Add on instead of moving on.

Pompano Beach lots from the canal-subdivision era are wider than they look and shallower than you would like, which makes an addition a design problem before it becomes a construction problem. The usual moves are familiar: a rear great room and primary suite pushed toward the water in Harbor Village or Snug Harbor, a second story over a single-story ranch in Santa Barbara Shores where the lot has nothing left to give, a garage or carport turned into a guest suite around Old Pompano, and full in-law wings on the deeper lots west of Federal Highway.

Nothing the City of Pompano Beach issues on a house is heavier than an addition permit. Development Services wants a signed and sealed plan set with survey, foundation plan, elevations, structural details and a window and door schedule, plus a geotechnical report with foundation recommendations, truss engineering, energy calculations and Manual J loads, a zoning compliance application, a tree permit if anything is growing near the work, and a floodplain application. Broward County environmental review enters where site work and drainage do. Inspections open at footings and formboard survey and close with a final survey and elevation certificate.

The half of an addition budget nobody photographs is footings, steel and tie-beams, and it decides whether the seam between old and new ever shows. We tie new foundations into existing ones correctly, match stucco texture and roof profile so the addition does not announce itself from the street, and keep the occupied portion of the house sealed off, powered and livable while the new part goes up. Everything is priced off a written specification, a superintendent runs the site daily, and one team carries the job from feasibility through warranty. That is how 150-plus remodels and additions have gone out the door, all of them permitted and inspected.