Every job below is one we do ourselves across National City.
We dig and pour concrete footings below grade, set posts, and frame with pressure-treated joists before the decking goes down. Every ledger board gets lag-bolted to the house rim joist and flashed, since that's where most new decks fail first if it's skipped.
We'll sketch the layout with you, including stair placement, railing style and whether it ties into an existing patio or roofline. Multi-level designs and built-in bench seating add framing complexity, so we price those out before any lumber is ordered.
When the frame underneath is rotted past saving, we tear the whole deck down to the footings and rebuild rather than deck over a bad frame. We'll tell you honestly if your footings are reusable or if they need to come out too.
Soft boards, popped nails, a wobbly railing, a splitting stair stringer, we fix all of it without necessarily rebuilding the whole structure. Sometimes a repair is a few boards and new hardware, sometimes it turns into more once we're under the deck and see the joists.
Composite boards like Trex or TimberTech don't splinter or need restaining, which matters if you're not planning to spend a weekend every other summer on upkeep. We still frame underneath with real lumber or treated joists, spaced tighter than code minimum so the boards don't bounce.
We pressure wash, let the wood dry out for a couple of days, then apply a penetrating stain or clear sealer depending on what you want the grain to look like. Skip this every year or two in full sun and the boards gray out and start checking.
Loose balusters, wobbly posts and rails that don't meet the 4-inch sphere spacing code all get fixed or replaced. We re-set posts into the frame with structural screws, not just toe-nailed, so the railing doesn't work loose again in a season.
Stepped decks need stair stringers cut to the right rise and run at each level, and the framing has to carry more point load where one level ties into another. We engineer the connections so the lower deck isn't just hanging off the upper one's rim joist.
A pergola or shade cover over an existing deck means tying new posts into the deck frame without weakening it, which usually means sistering joists or adding blocking underneath. We check what the current frame can actually carry before adding weight on top of it.
We also build wood and vinyl fencing, since a lot of deck jobs come with a fence that needs replacing at the same time. Post spacing and depth matter more than people think, especially in clay soil that shifts with the rain.
Four steps, and no surprises in any of them.
You tell us what you want doing, we look at what is actually there, and we ask the awkward questions early.
In writing, itemised, free. If something might add cost later we flag it now rather than at the end.
Same crew throughout. We cover your floors, keep the dust down and tidy up before we leave each day.
You point out anything you are not happy with and we fix it before the invoice, not after.
Deck construction and repair work covers these cities and the areas between them.
Questions that come up once a deck project is actually underway.
Describe the problem and we will tell you what it probably is. No obligation.