01
Additions and second storeys
Rooms and upper floors tied into a foundation, roof line and mechanical system already standing and already loaded.
An addition, an ADU or a bearing wall coming out in Reno pulls a city permit inside the line and a county permit outside it.
We contract whole-home remodels, kitchens and baths, additions, ADUs and exterior renovation in Reno. The first thing we settle is which government reviews the job, because two houses on one street can sit in two jurisdictions.
- Jurisdiction
- City of Reno: Development Services, inside city limits
- Permit counter
- 1 E. First Street, Reno · onenv.us portal
- Also covered here
- Washoe Valley · Sun Valley and the north valleys · Dayton
- Talk to us
- (775) 200-0648, Monday to Friday, 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM
01Two jurisdictions, one city name
City of Reno vs. unincorporated Washoe County: same job, two answers.
Inside city limits the reviewing authority is the City of Reno’s Development Services, counter at 1 E. First Street, submittals on the onenv.us portal. Cross the city line into unincorporated Washoe County and the counter, the submittal format and the review queue all change, while the scope that needs a permit, the actual work you are having done, mostly does not. An addition, an ADU, a garage conversion, a second storey, a wall coming out between a kitchen and a dining room, a covered porch tied to the house: those are permit jobs on both sides of the line. Reno points to the IRC list of work exempt from permit, and nothing we contract on this page is on it.
Where the two rulebooks genuinely split is the small stuff. Washoe County exempts like-for-like door and window replacement under four separate conditions; the City of Reno publishes no such exemption at all. That is a question for a single-trade job, not for a remodel, and a window, siding or door job on its own is not work we quote.
What the jurisdiction changes for the jobs we do take on is sequence. The city takes the set on the portal and returns plan-review comments there; the county has its own intake and its own inspection calendar. The permit set is drawn for the counter that will read it, and a set built for the wrong one comes back with the schedule attached. Which is why we settle the parcel first, not the mailing address.
02The stock, by decade
Remodeling 1950s to 1970s Reno stock: the framing was sized for the house that was there.
The dominant remodel target in Reno is post-war tract: 1950s and early 1960s stock east of Wells and up the northeast corridor, followed by 1970s and 1980s northwest Reno around Mae Anne and McCarran. Those houses were framed for their own floor plan. The wall between the kitchen and the dining room is often carrying the ceiling joists, the header over a six-foot opening was sized for six feet, and the band joist was never asked to hold a deck. What we find when a remodel opens one up: headers sized for the span that was there rather than the one you want; rot at the sill plate and band joist where a deck ledger was fastened through the cladding into nothing; and the plumbing stack or the duct run sitting inside the one wall you want gone.
None of that surprises us and all of it surprises a fixed price that never looked. Our contracts carry a written concealed-condition provision. We photograph what is there the day we find it, price the repair as labor plus material plus a stated markup, and get it signed before anyone builds it.
03Scopes that always pull a permit
Bearing walls, additions, ADUs and footprint changes: the scopes that always need a permit.
Taking out a wall is not a finish job, whatever it is called on an invoice. If the wall carries load it is a structural alteration: a header sized for the new span, bearing carried down to something that can take it, and, where the wall is doing shear work for the elevation, an engineer’s stamp before the framer starts. That is permit work in both jurisdictions, without exception. So is anything that adds floor area or changes the footprint: an addition, a second storey, an attached or detached ADU, a covered porch, a deck past the height the exempt list allows, a roofline change that moves the load path.
Conversions bring their own rule. The moment a basement room, a garage or a bonus room becomes a sleeping room, it needs an emergency escape and rescue opening that meets the IRC, and that opening is part of the conversion’s scope and part of its budget. So, usually, are the insulation, the heating and the ceiling height a garage was never asked to meet.
