Backyard & Outdoor Living in Lake Forest

City of Lake Forest Community Development Department, Building and Safety Division. Lake Forest's Building and Safety Division issues building permits, and pools and spas go on the city's Combination Pool/Spa Permit, with permit applications and building inspections requested through the eLakeForest portal. That application states that all bodies of water deeper than 18 inches must be fenced in accordance with state law and city ordinance. The city's Approvals Referral Sheet asks whether a site has slopes steeper than 5 percent or cut or fill exceeding 50 cubic yards or 3 feet in depth, and the Engineering Division can require a grading permit and pad certification before any building permit is issued. ADUs need both an ADU permit and a building permit unless the unit is created within existing or proposed single-family space, and every ADU and JADU must apply for its own address. Newly built detached and attached ADUs also need separately metered gas and electric service. We prepare the drawings, make the submittal and handle plan-check corrections ourselves, so you are not the one chasing plan check.

Minimum lot sizes vary by zoning district and planned community: 7,200 square feet in the city's R1 district, 5,000 square feet in the Lake Forest and Rancho Serrano planned communities, 3,000 square feet for conventional detached lots in Foothill Ranch and Portola Hills, and one acre for Portola Hills rural estate lots. In Portola Hills, an attached or detached covered patio must sit at least 3 feet from a property line, or 8 feet from the street side of a corner lot. One local condition that shapes the work: Three liquefaction zones mapped by the California Department of Conservation run roughly parallel through the city along El Toro Road, Serrano Creek and Borrego Canyon Wash, with residential the largest land use inside them, and the General Plan calls for site-specific studies in areas potentially subject to liquefaction.

All of it, including Foothill Ranch, Portola Hills, Baker Ranch and Serrano Highlands. Our crews run every job out of our Cahuenga Pass base in Los Angeles, with our own people on site.

Full backyard transformation: generally $50,000 to $250,000+ across Southern California. What moves it is how much hardscape is involved, whether a pool or outdoor kitchen is included, grading and retaining, and the level of lighting and planting. We give line-item pricing after seeing the site rather than quoting a number over the phone.

A patio and turf refresh often finishes in three to five weeks. A full transformation with hardscape, an outdoor kitchen, structures and lighting typically runs ten to sixteen weeks, and longer if a pool is part of the same phase.

Pavers cost more up front but flex with ground movement instead of cracking, and individual units can be lifted and replaced. Poured concrete is cheaper initially, but a crack means cutting out and repouring a section that rarely matches. On most Southern California soil we recommend pavers for anything you will look at every day.

Yes, and on most projects we insist on it. Correcting grade and adding proper drainage while the yard is already open is far cheaper than retrofitting it after new hardscape is down.

Yes. Design, permits, hardscape, structures, kitchen, lighting and planting run through one team and one project manager, so nothing gets lost between trades.