All Forum Posts by: David A.

Wall sheathing complete

Still waiting on electric company to relocate the lines before any roof framing can be done, working with the utility planner to hopefully avoid the need for a temporary power pole which would further drag out the timeline. 

New waterline should be trenched and installed next week, trying to get this work completed as quickly as possible as the new line is running through the tenant's front lawn and driveway.

Gas company is waiting on an encroachment permit from the city so they can schedule the new meter install. 

Ordering windows soon so there's no delays in getting these. Will also need to come up with a solution for the front door because the stoop is exactly 36 inches wide, which when you use a standard 36 inch door there is no room for the studs on either side or the thickness of the stucco. Small design flaw but hopefully we can solve this with a smaller door if the inspector is fine with it since we do have a large slider to move large appliances / mattresses etc. in and out.  

Thanks Inessa, I’m just trying to pay it forward for those who provided the guidance, encouragement and recommendations that got me this far along in the project. If even one point I shared helps someone progress on theirs or just saves them some heartache down the line I’m content. 

There were no parking requirements for this project as we were within a half mile of public transport. However, we did leave room for a separate two car driveway for the ADU off the alley.

Financing the build

There's not that many great options. I ended up cashflowing the soft costs as they came in, the build I'm financing using a HELOC against my primary residence. I used a local credit union that had the majority of my records for the application already on file from prior loans. I didn't want to be re-sending rental agreements, proof of insurance, mortgage statements etc for every single property and I knew their underwriters were efficient and weren't going to ask me for the same document 5 times over. The HELOC has a low intro rate with 1 year interest only payments and then switches to a variable rate (which as of current is also low). I'll look into the exit strategies once the ADU is completed such as a fannie / freddie cash-out refi on the entire property but even if the ADU doesn't add any value to the appraiser due to lack of sales comps with ADUs (duplexes, traditional two-on-a-lot properties may not count due to different zoning). Plan B is just use the cash flow to pay down the HELOC, which should take 4-5 years. I also looked into rental property HELOCs and came up short, PenFed said I have too many properties for their lending criteria and Signature Federal Credit Union still has my application pending from Feb with an impossible to reach lending department. I also looked into some business loans but the loan amounts were too small to be worth keeping track of another account. I'm fully funded for this and next build, so after that I'll look into some personal loans or pledged asset lines if I don't refi. I'm also keeping the remainder of the current build cost available in cash, just in case the credit line gets frozen.

Interior walls framed, sewer connection completed, and underground gas line in progress.

Framing for the pocket doors used for the master bath and closet was a little tricky since the opening is actually double the size of the door to accommodate the door when its open. I was also happy to see a standard sized vanity will work in the bathrooms. I don't know why its so hard to find bathroom vanities not made of particle board, especially in smaller sizes.

Also add another ~$200 printing invoice that was missed by the architect and $15 to get the easement for the new gas meter notarized to the soft costs

Site plan considerations

Where you place your new ADU is one of the most important decisions to make. Once you settle on this, its permanent, if you overlook something it can be a huge construction headache or an ongoing tenant issue. Walk the site with your architect, contractor, tenants and other local landlords because each person will think of some new challenge with your placement. Here are the considerations I had for my lot but this is just a starting point. Leverage the years of experience from the pros around you to get this right from the beginning because you don't get a second chance to fix it.

