structural work and inspections into the job.

One crew, one schedule, one scope covering the kitchen, the bathrooms, the floors, the drywall, the paint and the patio. Combining them is worth doing because the sequence matters and the calls are constant. Flooring goes under the cabinets in some designs and around them in others, drywall and texture have to be finished before paint, and the trim carpentry waits on the floors. When one crew is making those calls on one schedule, far less work gets torn back out.

On most jobs the order is flooring, then base and casing, then caulk and final paint coats, because base installed after the finish floor sits down tight to it, so there is no gap left that shoe moulding has to cover. If the flooring is a floating product, the base is still installed to the floor but never fastened through it, and the expansion gap stays open behind the trim. Where the walls are being sprayed, we often prime and paint the trim before installation and touch up joints and nail holes at the end, which gives a cleaner line than brushing everything in place.

Primed MDF is straight, has crisp profiles and takes paint well, which makes it the sensible default for painted base, casing and crown in dry rooms. Finger jointed pine holds up better to bumps and handles moisture at cut ends more forgivingly, and solid poplar or PVC belongs anywhere within splash range of a tub, shower or sink. Stain grade work is a different material conversation entirely, since the species and grain have to match across every piece in the room.

Two things move in a Houston house. The slab rides on expansive clay and shifts with seasonal soil moisture, which tilts walls slightly and opens gaps at the floor along one wall while the opposite wall stays tight, and the wood itself shrinks when indoor humidity drops in winter with the heat running. The joinery described above absorbs a lot of that, and the caulk line at the wall is designed to be cut out and renewed rather than treated as permanent.

Usually, and the first step is cutting a short cross section of the existing profile so it can be compared against stock rather than matched from memory. Some older profiles are still carried in stock, and the ones that are not can often be built up from two or three current pieces, which is usually the cleanest way to get there. If the closest match will read slightly different, we say so up front and give you the option of running the new profile in one full room so the difference falls at a doorway instead of mid wall.

Trim and moulding are finish work, and on their own they are not usually what drives a permit. What drives it is what sits behind the trim, such as removing or altering a bearing wall, moving electrical, or changing a structural opening, and that is permitted through the Houston Permitting Center inside city limits or through Harris County and the surrounding county and suburban offices elsewhere. Since Houston has no conventional zoning, exterior work that shows from the street is more often reviewed by deed restrictions or an HOA architectural committee, and that review is worth checking before an outdoor project starts.

Linear footage is only the starting point. Cost moves with profile size and whether the moulding is a single stick or a built up assembly, the number of inside and outside corners and door openings, ceiling height and access for crown, stain grade versus paint grade, and how far out of level and plumb the existing walls and ceilings are. Matching an obsolete profile and repairing damage found behind old base also add labor, which is why we measure and look behind the trim before quoting anything.

Sometimes. The existing tile has to be solidly bonded with no hollow-sounding pieces, flat within tolerance, and the added height of roughly 1/2 inch has to work with door clearances, appliance heights and transitions to adjacent rooms. In a shower or a bathroom floor where waterproofing is part of the job, the old tile comes out so the membrane can bond to a proper substrate. We sound the existing floor with a tap during the walkthrough and tell you which way it goes.

That pattern almost always means the slab moved and the tile was bonded directly to it with nothing in between. Houston's expansive clay drives that movement seasonally, and without an uncoupling membrane and movement joints the tile and grout have to absorb it. Replacing the cracked tiles alone usually buys a year or two at best. The durable repair is to remove the field, install crack isolation and set movement joints, and if the slab is still shifting significantly, address the foundation before new tile goes down.

Foot traffic on a freshly set floor is generally held off for about 24 hours, and grout goes in after that, with heavy loads and furniture waiting longer. A tiled shower needs the grout to reach full cure per the manufacturer before it gets wet, which is typically several days rather than overnight. Houston humidity slows cement grout drying, so that window can stretch, and we give you the actual dates rather than a rule of thumb.

Cement-based grout is porous and should be sealed once it has fully cured, then refreshed periodically depending on traffic and cleaning products. Epoxy and high-performance grouts do not require sealing, which is part of why they are worth the extra cost in showers and behind a cooktop. Sealer is not a fix for the wrong grout in a wet area, and it never belongs in place of silicone at an inside corner.

