ADUs & Additions in Studio City

Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety (LADBS). Private pools in the City of Los Angeles are permitted through a Combined Building-Mechanical permit, while pools serving more than two dwelling units need separate building, electrical, plumbing and mechanical permits.

Using a City of Los Angeles standard plan on file with LADBS reduces plan check time. Most properties south of Ventura Boulevard, in the hills, are inside the Hillside Grading Area. A pool there needs its own LADBS grading permit, and the Baseline Hillside Ordinance caps grading and import/export quantities.

Much of that hillside is also a Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone. We prepare the drawings, make the submittal and handle plan-check corrections ourselves, so you are not the one chasing plan check.

A split market: flat valley-floor lots north of Ventura Boulevard (the single-family median is about 7,000 square feet in LA County Assessor data) and hillside parcels to the south, which are often larger but steep. The two build very differently and price very differently.

One local condition that shapes the work: Hillside lots south of Ventura Boulevard often need engineered retaining and caisson work before any pool shell is poured.

All of it, including Silver Triangle and Fryman Canyon. Our crews run every job out of our Cahuenga Pass base in Los Angeles, with our own people on site.

Detached ADU: generally $150,000 to $400,000+ across Southern California. What moves it is square footage, finish level, utility runs, and site access; garage conversions typically run well below a ground-up detached build. We give line-item pricing after seeing the site rather than quoting a number over the phone.

Plan a realistic year. Design and engineering typically take one to three months, city plan check and corrections add several more, and construction usually runs four to eight months depending on size and site access.

Usually yes, and often substantially, because the foundation, walls and roof already exist. The trade-offs are that you lose the garage, and older slabs and framing sometimes need upgrading to meet current code.

California ADU law is designed to allow long-term rental, and an ADU is one of the few ways to add rentable square footage to a single-family lot. Short-term rental rules vary by city, so confirm your local ordinance before counting on that income.

Yes. Plans, engineering, Title 24 and the city submittal are all handled in-house, including responding to plan-check corrections. That is a service we sell on its own, so it is not something we hand off.