• Tenant (or your own) privacy - you are forcing a single family lot into a multi-family. I try my best to make these feel like two separate stand alone lots where its just like having a back door neighbor. I focus on properties with alley access so the ADU can have its own private driveway and entrance off the alley. However, not alleys are created equal - at this property the alley is wide, nicely paved, with street lights and easy access to the main streets. I have other properties where the alleys are narrow, bumpy with an awkward entrance to the main street that's guaranteed the scrape the bottom of your car - in this case, I'd think about whether accessing the ADU from the main street would be better. Its always a trade off between the main house and ADU, for example an entrance off the main street may be better for the ADU but what if it means that there are cars and people passing by the bedroom windows of the main house. For this project we decided the ADU will be accessed from the alley, going with the minimum setback off the alley since there's hardly any thoroughfare traffic and that left the largest buffer between the two units / tenants.
• Services such as mail and deliveries, trash pick-up - your mailman, ubereats, amazon delivery driver probably isn't going to walk all the way around the alley to deliver to your ADU. The trash truck only picks up the bins off the alley or main street so at at least once a week one tenant will be wheeling trash bins back and forth so plan for this
• Utilities (water, gas, sewer, electric) - Consider where your meters and service lines are now, most likely the utilities will put the new meter next to the existing. Think about the digging and trenching needed for new lines, is there a clear path or do you need to cut up your concrete driveway or patio? Is your or your neighbor's overhead electric service line in the way of where your ADU roof will be because waiting on utilities will kill your timeline.
• Future use and exit strategy - do you plan to doing an addition to you main home down the line? With an ADU you will have a lot less space to work with - not just for the addition itself but open space / parking / garage requirements from your planning dept. Not all home buyers are savvy RE investors like you, can the ADU function as extended living space for big families, caretakers, guests, occasional short term rental or rental to close friend. For my project a future owner could go out the back door of the main house, across the backyards and into the back door of the ADU to check on grandma. They could easily take down the fence and combine the backyards for a common space if they wanted. The ADU front door entrance at the side makes it easy to access the ADU from both the main street and alley.
• Existing tenants - construction sucks, how do you make this as not awful as possible for them. Are you asking for amenities back that weren't discussed at lease signing. Did the sign up for a big open backyard and now you want to add a neighbor where their kid's swing set is? What will the direct impacts of the build be to them - do you need to dig up their driveway to run the water line to your ADU, what outages can they expect. My contractor walked the project with the existing tenant to answer any questions or address any concerns they had. The tenants have the contractor's phone number if they have any issues. All work impacting the existing tenants has been planned around the tenant's schedule - for example, we'll send them out for a nice dinner on us while the electrical service is getting switched over. We also asked the existing tenant if we could run one extension cord to the site for battery chargers, and a hose to spray the dirt down before digging to keep the dust down. Its probably only a few bucks of water and power but we provide a $50 per month credit because it saves the hassle of temporary power / water.
• Everything else - what will the views be like from the ADU, do windows look into the main house or the neighbors, are there any mature trees to build around, how easy will it be your contractor to unload materials / tools or just park each day.

It would be best to get this info directly from the city. You can start with calling the planning department with the address and ask about adding an ADU, they often have one-pager summary of the requirements they can send you or they can point you to where they have their codes pertaining to ADUs on their website. I haven't worked with the city of Burbank, but all the planning departments I've spoke are very nice and you definitely won't be the first person calling in asking about ADUs (that week, day, or even hour). An architect, designer or design/build firm could (and will if you hire them) do this for you but I bet most are pretty swamped right now.

Can you send me a message with the location, timeline and the type of survey you need? I'm happy to share but want to make sure its the right recommendation for what you need. I also don't want to publicly post his contact info to save him from getting a bunch of extended warranty robo calls and spam emails.

I'm so glad its been helpful. That sounds like a perfect set-up, you should be able to get at least 800 sq ft or possibly even more. I'm close-by in Pasadena so I'm sure the rents for that ADU will be up there. If you guys ever want to drive by my project and check it out, just message me and I'll send you the address. Its a little further down the 210 and it would need to be after construction hours or on the weekend but its definitely worthwhile to see what's possible with these ADUs!

Glad to hear it. It definitely helps pass the time while you wait on inspections, utilities etc. and if your friends and family are anything like mine, they are over hearing your ramble on about setbacks and water meters all day. Let me know when you post, I'd be great to see your build.  

These are really great points to consider and I'm glad you mentioned the footprint. For me it was hard for me envision the real life scale from the paper plans until I was actually standing in it. My 800 sq ft feels massive and tall but I'm sure with some landscaping it will blend back into the lot. For max cashflow, I'd love to have a stucco box mini apartment tower growing out in the back of my SFH but not best for the long term play. Both cities I've worked with so far have requirements that the ADU must use the same design elements as the main home or be complimentary, which I can appreciate. The main homes I'm trying to match are from the turn of the century and 1920s so we've had to get creative and spend a little more than just a box with simplest roof possible. Another consideration was leaving room on the lot for anything else you want to do in the future - for example the main home has a full height attic that I would love to convert into living space. But since I'd be adding square footage, the city will require me to replace the tiny one car garage with a two car and have room for the proper driveway turn outs. The city was really pushing the two car garage with an apartment on top idea on me. My architect added a phantom 2 car garage elsewhere on the lot in our initial plans to make sure we weren't limiting our options down the line or putting things like gas meters in the way of future work. There are so many variables to consider during the design, and if you get something off its not easy to change. I was very glad to be working with pros to make sure I was thinking about the potential gotchas.

I fortunately didn't need the 60 day rule, planning department approval took just over a week and building and safety department plan check had a 10 day turn around for each submission which for us was 10 days to get our corrections and then another 10 days after we submitted our correct plans for approval. I have a friend who had similar quick turn around with LA county for a garage conversion ADU. I'm also interested to know what end ups being part of that 60 day count down in practice. If you had a bunch of corrections will it be 60 days for each re-review? Have you encountered any cities that have dragged their feet on ADUs?