Either works. Plenty of homeowners want to pick the tile themselves, in which case we give you the square footage plus overage and the specifics that matter, such as whether the tile is rectified and what thickness it is, so you order the right amount from a single shade lot. If we supply it, the same information goes in the written scope. Keep the leftover box either way, since matching a discontinued tile years later is often impossible.

There is no such thing as a truly zero grout joint. Rectified porcelain can go as tight as about 1/16 inch, while pressed tile such as standard subway usually needs 1/8 inch because the individual pieces vary in size and are slightly warped. A wider joint absorbs that variation and hides it; a joint that is too tight puts every millimeter of difference on display along a long run. For long plank tile, the joint width and a one-third offset work together to keep lippage under control.

The reliable check is from above: if the ceiling joists run perpendicular to the wall and land on or splice over its top plate, that wall is carrying them. Walls under a second-story wall, under a roof strut, or under an attic HVAC platform are carrying load even when they look like a simple partition. Original floor plans and interior finishes tell you almost nothing, so we verify in the attic and, where access allows, below the floor before quoting the work.

Structural alteration generally requires a permit, and in some jurisdictions removing a non-bearing partition does too. Inside city limits that runs through the Houston Permitting Center, unincorporated areas through Harris County, and each surrounding county and incorporated suburb operates its own office. Larger openings typically need a drawing sealed by a Texas professional engineer, and a framing inspection usually has to pass before the header can be covered.

It depends on how deep the existing joists are compared with the header the span requires. If the header fits within the joist depth, the cut joists are hung off it with hangers and the ceiling finishes flat with no visible beam. If the required member is deeper than the framing, or ducts and plumbing occupy the bay, the beam drops below the ceiling and gets wrapped and trimmed; a flush beam costs more and takes longer, and it is only possible when the required member fits inside the existing joist depth; where both are workable we price them side by side.

Yes, and most interior wall removals never touch the slab, because the new posts bear on the same concrete the wall did. Where the design calls for a drilled anchor, a footing pocket or any coring, the slab is scanned to locate the tendons before anything cuts into it. Nobody should be drilling a post-tension slab on assumption, and we do not.

There is a strip the width of the bottom plate with no finish flooring in it. On tile and on aged wood floors an invisible match is unlikely, so the practical choices are weaving material in and refinishing the whole area, using a deliberate transition, or running new flooring across both rooms while the space is already open. This is worth deciding during the estimate, because it often affects scope and budget more than the header does.

Ask how the header will be sized and by whom, exactly where the load goes once it leaves the posts, and whether the price includes the permit and the inspection. Ask how the ceiling will be supported while the wall is out, who reroutes the electrical and HVAC inside the wall, and how the ceiling texture and floor infill will be handled. We have been remodeling Houston homes for more than 15 years, and we would rather answer all of that in writing before demolition than argue about it afterward.

Usually not directly. City preservation review is concerned with what the street can see: siding, windows, porches, roof lines, additions and demolition. A kitchen or bathroom rebuilt inside the existing walls is generally a different conversation. Once the work moves a window opening, changes an exterior wall or grows the footprint, that review comes before the building permit. District boundaries do not follow neighbourhood boundaries, so check your specific address with the city rather than assuming from the street name.

Not necessarily, and it is worth settling first. Much of the area with a Houston mailing address is unincorporated Harris County and permits through the county. Bellaire, West University Place, Southside Place, Jersey Village and the Memorial Villages are separate incorporated cities with their own offices and their own requirements, and several of them carry Houston mailing addresses. The city limits themselves reach into Fort Bend and Montgomery County, and some addresses on the far edges are outside the city altogether, so the county line alone does not tell you who inspects. Who has jurisdiction decides what rules apply and who inspects.

It can change the whole shape of the project. In a mapped floodplain, work whose value crosses the threshold set in the city's floodplain rules is treated as a substantial improvement, and at that point elevation requirements apply to the structure rather than just the room being remodelled. That is the difference between a kitchen remodel and a kitchen remodel that triggers raising a house. On a home that flooded before, we also want to know how far the water came up, what was replaced afterwards and what was only dried out, because that decides how much wall comes open.