Multi-trade work sequences around the inspections. On an addition the order runs footing, framing and roof tie-in, then the rough-ins for electrical, plumbing and mechanical (the pipe, wire and duct that go in before the walls close), then insulation, then drywall, then final, and each one is a hold point: the next trade does not start until the last card is signed. We build the trade calendar around that list rather than the other way round.
04Scope
What we take on in Reno.
We are a general contractor, not a single-trade installer. Four kinds of job, all four on one contract and one schedule.
02
ADUs and garage conversions
Designed to the rulebook the parcel sits under, confirmed before design: the city ordinance inside city limits, the county code outside.
03
Whole-home renovation
Layout, structure, mechanical, finishes and exterior sequenced so the trades never queue behind each other.
04
Exterior renovation: roofline, porches, footprint changes
Roofline changes, covered porches, decks and footprint changes, carried as one scope with the structure they tie into.
More on three of them: home additions, ADUs and garage conversions and exterior renovation.
05Permit, inspection, sign-off
We prepare the set, we submit it, and we meet the inspector.
We confirm jurisdiction and zoning from the parcel before design starts, build the submittal in the format that counter wants, and answer plan-review comments ourselves. Inspections are booked against the trade calendar, so a passed rough-in is followed by drywall that week rather than three weeks later because nobody called.
At close-out you get the approved drawings, the inspection record and the manufacturer documentation for what was installed. The final draw is released after the punch list is signed, not before.
06Around the city line
Washoe Valley
South of Pleasant Valley on the I-580 corridor. NDOT runs an automated wind-warning system through the valley: at the posted thresholds (50 mph on I-580 through Washoe Valley, 40 mph on I-580 between the Mt Rose Highway and north Washoe Valley, and 40 mph on Alt-395 through Franktown), vehicles nine feet or taller are prohibited. When the state closes a freeway to box trucks, that is the wind load a second storey, a patio cover or a new roofline on a west elevation is designed against, and it shows up in the hold-downs and uplift connectors long before it shows up anywhere you can see.
Sun Valley and the north valleys
Unincorporated Washoe County north of Sparks, with a large share of manufactured and mobile homes alongside 1960s and 1970s site-built stock. A HUD-code manufactured home is not an IRC building: an addition, a porch or a deck tied to one is a different attachment problem from a stick-built wall, and the oversight path is not automatically the county counter. We confirm which rulebook applies before we scope it.
Dayton and the outer ring
Dayton is unincorporated Lyon County, out US-50 east of Carson City: a different county, a different counter, a different answer than Reno or Sparks. Lyon County’s published exemption examples cover small sheds, low decks and short fences. An addition, an ADU, a wall coming out or a deck past that scale is permit work, and we confirm the path with the Dayton office rather than carry a Reno assumption across a county line.
07Questions
Three questions Reno homeowners ask first.
Contracts, draws and change orders are answered on the home page. These are about Reno.
Not necessarily. Postal addressing and jurisdiction are two different systems, and plenty of Reno-addressed parcels sit in unincorporated Washoe County. We check the parcel rather than the envelope, because a submittal built for the wrong counter comes back.
Often, and we would rather establish it in design than in framing. Removing a wall, or widening the opening in it, changes the span a header carries and can land on a wall doing shear work for the whole elevation. Where that is in question we bring an engineer in early, when a stamp costs a drawing revision instead of a demolition sequence.
As a change order, written before the repair happens. We photograph what is there, price it as labor plus material plus a stated markup, and you sign it before anyone builds. Same mechanism for a concealed condition as for a scope change you ask for.
08Start a conversation
Give us the address and the scope. We will tell you who reviews it.
The first conversation is not a sales call. It is us establishing which jurisdiction your parcel is in and what that does to the sequence.
Fastest way to reach us
(775) 200-0648
Monday to Friday, 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM. A person answers, and it is somebody who has been on a job site. The form goes to the same place, one business day behind the phone.
Request received.
We will call you back within one business day to set the walkthrough. If you need us sooner than that, call (775) 200-0648 now, Monday to Friday, 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM.