Doing A New Deck on the House

[Horse Fork Farm]

Were getting ready to do a new deck down the side of our house to help with safety issues as far as the house being so high off the ground. With the way prices are right now on treated lumber I thought I'd ask here for opinions on the most cost effective way of doing it. Our choices here are pretty limited for buying lumber-- Lowes, 84 Lumber, and Home Depot. It will run the house length which is 41' and 8' width. I'm not looking for ways to skimp on safety here, just I know there are some ways of saving safely! Our boys windows are approx. 14 ft off the ground- long ways down.

I figured some of you guys who do a lot of building can probably even guesstimate a rough cost. We don't build enough stuff (from new lumber anyway!) to even hazard a guess. Thanks if you have an idea, Kathy

[Helena]

We just redid our deck last summer and did it with the new type of recycled "plastic" wood. Don't know what it is really called but looks very nice and looks like wood.Comes in different colors of "wood" too. You will never have to sand it or refinish it and it is eco friendly. It is made from recycled plastic bags !! I like it because during the winter it is not slippery and I have even put it in my laundry room and also used it for a deck around our above ground pool. We happened to buy it at a discount lumber yard but I'm sure Lowe's and others carry it. We just couldn't see putting another new deck on the house in 10 years or so. It is here to stay with no maintance.

[Bearfootfarm]

Check around with your utility companies and see if you can get used telephone poles to use for the verticals. They will be a little harder to work with than square lumber, but around here the last time I got some they were only 35 CENTS per foot, up to 35 ft long.

[The Paw]

The plastic wood is good in that it is recycling and it is no-maintenance. But I don't think it is rated for structural use. (it is also a little more expensive) That means you can use if for your deck planks, but the joists underneath have to be regular wood or engineered lumber.

you would want to have a joist system of 8 foot long joists, 16 inches apart, and enough to nail them to for 41 feet. 2 x 6 joists will be strong enough. You will need about 40 of these for your deck assembly.

You can lag bolt one side of your joist assembly to the house, but the the joists on the other side will have to sit on something. Probably a "beam" of three 2 x6s wide, nailed together. The beam will take either 15 of these if they are 8 feet or 12 if they are 10 feet.

The whole beam will sit on 4 x4 posts, which should sit on cement pads. I am just guessing, but I would probably want a post every 6 feet or so, meaning you will need 7 of them. The length will depend on how high your deck is off the ground. These posts should especially be treated.

Decking should be available in 2x6 width, 8 foot lengths, so you will need probably 80 of these.

Really all your material should be treated lumber if you want to last (or the plastic wood for the decking). Otherwise, rain will seep under the deck boards on to the joists, and eventually they will rot, not hold a nail, and it won't last nearly as long.

Oh, and none of the above counts railings, or stairways off the deck.

[Ross]

Plastic wood is alot more expensive and uses special screws. We built one last year for a customer and while its very pretty and durable it was wickedly hot in the sun. We screwed it from underneith using decksters (fancy brackets to screw into the side of the PT fame and into the bottom of the trex boards. ) Kinda pointless to try and guesstimate the cost my prices are not even from the USA! I suppose a 2x6 PT 8 foot is around $3 and you need around 80 for the deck and probably a third as many for the frame support, plus some 2x.... whatever for the headers depending on span plus verticals cement hardware..... WAG, just under 2k I built my porch deck out of local eastern cedar on PT posts and frame. Its covered and going on 15 years old.

[ronbre]

i've been pricing redoing a deck on the east side of our house..and we are running between $700 and $800 for a 10' x 48' deck with Michigan Menards lumber prices and attached to the house..steps are already here..and we would also be adding a clothesline along one side so that prices extra long posts for the clothesline..this doesn't include any cement or railings..as we have the railings and haven't priced the cement yet...we priced ours with 2x6 lumber as we prefer it over deck lumber..it is more solid and lasts longer..

[motdaugrnds]

Can you get "damaged" treated wood from your local lumber yards? That is what we used to construct some of our out buildings. It is extremely cheap.

I was doing a project a few years ago & a carpenter friend of mine gave me this tip . Talk to the manager of each of the lumber-yards in your area & see if you put money on deposit with them if they will give you a better price . The way this works is you give them the approximate cost of the project up front & when you buy something they subtract that amount from your deposit . You can add more money to the deposit if necessary & when the project is finished they refund any money left in the account . I did this with 84 lumber & received a 10% discount on everything I bought unless it was an on sale item & then I received the sale price .
If you are planning on buying everything all at once I would still talk to the manager & ask for a discount . Remember , these people want & need your business . Don't be bashful about letting them know you are price shopping for the best deal . In fact that's the first thing I tell the manager when I speak with them .

