About a year ago, my wife and I noticed that our deck was getting a little worn. We had talked about resealing and painting the wood, but as I got looking at it, I noticed that a lot of the boards were starting to rot.

We decided that it might be in our best interest to replace the whole deck instead. Personally, we had neither the time nor the desire to do the work ourselves, so we decided that we were going to hire a contractor to do it.

Thinking I could save some money, I decided to do most of the demo on the old deck myself. I rented a dumpster and got to work tearing it all apart.

As you can see there was a small shed underneath the upper part of the deck. That shed proved to be the most difficult part of the whole demo process. The material it was made out of was very heavy and we basically had to remove one wall at a time.

The total area of the original deck was about 16' wide by 26' long. That included the stairs which went all the way across and were really wasted space. Who really needs a stairway that is 16 feet wide? The other problem with the stairs is they were very narrow. My wife and I like our ankles and prefer to keep them intact, so we knew we wanted to rethink those ankle-breaker stairs.

My wife and I also decided that we wanted to go with a composite material so that we wouldn't have to worry about upkeep in the future. Having no desire to reseal and repaint a deck is what got us into this situtation anyway right?

I talked to my friend who is a builder and he gave us a price to do the deck. I about fell over, it was twice the price I had been anticipating. In my preliminary figuring, I had grossly underestimated the total cost.

Meanwhile the busy season was starting up for my friend and I knew he would have other jobs to take on. I quickly started to draw up new plans and by the 7th try, I finally had a design I was happy with.

I contacted another contractor that I know and he came out to take a look. I had reduced the size of the new deck to 16' x 20' and I had also decided to have it just be one level. That would elimiate some of the awkwardness of the two level setup we previously had.

The contractor told me he could do the new design for half the cost of what my friend quoted. I quickly contacted my friend and he told me enthusiastically to let the other guy do it!

I contacted the contractor and he said he could begin work immediately. Then a couple days later he contacted me back and said he was having trouble finding a crew so it might be a little longer.

Finally about two months after the date he initially said he could start, we came home to find this in our back yard:

My wife and I were so excited that things were finally starting to get done. Our dog was also excited that soon she would be able to play in the back yard again, instead of having to go out in the front of the house.

Slowly over the course of a week or two, things started to take shape:

Before they did the framing, they pulled out the window that was under the old deck. They filled in the space from the window and put siding back over it.

After the framing was done, they started to lay the boards...

It was exciting to come home each day and see how much they had accomplished. I think if the contractor had been able to get a full crew they probably could have been done much sooner. The two of them did a great job though.

The old electrical lines were proving to be a little difficult, so he moved those out of the way and the end result is much more aesthetically pleasing. He also fixed the vent to do the downstairs bathroom that the previous owners had sided over. I was happy to know that it would be venting properly now.

The next week we were greeted with rails! Still no steps though, but it was nice to look out and see the potential of the new deck.

Finally, my wife and I took our trip to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and when we came home, were pleasantly surprised:

It is taking a while to get used to the difference in size from the other deck, but we are both really happy with the final product. While a little more expensive than other materials, the Azek decking we picked is top notch.

You can see the contractor had to use a little bit different color siding in the areas where the old stuff was pulled off, but we really don't mind. We still have some clean up to do around the bottom and outside. We are also still trying to decide if we want to close in the under part of the deck or leave it open. My biggest concern is birds building nests under there.

Ultimately this is a project that I am glad I didn't try to tackle myself. I have no doubt I could have done a decent job at it, but I don't think it would have been anywhere near as nice as the final product.

My apologies if I missled you with the title of this post, just remember I did do the demo myself(with some help from my wife and in-laws).

Thanks for reading!

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