As your kids get older, you realize it’s nice to have a separate room where they and their screaming friends can all hang out and still be under your roof, not somewhere else… But it’s not easy to find the space to add on when your home has a septic system that takes up much of the front and side yards, and the backyard has steep grades that unless major shoring (like large piles) are installed, a new foundation can’t be built. It is a Game Room for kids, so it has to make a financial sense. So the answer was to go up over the existing garage. So the homeowners tasked us with three goals: #1, the overall cost meets the desired outcome; #2, the addition needs to blend in with the rest of the house which needs to enhance the curb appeal (not having the addition stick out like a sore thumb); and #3, must avoid adding any (load bearing) posts in the garage below. These goals were achieved by working closely with the architect and structural engineer from the beginning. The doorway to enter the addition was from the hallway, which eliminated a need to remodel the existing side of the house. New structural components were engineered to retain a part of the existing lower roof along with addition without new posts. And these solutions which included a gable also enhanced the curb appeal. And to reduce the cost, the existing trusses were designed to be cut about a foot above the bottom chords so that the lower roof did not have to be removed (new framing members were added to the cut-trusses). This also saved much of the drywall on the garage ceiling further reducing the overall cost. The end result was a game room for the kids that also made sense for the pocketbook.