[cfabe]

If your concern is the ability to use the bedroom windows as a fire escape, you can install emergency ladders for much less money than building a deck.

[TnAndy]

Originally Posted by Heartstrings

Were getting ready to do a new deck down the side of our house to help with safety issues as far as the house being so high off the ground.

Building a deck isn't rocket science, but there are enough safety issues that if you have to ask, you should probably be getting some professional local help. An internet forum will give you just enough info to potentially get yourself in trouble.

Consider The Paw's answer, for example......while I understand what he is saying, I would also point out the limits of some of it:

You can lag bolt one side of your joist assembly to the house,

Yes.....normally you can....but that varies. If, for example, the house is some kind of masonry finish, it takes special anchors. And some of today's houses are built using I joists or floor trusses, and there isn't even a solid box sill around the outside to lag anything TO....house here locally had a high deck collapse few years back, killing one, injuring others....turns out the idiots that built the deck lagged the houseside band to OSB under the siding....held fine until they got a dozen folks out on the deck for a party....then KABOOM.

"The whole beam will sit on 4 x4 posts,"

I personally would NOT use 4x4's on a high deck.....they are simply the bare minimum of support most of the time, and that goes down as they age...anything over 3-4' off the ground, and I use 6x6. Also, the use of 2x6 joists is bare minimum. You need to build STRONG, as you have no idea how much load could be put on the deck later....have a party with 15-20 people stomping around on it, and you'll find out how 'bare minimum' combined with some age on the deck doesn't work out.

[The Paw]

Originally Posted by TnAndy

Building a deck isn't rocket science, but there are enough safety issues that if you have to ask, you should probably be getting some professional local help. An internet forum will give you just enough info to potentially get yourself in trouble.

Consider The Paw's answer, for example......while I understand what he is saying, I would also point out the limits of some of it:

You can lag bolt one side of your joist assembly to the house,

Yes.....normally you can....but that varies. If, for example, the house is some kind of masonry finish, it takes special anchors. And some of today's houses are built using I joists or floor trusses, and there isn't even a solid box sill around the outside to lag anything TO....house here locally had a high deck collapse few years back, killing one, injuring others....turns out the idiots that built the deck lagged the houseside band to OSB under the siding....held fine until they got a dozen folks out on the deck for a party....then KABOOM.

"The whole beam will sit on 4 x4 posts,"

I personally would NOT use 4x4's on a high deck.....they are simply the bare minimum of support most of the time, and that goes down as they age...anything over 3-4' off the ground, and I use 6x6. Also, the use of 2x6 joists is bare minimum. You need to build STRONG, as you have no idea how much load could be put on the deck later....have a party with 15-20 people stomping around on it, and you'll find out how 'bare minimum' combined with some age on the deck doesn't work out.

I don't disagree with TnAndy's comments. I presume you are just using this for a rough material list and will actually do some research on how to do it to code, where to lag in to the structure etc. I would still say:

1. 2x6 at 16" o.c. with an 8 foot span is plenty strong.

2. I wouldn't use 4x4 on a really high deck either, but it really doesn't say in your post how high the deck is off the ground. If I had more than 4 feet to the beam, before using 6x6 I would probably look at pouring a cement pier in a sonotube, with the cement coming up 3 or 4 feet above grade.

3. I think you can get good advice on the internet, but get it from a site that focuses on the specific topic and includes diagrams and load calculations for different styles.

[Horse Fork Farm]

Its ok guys. Hubby didn't ask me to get on here and ask.. it was just me being too impatient to wait for his day off. He's done everything from additions to concrete to decks to roofs etc... Hes just working overtime right now and I was impatient to figure what it would cost so I would know ahead of time how much money I might be able to squeeze out for another project I really want to do which is a gazebo with a firepit! I went to the DIY website last night and figured the cost myself and it looks like theres not going to be enough except for the deck. I appreciate you guys trying to keep us safe though!!

[flaswampratt]

Lowe's and Home Depot down here in S.W. Fla are ofering a 10% discount on purchases up to $500 for both Vets and Active Duty personel. You must show proof(i.d. card).

Hope this Helps.

[Ross]

Just curious what was the DIY website estimate.