Flooring Contractor in Altadena, CA - Floors prepped right for older and rebuilt homes

You check with LA County Public Works, which issues permits in Altadena because it's unincorporated and the County serves as its local government. Enter your street address on the Public Works permit site and click Find Services to see which office covers it. Its list names work like repairs, alterations and patios rather than floor coatings, so we check with Public Works for your address and tell you what we find before we start.

You can do it yourself without a license if you meet all of the state contractor board's owner-builder conditions: it's the home you live in, the work is done before any sale, you've lived there for the 12 months before it's finished, and you haven't used the exemption on more than two structures in three years. If you'd rather hire it out, we're licensed and insured, and I come out to look at the floor myself and lead the crew that does the work.

There isn't one price, because the cost comes from your floor: its size, how much old paint or sealer has to come off, how much crack repair it needs and which finish you choose. An older garage with layers of old coating usually takes more grinding than a new slab on a rebuild, and a flake floor usually costs less than a metallic one. I'll give you a number for your garage once I've looked at it in person.

LA County Planning treats a rebuild as like-for-like when it keeps the same size, location and land use as the legally established house it replaces. Changes can still be approved if they add no more than 10 percent or 200 square feet, whichever is greater, to the floor area, size, height or footprint. Go past that and the rebuild falls under current County development standards, including the Altadena Community Standards District and a 20-foot minimum front setback. If you're not sure where yours lands, the County's Altadena One-Stop Permit Center offers free virtual appointments on rebuilding plans and permits.

It has to be a written, fixed price contract that says who will get the permits and gives a completion date, and the contractor can't ask for or take a down payment over $1,000 or 10 percent of the price, whichever is less. California's contractor board requires a written contract for any home improvement job over $500, and it treats rebuilding after a wildfire or other declared disaster as home improvement. Read any bid with those rules in mind before you sign.

You might, because depending on location the County protects oak trees and other native trees, and a permit is normally required for development activities within a protected tree's zone. On a fire rebuild, the exception applies only where a legally established structure already stood in that zone on the day the fire damaged or destroyed it. If your patio or deck sits under an oak, it's one of the things we ask the County about for your address.