Sometimes, and often that is the sensible answer. Tile of that age and the black mastic under it may contain asbestos, so the first step is a test rather than a guess. If it is left in place, a floating floor or a new underlayment over the top can be the right call. If it has to come up, that removal is specialist work under state rules and gets scheduled before our demolition rather than discovered during it. What nobody should do is dry-scrape or sand it.

Usually yes, with a beam. What we check first is which way the ceiling joists run above it, whether the roof is conventionally framed with joists lapped over that wall or trussed to clear span, and what is inside the wall: a drain stack, a duct run, or the feed to the panel all change the price. Then the header is sized and the posts are given somewhere to land. In houses of that era we also look at whether the branch wiring is aluminium, because that changes how the circuits in that wall are handled.

Usually not. The incorporated City of Katy is a fraction of the area that uses a Katy address, and its limits cross three counties. Most of Cinco Ranch, Seven Meadows, Grand Lakes, Kelliwood and Nottingham Country are unincorporated Harris or Fort Bend County, and the newer sections north and west run into Waller County. The first thing to settle on any job here is whether the lot is inside the city limits and which county it sits in, then confirm the requirements with that authority having jurisdiction before planning around them.

They are two separate approvals and neither one covers the other. The architectural control committee is looking at appearance and placement: roof pitch against the house, shingle and paint match, column style, and whether the structure stays off the rear and side easements shown on your survey. The permitting office is looking at structure and drainage. Committees meet on their own schedule, so the submittal should go in well before material is ordered. We prepare the plot plan, elevation and materials list the committee asks for, and the submittal itself goes in under your name as the lot owner.

Often yes, but nothing is cut until the tendons are located. Post-tension foundations are the norm in Katy's building era and cutting a cable is a serious and expensive mistake, so we find the slab plan or have the area scanned first and route the plumbing around what is there. Sometimes the better answer is to leave the drain where it is and design the layout around it, which costs less and works just as well.

Most of what changes sits below the finish. We want to know how high the water came, what was cut out versus only dried, whether the bottom plates and wall cavities were opened and properly dried, and how the slab reads for moisture now. That drives the flooring choice, because a glue down or click luxury vinyl plank or a porcelain tile behaves very differently on a slab that has been wet than engineered wood does. It also affects outlet heights, the cabinet toe kick detail, and whether drywall is replaced only above the old cut line or taken further up.

In most Katy two storey plans it can, but the header is not a guess. The trusses spanning the family room may bear on that wall or on a girder truss that lands on it, and upstairs there may be a bearing wall or a point load sitting over the same line. We open a small section of ceiling to see what is really happening, size the beam for the actual load, carry it down through the framing below to the slab, and shore the structure on temporary posts while the header goes in. If it turns out to be non bearing the job gets much simpler, and we would rather learn that from a hole in the drywall than from an assumption.

Almost certainly Harris County, because Cypress is a postal designation rather than a municipality. Cypress is a postal designation, not a municipality, so there is no city permit counter to visit. Water and sewer come from a municipal utility district, land use is controlled by your deed restrictions and HOA, and permit questions go to the county. A small number of parcels around the edges of the 77429 and 77433 area sit under a different jurisdiction, so it is worth confirming rather than assuming.

What sends a Cypress patio application back most often is not the drawing but the calendar attached to it: committees here also set the working hours, the days a container may sit on the street and where a crew may park, so the approval letter is read for the schedule it imposes as much as for the design it allows. That submittal goes in before we order framing lumber or roofing, and their approval is separate from anything Harris County requires.

Expansive clay under a post-tension slab moves with the seasons, and the drywall telegraphs it at the weakest points, usually door and window corners and the top of a stair landing. A lasting repair means cutting the crack out, taping and floating it rather than caulking it, matching texture and repainting, which is why we like to pair it with a room or floor repaint. Keeping irrigation and roof runoff even around the slab reduces how far it swings.

Usually the water. MUD supplies here carry enough mineral to leave scale on glass, aerators and polished finishes, and it dulls unsealed grout. In a bathroom remodel we can specify textured or matte finishes that hide film, larger tile with fewer grout joints, properly sealed grout and coated glass, and rough in a softener loop while the walls are open.

