Out, up, or down.Your lot decidesmore than your budget.
Ground-level additions on new foundations, second-storey pop-tops, bump-outs and room additions across Denver and the Front Range — including additions dug to basement level against an existing foundation.
Setbacks and lot coverage decide this before you do.
Most people arrive with a direction already chosen. Then the parcel answers a question nobody asked: how much footprint are you actually allowed, once setbacks, lot coverage limits, easements and any covenants have had their say?
That answer determines whether you build out, build up, or build down — and it is worth establishing in the first conversation rather than after a designer has been paid. On a tight Front Range lot the honest answer is often that going out is not available at all, which makes a second storey the only direction left.
The other half of it is structural. An addition on a new foundation is a fairly clean piece of work. An addition on or against an existing house is not: you are tying new structure into old, and what the old structure can carry is an engineering question with a definite answer.
Four ways to add space, and they are not interchangeable.
Ground-level additions
New foundation, new structure, tied into the existing house. The most straightforward option — if your lot allows the footprint.
Second storeys & pop-tops
The cheapest land you own is the air above your roof. Whether your walls and footings can carry a floor is an engineering question.
Room additions
A single room rather than a wing. Smaller, but the same setback, foundation and tie-in questions apply.
Bump-outs
A few feet in the right place can transform a kitchen or a bath without triggering a full addition.
Garage additions & conversions
Adding bays, or converting what you have — which usually means replacing the parking somewhere on the lot.
Additions to basement level
Digging alongside an existing foundation, which means underpinning it in sequence before anything new goes in.
Per-square-foot figures are close to useless here. An addition on open ground and an addition that requires underpinning an existing foundation cannot be averaged into the same number. Anyone quoting your addition off a rate card has not looked at your house.
Digging next to a foundation that is holding a house up.
On the Englewood project documented on this site, the addition went to basement level against the existing house. You cannot simply excavate beside a footing — remove the soil supporting it and the house above it goes with it.
The answer is underpinning in sequence: the existing foundation is extended downward in alternating sections, each one dug, formed and poured before the next is opened, so the house is never unsupported across a continuous span. It is slow, it is engineered, and it is the difference between an addition and a structural failure. It is also exactly the kind of work that disappears from a low bid.
Six steps, and the first one is a phone call.
Discovery call
A short call to understand the project, the property and whether we are the right fit.
Job walk
We look at what is actually standing — structure, services, access.
Design
Drawings worked through with you, so you approve a plan rather than imagine one.
Engineering & permitting
Structural engineering and the permit set, handled by us.
Construction
One project manager, and a job site kept clean because you usually still live here.
Walkthrough
We finish the list you write, not the one we think is left.
AAA did a wonderful job on the addition on our home (Approx 400 SF master bed and bath with rooftop deck). They were very responsive and resolved any issues when they arose. The project came out great and we were very pleased with the end result.
Tell us the address and how much more space you need.
We will work out what your setbacks and lot coverage actually allow, and whether the answer is out, up or down — before anyone draws anything.
Prefer to talk now? Call (720) 637-2060
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