Our old deck is falling apart! It was built around 30 years ago and while the tops of the cedar deck boards look fine, the framing underneath is rotting out. The boards are bouncing or falling off in some places.
When we originally bought the house there was nothing around the deck. We felt like we were on “stage” for our neighbors whenever we sat out there. We also had no protection from wind and the sun really beats down on that area in the summer. Over the years we improved the area by adding a fence and later a sun shade to make it more comfortable. The multiple heights of the deck sections, though, made it difficult to have more than a few people out there together and we have never been happy with the space. We’ve even had some close calls with chairs falling off the highest section. Along with rotting framing and deck boards we decided it was time to upgrade.
Our first thought was to simply replace the existing deck with another, single-level, wood deck. We then thought about installing a paver patio and, after talking to some neighbors and seeing their backyard space, hiring someone to pour a concrete patio. The benefit of concrete is that we could lower the whole patio and we would be hiring someone else to do the work. We also want to add a shelter as part of the project, so the shelter could be attached with anchors to the concrete slab. After about a week and a half of going back and forth with several concrete contractors we realized we were never going to get a slab poured before the fall. They are all very busy and one guy even said “maybe by Christmas.” That sealed the deal for us: after considering pavers and concrete we were back to a deck we could build ourselves.
We decided we could make it work as a single level and would just have to deal with a step up in both the front and back of the yard. The overall yard slopes down toward the front of the house so the front step up will be bigger than the back. With our rough measurements we decided we’ll need to add an extra small step in the front.
We started doing some research on ground-level deck designs and thinking about whether to go with wood or composite decking but our first step is to demolish the old deck and prepare the ground for the new one.