Yes, and it is planned as its own phase. It takes a lift or scaffold, floor and stair protection, a matched knockdown texture on any repairs, and careful cut lines where the wall meets the catwalk rail and stair skirt. Those rooms take longer per square foot than the rest of the house, which is the main reason it is cheaper to do the whole open ground floor in one visit.

It depends on the scope and on which side of the county line you are on. Unincorporated Spring in Harris County is permitted by the county rather than a city, since there is no Spring city government. Houses with a Spring address north of Spring Creek are in Montgomery County, where the requirements for unincorporated residential work are different, so jurisdiction and scope get confirmed for that address before anything is submitted. Structural changes such as taking out a bearing wall, plus electrical, plumbing and mechanical work, are normally permitted and inspected. Replacing cabinets, flooring, drywall finish or paint generally is not. Homes in a mapped flood hazard area near Cypress Creek or Spring Creek pick up floodplain review on top of that. We confirm jurisdiction and scope with the authority having jurisdiction for your specific address before work starts.

Not before it is tested. Ceiling texture and joint compound from that period can contain asbestos, and on a house of that age the responsible order is to have the material tested first. If it comes back clear, the ceiling is scraped, the surface is skimmed and sanded flat, then primed and painted. If it comes back positive, removal is an abatement contractor's work, not ours, and we pick the job back up afterward for the drywall finish and paint. In an eight-foot-ceiling room, going to a smooth finish makes a visible difference and is worth the extra prep.

Both are legitimate, and the answer is behind the paneling. In most Spring houses of this era it was nailed to horizontal furring strips over bare studs with no drywall underneath, so removing it means hanging new rock, taping, texturing and running new base and casing. Painting it is faster and cheaper: fill the vertical grooves, prime for the stain bleeding through, then finish. The trade-off is that filled grooves usually still telegraph in raking light from a window. We pull a piece loose in an inconspicuous spot and look before quoting either way.

Usually yes, but it is not a demolition question, it is a framing and utilities question. First we determine whether that wall carries load, which depends on how the roof above it is framed, and then whether a beam can sit flush in the ceiling instead of hanging below it, which matters a great deal at eight feet. Then we find what is inside it. In these floor plans that wall often carries an HVAC trunk line, a plumbing vent or a drain stack from a bathroom above. All of that gets located and planned for before anything is cut.

Two things. First, we look for the old flood cut, which is the line where drywall was removed and re-hung after the last event. It affects insulation, base and how the new drywall ties in. Second, if the lot is in a mapped flood hazard area the floodplain review sits on top of the building permit, and on a Spring house the practical question is usually whether the previous repair was permitted at all, because an unpermitted rebuild after 2016 or Harvey leaves no record of what height the walls were cut to or what was replaced behind them. That is worth understanding before the scope is finalized, so the design and the budget account for it rather than colliding with it mid-project.

Yes. A patio cover is an exterior modification, which means an application through the Township's Covenant Administration department for the Development Standards Committee before work begins. Expect the review to look at roof pitch and shingle colour against the existing house, post and beam material and finish, how the structure reads from the greenbelt or golf course behind the lot, distance from the rear and side lot lines, and whether the slab would sit in a drainage easement. Selections get made and submitted early, because the answer decides what is ordered. Confirm the current standards and submittal requirements for your village and section with Covenant Administration.

For most addresses inside The Woodlands there is no city building department, because the community is unincorporated, and county involvement in an interior remodel is limited. What you cannot skip is covenant review for anything that changes the exterior. Drainage and floodplain review comes from Montgomery County, or Harris County for Creekside Park south of Spring Creek, when a lot sits near a creek corridor or a mapped easement. And if the address is actually in Shenandoah, Oak Ridge North or Conroe rather than The Woodlands, you are dealing with a city building department and inspections. Check jurisdiction by address with the authority having jurisdiction rather than by the mailing city on the envelope.

