As some of you stalkers may know, I live in a very small house by American standards. It's only 800sq feet, and one floor.

So, I have a closet that could be converted into stairs going into the attic, but the attic isn't tall enough to stand up in except in the middle. I was thinking of finishing the attic and putting in a desk (for my computer) and moving my bed there, as it would free up a whole room.

Anyone refinished an attic or know what is involved?

I would install soffet and peak vents and Raft-R-Mate to make sure the roof gets adequate ventilation, and I would install insulation on the roof.

It would be very easy for me to run wires and insulation up there, and the electrical panel has all the room I need to add more circuits.

I would put in windows in the gables and a few pop-up skylights.


Thoughts? Ideas?

You might want to check into the spray foam insulation for the attic if you are going to be sheetrocking the rafters, I'm not 100% sure about it but you might not have to do all the vents and whatnot if you do it. Look into Icynene (http://www.icynene.com/) or the DIY Kits (http://www.fomofoam.com/). I know for a fact with the DIY kits you can get the high temp rating, an fire retardant mixes that would probably be the ticket for your attic. And to top it of they have something like R7 per inch (IIRC), so if your rafters are only 2x4's its still ~ R25.

The thing you need to worry about is flooring. You are going to need to do a double layer of plywood, usually one layer of 3/4" subfloor and one layer of 3/4" flooring (can't remember the names of the actual sheets you want since its been a while, but they both have tongue and groove). On top of that you can do whatever you want. Make sure that your rafters can support it though, some of the older houses were built to minimum specs and can't support as much weight per square foot as "normal" flooring.

I would also do the spray foam insulation under the floor you put up there, it will keep the temperature cooler by keeping the hot air in the main floor separated from the top floor as much as possible.

You need to look at how the duct work for the heater is ran as well, you'll need some ran up to there if its in the crawl space or basement of your current home. That can be a major pain in the ass to run as well.

As for roof gables, they are simple to build but hard to finish. You'll have to make sure that you get the shingles on there and everything sealed up, otherwise you'll have leaks like you wouldn't believe. You also need to make sure that you don't have anything built into them that will hold snow or water, as either condition will let water seep in even if its sealed as good as possible.

Windows are another matter, you need to look into which ones you want to run, make sure they will work with the gables you are going to put in, etc. As for pop up skylights, I don't like them. They don't hold up to snow loads as well as they should IMO.

Anyway, thats just the shit off the top of my head.

Thanks for all that info, that's exactly what I needed!

So I took that, threw together some measurements of what I'd have to do (including beefing up some supports) and it looks like after I'm done everything I wouldn't have enough room left to do anything! I think I'll just nail down some plywood and store stuff up there. Thanks tho! :D

great for growing pot.

Thoughts? Ideas?

Get a home equity loan on your place and build an addition. I'm outside your place right now staring into your window. For crying out loud, put some clothes on.

I never leave my windows open at this time of year :)

AC FTW