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For a detached garage addition, how long does it take to build?

Briefly, depending on the specific garage, it can take anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months. Why?

First of all, will the new garage have a standard floorplan or a custom design? When building any garage that is truly a custom design, the first stage is the completion of the custom design (the blueprint). Further, it is always important to consider the specifics of the soil and terrain to make sure that the design is a good match for the actual property and ground.

Once the design is ready and the permits are issued (plus the financing has been secured), then one of the next big factors that can influence the how long the actual construction takes is... the weather. If there are no delays from severe weather, then the construction of the garage addition can at least begin to be built in as little as a week (if there are absolutely no delays relating to all of the initial "paperwork"). So, completion time for custom garage construction can range from over two months (for large custom garage additions) down to a few weeks for a small free-standing garage of a common design.

What are the stages in the process of building a custom detached garage?

Before the actual construction stages, there are the pre-construction stages, including the survey of the property, the architectural drafting of the blueprint, the obtaining of building permits, and the financing of the construction. In some cases, people will have completed all of those steps before contacting the building contractor. However, our garage builders can also help you to complete all of these steps of planning and preparation.

Next comes the actual construction of the free-standing detached garage. Typically, that involves preparing the ground (leveling the dirt) to be ready for pouring the concrete foundation. Then, the crew will set up the boards that will form the wet concrete as it dries (plus place the grid of steel for reinforcement). Once the slab is ready for framing, then the frame can be built. Roof trusses can eventually be attached and then the roof decking, exterior roof, and interior walls can be finished (including insulation). Besides later steps like the siding and painting, one of the last steps is typically the installation of the garage door and the opener.

How much will it cost for the garage builders to construct a free-standing garage addition?

Naturally, the cost of custom construction jobs will not be easy to estimate until after the main details of the desired garage are clear to the estimator. With any big job, there will be a few variables that will allow people to keep the initial costs low (like the angle and materials of the roof). When you contact a garage construction supervisor through this site, it is best to let us know your top priorities, such as "curb appeal," keeping the budget modest, urgency of fast completion, or something else. To request your consultation now, click contact your new garage construction contractor.

Here is a detailed example of the steps of building a custom detached garage addition:

source: http://www.gtcreations.com/workshop/

Here are some close-ups of some of the early stages of building a detached (AKA "free-standing") garage addition, including the pouring of the concrete and framing of the walls

Our general contractor built this 500 square foot free-standing detached garage addition as a home improvement project.

Here is one of our remodelers checking the alignment along one of on the walls.

One of the first stages of building this free-standing garage addition was pouring the foundation. Here you can see two of our construction workers spreading the wet cement through a hose and and using another tool for spreading it around evenly.

Here is a close-up showing the form boards (the wood across the bottom) which are used to shape the wet cement in to a nice rectangle while it dries. In the top left, you can also see a closer look at those fashionable white boots that the builders wear when pouring the foundation.

This picture might not look very exciting as a still photo, but that is wet cement flying through the air in to the trench! In the central areas of the foundation, it is fine to shoot the cement in at a fast rate and let it splash up a little bit. In contrast, what you see in the other photos is a construction worker holding the cement hose very close to the ground so that there is no splashing. That takes longer, but precision is more important on the edges. In the center, it is a priority to get a lot of cement in there quickly.

Here is the final picture of the foundation. In the upper left corner, you can see that the cement was higher when this picture was taken then along the far edge. In the next, photo, you can see the finished product.

The foundation is complete and level plus the walls are in progress.

The front wall is the last exterior wall. That one will include some strong horizontal beams where we install overhead garage doors.

The final wall is an interior wall. With that wall, this detached addition will include two enclosed spaces. Both of the two sides of the building can be used as a one-car garage, but the home owner is also planning to use one side of the addition as a workshop and storage space.

Here is one of the prior pictures again. This is the last picture we had of this as of the time of publishing this page. there was much more to do including insulating the walls, adding electrical outlets and drywall sheets, then installing the garage doors and openers, plus adding a new shingle roof and finishing the doorways.

To see even more photos of the construction of more custom-built detached garages, click here building a custom detached garage plus a room addition or here building a semi-custom 2-story garage using a customizable blueprint.

HomeAdvisor reports that most garages built in the US cost between
$15,000 and $34,000 to build, with an average of just under $25,000.

NATIONWIDE averages (from over 900 garage builds)

View more Garages cost guides or View all home projects

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