Not automatically. Tree removal on a residential lot is covered by the covenants above a certain trunk size, and dead or hazardous trees are treated differently from healthy ones, so the application comes first. Drought years like 2011 left standing dead and beetle-killed pine across the community, and a dead pine over a roof is a different conversation from a healthy tree in the way of a new patio. Two other things worth checking: the tree may stand on a forested reserve or an easement rather than on your lot, and pulling out a large pine close to the slab changes the moisture balance in soil that tree has been drawing down for decades. Ask Covenant Administration what applies before anyone climbs it.

The soffit. Plenty of them carry something, whether that is supply duct, a vent stack, a range hood run or actual structure, and you do not know which until it is open. Under it the cabinets were usually built in place, so they come out in pieces rather than as boxes. After that the common finds are cast iron drain lines under a slab that has already moved a time or two, a panel with no room for the dedicated circuits current appliances want, and textured ceilings and old resilient flooring that should be tested before demolition rather than after. An exploratory opening before the number is set is worth more than another walkthrough.

Canopy. A room whose windows face north under mature pine gets almost no direct sun, and the light that does reach it is filtered green through needles. Warm neutrals turn muddy, greys turn blue, and a colour that looked right under showroom lighting lands several shades darker on the wall. Sample large, on the actual wall, on more than one wall in the room, and look at it in the morning and again at four in the afternoon before committing to a whole interior.

Usually not. A crack that runs a straight line across the room, through grout and sometimes through the tile body, is normally the slab moving underneath or a control joint telegraphing up. Regrouting will not hold it. The order of operations is to find out what the floor is doing, then set the replacement over an uncoupling or crack isolation membrane with soft movement joints at the walls so the assembly has somewhere to go.

If doors bind throughout the house, tile is cracking in lines, or the floor drops noticeably from one room to the next, get a floor elevation survey and have a structural or foundation engineer read it before finishes are ordered, rather than relying on a repair company's free inspection. On a forty year old slab in the older sections of town that is worth doing before cabinets are ordered, not after they are set. If the slab needs work it is far cheaper to do it before cabinets and tile go in than to lift them later. If the elevations are within reason and stable, the answer is often to level the finishes and leave the slab alone.

For structural, electrical, plumbing or mechanical work inside the city limits, yes, through the city's building division, with inspections to follow. First confirm your address is actually in the city: Greatwood and New Territory came in during December 2017, and some addresses with Sugar Land mail sit in Missouri City or in unincorporated Fort Bend County. Your association's architectural review is a separate approval and does not stand in for the permit.

Often yes, but those slabs are post-tension. Drain and supply have to pass through the floor, so tendons get located and marked first and the island is positioned around what is found, not the other way around. Where coring does not make sense, the layout adapts: a prep island with no plumbing, or the sink staying on the line that is already there.

That is the clay. It shrinks back from the slab edge through a dry summer and swells again when the rain returns, and the house moves a fraction with it. For finish work the useful number is the door reveal rather than the crack: measure the gap at the top corner of two or three doors in March and again in September, and the difference tells you whether this is a hinge and strike-plate adjustment or a conversation to have with an engineer before cabinets are ordered. For finish work it means measuring the floor with the season in mind and adjusting hinges and strike plates rather than planing a door down every year until it no longer fits when the ground comes back up.

If the address is inside the Pearland city limits, neither. The city issues the residential building permit and sends the inspector, whether the lot sits on the Brazoria County side or the Harris County side north of Clear Creek. The county line changes your tax office and your recorded plat, not who inspects your framing. If the address is outside the city limits in Pearland's extraterritorial jurisdiction or in unincorporated Brazoria County, the county's role is narrower, but floodplain and on-site sewage rules still apply. Confirm the jurisdiction for your specific address with the City of Pearland before scoping.

Usually, but the answer is decided in the attic, not in the kitchen. What we look at first in these plans is the second-floor wall stack, because where an upstairs bathroom or the laundry sits over the kitchen wall the drain and vent inside it usually cost more to relocate than the beam does, and that is the number that decides whether the opening is worth taking to the full width the owner wants. Once we see what is landing on it, the opening gets a properly sized header or beam, temporary shoring while it goes in, and a load path down to the slab. Some of those walls turn out to be non-bearing partitions, which is a much shorter job.

