Dormering a Ranch style house in Franklin Square (Hempstead, Nassau: real estate market, low crime)

[arkitect325]

Hello all! So my fiancee and I are considering buying a Ranch house in Franklin Square. It is currently one story and is 30x40 with a Detached Garage. We want to knock down the detached garage, attach a garage to the house, and put a full second floor on that would go over the new garage addition. Does anyone have a general idea of where we would be landing $$ wise. I am just trying to get the "Shell" up on the second floor - no interior work. I figured I'll get the shell up and then as time goes on do the interior work myself (partition walls, plumbing, electrical, sheetrock, etc.) Obviously I would contract out the areas that I needed to down the road, but for the most part I would do the work myself. So what are we looking at? $25k, $50k, $100k, $200k LOL??

Someone shed some light here for me please

Thanks!

[Chrisk327]

well, it will cost a bit... really you should go out and get quotes, or talk to some contractors. We bought a cape with an attached garage, we contracted out most of the work ourselves, it cost a lot close to the high end of what you're talking about.

we didn't have to demo a 2 car garage, we didn't have to build one either. our house was 25x32 plus a garage of 12x20. so similar in size to your ranch. things add up windows, siding roofing, framing, the front porch, doors, staircase, lumber.

to start off with your plan here....... electrical you have to take a test in order to do your own in my town, I did, and it definately saved money, especially if you're a little nuts with the amount of high hats, switches, outlets etc.

plumbing- you can't do this in my town, you need a licensed plumber to do all plumbing work. and btw, they aren't cheap.

partition walls, you're wasting your time. if you have a framer there to do the frame, the partition walls cost little more than the wood, and maybe a 2 man days of labor.

sheetrock...... good luck, don't know what you do for a living but I'm pretty sure you're better at it than you are sheetrocking. a crew will have the boards hung in less than 2 days. thats the whole house. spackeling you'll be good for paint in a week. hire it out, be glad you didn't have to lift the 16 foot boards

central air- again, hire it out, it isn't super cheap, but doesn't have to be super pricey.

I mean, you can definately save some money doing what you are doing... but a lot of the trades it is really just night and day how much quicker, neater, better quality that they can be.

for the shell, with siding and roof, and windows, and the garage, my guess, and its only a guess, is going to be closest to 100K.

our framing quote with lumber pack was in the mid 30s, plus siding plus roofing, plus windows, and the garage, and demo. that is after you have plans, a permit and WC.

[arkitect325]

Chrisk, Thanks so much for all of the information! The electrical & plumbing I'll do the rough-ins and have someone come in to "sign-off". Sheetrocking is no problem for me. My day job is a boring accountant, but I've worked in the carpentry trade for about 10 years so I'll be able to save some $ there.

Anyway, thanks for your help - it is just so hard to get quotes from contractors unless they can come out and see and feel the house and in my situation that is close to impossible, considering I haven't actually bought a house yet!

Thanks again for all your help.
Joe

[NSHL10]

Just make sure the area can handle the price of the house and addition. I am a FS resident and see many houses have gone down in value as the neighborhood has declined somewhat.

[rh71]

Originally Posted by arkitect325

Anyway, thanks for your help - it is just so hard to get quotes from contractors unless they can come out and see and feel the house and in my situation that is close to impossible, considering I haven't actually bought a house yet!

Thanks again for all your help.
Joe

We had contractors come in to a couple homes we were targeting to buy. Our realtor got the ok to let us in. Since the home's potential is a big reason why we would pick that house, it's important to know the ballpark range of any construction so the realtors understand. The hard part is getting the contractors to agree to the estimate and a few actually did since times are tough for them. It really shouldn't take more than 30 minutes of their time.

[arkitect325]

Thank you to you both for your comments! have a great day!

[TVR1997]

Originally Posted by NSHL10

Just make sure the area can handle the price of the house and addition. I am a FS resident and see many houses have gone down in value as the neighborhood has declined somewhat.

Completely agree on this. I would not buy a home now in Frankin Square AND invest a huge amount of money into improvements.....despite what many say here the area has declined sadly.

[Chrisk327]

Originally Posted by arkitect325

Chrisk, Thanks so much for all of the information! The electrical & plumbing I'll do the rough-ins and have someone come in to "sign-off". Sheetrocking is no problem for me. My day job is a boring accountant, but I've worked in the carpentry trade for about 10 years so I'll be able to save some $ there.

Anyway, thanks for your help - it is just so hard to get quotes from contractors unless they can come out and see and feel the house and in my situation that is close to impossible, considering I haven't actually bought a house yet!

Thanks again for all your help.
Joe

I'm a fellow accountant too. I'm assuming you must know an electrican and plumber willing to do that, I didn't and unless you're friends with them, most won't take the responsability.


I'm assuming you may know people from when you did carpentry work, so you may be all set, but
Just be aware, some of the contractors are less than thrilled working for a homeowner GC, and if you don't know about their trade you can get taken to the cleaners, or have subpar work performed, and some people who's companies were reliabile and good 5 years ago, in the "new" economy have issues in both cash flow and reliability.

[FSResident]

Originally Posted by TVR1997

Completely agree on this. I would not buy a home now in Frankin Square AND invest a huge amount of money into improvements.....despite what many say here the area has declined sadly.

I have to DISagree that the area has sadly declined. Yes, the home values have gone down, but that is largely due to the real estate market's decline everywhere.

What exactly do you mean by declined? I agree Hempstead Tpke is not the nicest looking area to drive down, but once you get into the residential streets you will notice meticulous homes, normal middle to upper middle class families, extremely low crime, families are active in sports with a newly renovated football and baseball field, community pool, schools are very good, etc.

NSHL10, if you're a Franklin Square resident, why would you make such a statement and turn people away who are willing to move in and improve the neighborhood. Would you rather make it seem like it's a low class neighborhood and entice that class of people to move on in and bring it down some more. Unbelievable! That's how the cycle begins, people get scared off by something they see and don't like and run away and open the doors for more of what you say "declines" the neighborhood.

From what I see, Franklin Square is the type of neighborhood where kids go off to college and come back to raise their families. I've been living here since the 1970's and I'd say there's been a minimal negative change and a greater positive change in respect to bigger and nicer looking homes . . . not a sad decline!

[twingles]

I don't think the area has declined much either - it's what it always was. Have only been back a few times in the last 2 years, but it looks the same to me (used to live very close to FS). The biggest problem with FS is that its "main streets" are Nassau Blvd (which is great) and Hempstead Tpke, and the turnpike is on a swift downward slide. But other than that people still keep their homes up, etc.

I do agree that I'd be leery of putting an entire 2nd floor on a ranch there. Not only could you price yourself right out of the market but your taxes will become astronomical in a very short time, making the house that much harder to sell when the time comes.