It changes access and drainage both. On these lots the real decision is whether the pour reaches the back yard without the truck leaving the street: where the culvert will not take the load we place concrete with a line pump from the front and keep the mixer on the pavement, which costs more per yard and less than replacing a culvert the city then has to inspect. The ditch is also the drainage system for the whole street, so a new patio slab cannot be graded to dump into a neighbor's ditch, and the ditch cannot be filled to gain parking. On those lots we set the finished slab elevation and the fall away from the house first and pour second.

Camera the line before you decide. Cast iron in this area is commonly at the point where the bottom of the pipe has scaled or channeled out, and the cheapest hour to deal with it is the hour the tile floor is already gone. Tunneling or trenching a section of a conventionally reinforced slab is straightforward work. A post-tensioned slab in a newer neighborhood changes the answer, because the tendons have to be located and mapped before anything is cut, and rerouting above the slab is often the better plan.

It can, and it is worth knowing before you pick finishes. Pearland's floodplain administrator is in the same building as the permit counter, which is the practical advantage here: the flood zone, the base flood elevation for the lot and the way structure value is determined can all be settled in one visit before a scope is written, rather than discovered when the drawings are already out for review. Larger whole-home scopes are the ones that run into it. Verify the property's flood zone and how the city's floodplain administrator applies that rule with the City of Pearland before you set a budget.

It depends on the parcel, not the mailing address. Confirm the authority having jurisdiction with the office that covers your address before scheduling, since a Kingwood, Humble or Atascocita mailing address does not tell you which building department reviews the work, and ask that same office whether floodplain review applies to your lot. Atascocita, Huffman and the unincorporated pockets go through Harris County, and addresses north of the Harris County line, toward Porter, fall in Montgomery County. Confirm the authority having jurisdiction for your address before scheduling, and ask that same office whether floodplain review applies.

If a house sits in a mapped special flood hazard area and the cost of the improvement, or of repairing damage, reaches half the market value of the structure itself, floodplain rules treat it as a substantial improvement and the whole house has to be brought up to current requirements, which can mean raising the finished floor. Houston tightened its floodplain rules after Harvey, and the required height above the flood elevation has changed before. Whether your address is mapped in, what your base flood elevation is and how value is determined are all questions for the floodplain office in your jurisdiction. Get the answer before the scope is set, not halfway through, because a project can be planned to stay under that threshold or planned to do the raising properly.

Look for a ridge, hairline crack or tape line running horizontally at about two or four feet, baseboard that has cupped or pulled away, a musty smell strongest at outlets on exterior walls, and a cabinet toe kick that has swelled. The definitive check is cheap: cut a small inspection opening low in a closet or utility wall, look at the bottom plate and the insulation in the bay, and put a moisture meter on the stud. It either reads dry with clean batts or it does not, and either way you stop guessing.

Porcelain tile is the most tolerant thing you can put down. It survives standing water, a wet vac and fans, and it does not care about humidity. It needs a flat slab, crack isolation or an uncoupling membrane where the slab has moved, and honest movement joints, and it costs more to install and is harder underfoot. Rigid-core LVP is faster, warmer and more forgiving of a slab that is not perfectly flat, and where a floating floor is lifted quickly some of it can sometimes be salvaged, though the underlayment and any damaged locking edges do not go back down. Whichever you choose, the locking edge and the underlayment matter more here than the wear-layer marketing. Engineered wood is the one we steer people away from on a ground floor in this part of the county.

In Kingwood, usually yes for anything visible from outside. Each village has a community association with architectural control, and because Houston has no zoning, those deed restrictions are what actually govern the exterior. A covered patio, a roofline or window change, exterior color and tree removal typically go to the architectural committee before the permit. Interior work generally does not, though associations often still want to know about dumpster placement and work hours. Humble's older streets may have no association at all, and Atascocita's newer subdivisions have one plus a utility district. Read the restrictions for your own village, because they are not identical.

The fastest way through it is the appraisal district record for your account number, because the taxing units listed on it settle the question: a City of Tomball line means you are inside the limits, and no city line means the county has it. The appraisal district record for the property and the city limits map will tell you, and the city can confirm a specific address. It matters because it decides which office reviews the work, what gets inspected, and whether septic and driveway access are part of the conversation. Two houses a mile apart on the same road can land on opposite sides of that line.

On a pier-and-beam house it is usually not the problem a slab house has. Piers settle at different rates, shims compress, and beam ends and sill plates soften where the crawlspace stays damp, so the floor dips in one area instead of the whole house tilting. The first step is measuring elevations across the floor and getting underneath to look at the piers, beams and joist ends. Leveling and any framing repair come before flooring, tile or new trim, not after, or the new work just moves with the old problem.

Usually yes, and the pier-and-beam floor is why it is more straightforward here than on a slab. Drain and supply lines run in the crawlspace instead of being cut into concrete, and there are no post-tension cables to locate first. What decides it is crawl height and access, the condition of the existing lines, which in the oldest houses means cast iron drains and galvanized supply, and on a septic property whether the system can take the added fixtures.

Yes, once the floor is stiff enough and flat enough. A diagonal 1x subfloor on old joists is not a tile substrate by itself; it generally needs added blocking, a plywood layer over the boards and an uncoupling membrane, with the framing brought within the deflection limits tile assemblies are built to, which is L/360 for ceramic and tighter for natural stone. Large-format tile also shows lippage on any floor that is not flat, so the leveling happens first either way.

Access and utilities, mostly. A drain field cannot take a dumpster, a pallet of tile or a delivery truck turning around, so staging gets planned around it, and a long gravel drive, a culvert or low pine limbs can decide what size truck reaches the house. Added bathrooms and fixtures change the load on the septic system and go through the county's on-site sewage program. Well water carrying iron and hardness will stain new fixtures and light grout, so that is better addressed before the finishes go in.

Look above it. In the attic, a run of prefabricated trusses passing over the wall without landing on it usually means the wall is a partition. Ceiling joists lapped and nailed together over the wall means it is bearing. The condition that fools people is a girder truss, a multi-ply truss that collects the ends of other trusses where the plan offsets, because it can drop a heavy point load onto one interior wall that looks ordinary from the room below. Check what is inside the wall too. Plumbing vents, a return air chase and duct are as likely to complicate the job as the structure is. Anything structural should be confirmed on a drawing before demolition.

Yes, and often it is straightforward, because trusses carry the roof out to the exterior walls. What cannot happen is cutting, notching or drilling a truss chord to make something fit. A modified truss needs an engineered repair detail and there is no field substitute for one. Where a girder truss lands on the wall, the opening gets a header sized for that load and the load goes down through jacks and a post to the slab like any other bearing condition. At the eight-foot ceilings common in the older Missouri City sections, the real decision is whether the beam drops below the ceiling or sits flush in it.

If the house is inside the Missouri City limits, the city handles it, including the small part of the city that lies in Harris County. If the address is Missouri City by mail but the lot is unincorporated Fort Bend County, out toward Fresno, it goes through the county instead. Confirm which one applies to your address before scheduling anything, because the review and inspection steps are not the same. Which private document applies depends on where in the city you are: Quail Valley restrictions are administered section by section from paperwork drawn when each section was platted, so the approval route for a Thunderbird address is not the same route as an El Dorado one, and neither resembles the master association packet used south of Highway 6.

Usually, but the slab decides the route. Houses of that era in Sienna and Riverstone are post-tensioned, so the cable layout is located and marked before any concrete is cut and the trench is planned around the tendons rather than through them. Where the tendons will not allow the run, the alternative in these plans is to keep the sink on the perimeter wall that already has the drain and give the island the cooktop instead, which turns a concrete problem into a layout decision and keeps the vent on the wall where it already runs. Either way, the plumbing layout is settled at the drawing stage rather than on demolition day.

Often it is not. A straight crack along the wall and ceiling line that opens in dry weather and closes when the weather turns is a classic truss roof symptom. The bottom chord dries, arches slightly and lifts the ceiling away from the top plate of an interior partition. Often it is not. A straight crack along the wall and ceiling line that opens in dry weather and closes when the weather turns is a truss roof symptom rather than a foundation one, and the difference matters because the fixes are not related. There is more on how to tell them apart, and on the carpentry repair that holds, further up this page. The truss version has a carpentry fix rather than an annual patch, by fastening crown to the wall only so the ceiling can move behind it.