Design-build remodeling in Lake Oswego, OR
Zero-threshold showers, wider doorways, first-floor suites, and grab bars that look like they belong there.
Most of what makes a house work for the long haul is invisible if it's planned early: a shower with no curb, doorways a few inches wider, blocking in the walls where a grab bar will one day go, and a first floor that can hold a bedroom and a full bath.
We treat aging-in-place as remodeling done with a longer view, not as a separate category with its own catalog. A zero-threshold shower is the same waterproofing job we do on every bath, with the floor recessed so the water goes where it should. Doorways go to 36 inches where the framing allows. Lever handles, rocker switches, and better lighting add little cost when they are chosen in the selections schedule. Blocking for grab bars goes into every bath wall we open, whether or not you want the bars now, because opening the wall later is the expensive part.
Every aging-in-place project runs through the same six steps: a consultation at the house, design and selections, a fixed-price proposal, permits, the build, and a walkthrough with a written two-year warranty. We pull the permits in our name as contractor of record and schedule the inspections ourselves: plumbing and electrical rough where those trades are involved, framing if doorways or walls move, and final. Change orders are priced and signed before work continues, never after.
Priced as a fixed proposal after design. The typical ranges are on the home page.
The proposal was eleven pages and every allowance was on it: tile per square foot, the faucet, the lighting. When we upgraded the range hood mid-job they wrote up the change order that afternoon and we signed it before anyone ordered anything. Eleven weeks, and they finished on the day they said they would.
We had two other contractors quote a bath over the phone. Hartwell wouldn't, and I understand why now. Moving the drain for the curbless shower meant opening the ceiling below, which the other quotes had simply left out. Their lead carpenter, Luis, was here every single morning at seven.
Kitchens, bathrooms, additions
We are a design-build shop on State Street in Lake Oswego, which means the people who draw your kitchen are the people who build it. You get drawings and a selections schedule first, then one fixed-price proposal with every allowance written on it, then a lead carpenter whose name you will know by the end of the first week.
Real budgets and durations from jobs in Clackamas, Washington, and Multnomah counties. We put them here because most people have no idea what a kitchen costs until they have asked three contractors, and we would rather you knew before you called.
Design-build means the people who draw the job are the people who build it. There is no handoff between an architect and a contractor, and nobody to referee when the drawings and the site disagree.
Anything from new cabinetry and counters in the layout you have to a full gut with a beam where a wall used to be and the island moved to where it should have been.
Primary baths, hall baths, and powder rooms. Curbless showers, heated floors, and plumbing moved where the layout needs it.
Rear and side additions, second stories, and dormers. Foundation, framing, roof tie-in, and mechanicals under one proposal.
Finished basements with egress, full baths, proper insulation, and a mechanical room you can still get into.
Reconfigured floor plans, new mechanicals, and every finish selected once. Phased so you can stay in the house where possible.
Composite and hardwood decks, covered porches, and outdoor rooms you can use through the rainy season, with footings inspected and railings to code.
Zero-threshold showers, wider doorways, first-floor suites, and grab bars that look like they belong there.
Layouts, drawings, and a full selections schedule, which you can take anywhere. If you build with us, the design fee comes off the proposal.
Design fee from $3,500.Every job runs in the same order, so you always know which step you are on, what has been decided, and what it costs.
We walk the house, talk about how you actually live in it, and tell you plainly whether the budget and the scope line up.
About ninety minutes, at the house, no charge.
Drawings, layouts, and a selections schedule: cabinetry, tile, fixtures, hardware, lighting. You decide everything once, before demo.
The design fee is credited against the build.
A line-by-line proposal built from the finished design and your selections. Allowances are listed line by line, so you know exactly what's included and what isn't.
Change orders are priced before work continues, never after.
We pull permits with the City of Lake Oswego, or with Clackamas County outside city limits, and schedule every inspection: footing, framing, electrical, plumbing, insulation, final.
Permitted work protects your resale and your insurance.
A dedicated lead carpenter, a weekly schedule update, dust walls and floor protection, and the same crew from demo to trim.
You'll know who is in your house every day.
We walk the finished job together and close out the punch list item by item. Then you get a written two-year workmanship warranty.
Final payment comes after the punch list, not before.
New tile, fixtures, vanity, and lighting inside the existing footprint. Plumbing stays where it is.
From new cabinetry and counters in the same layout to a full gut with a beam, an island, and new electrical.
Foundation up. The number depends on size, roof tie-in, and how far the mechanicals have to travel.
These are ranges, not quotes. They come from our last three years of jobs in Clackamas, Washington, and Multnomah counties, and they include labor, materials at our standard allowances, permits, and dumpsters. They do not include furniture or appliances unless we say so.
A fixed-price proposal follows design. We do not quote a kitchen from a phone call, and we would be wary of anyone who does.
The proposal was eleven pages and every allowance was on it: tile per square foot, the faucet, the lighting. When we upgraded the range hood mid-job they wrote up the change order that afternoon and we signed it before anyone ordered anything. Eleven weeks, and they finished on the day they said they would.
We had two other contractors quote a bath over the phone. Hartwell wouldn't, and I understand why now. Moving the drain for the curbless shower meant opening the ceiling below, which the other quotes had simply left out. Their lead carpenter, Luis, was here every single morning at seven.
An addition is a lot of inspections, and they handled all of them with the city without me having to chase anyone. The weekly schedule email told us what was happening the next five days. We lived in the house through the whole thing and the dust wall actually worked.
The egress window and the full bath came in inside the range they gave us at the first meeting, which is not what I'd been told to expect from a renovation. The punch list at the end had nine items on it and they cleared all nine in two days.
Twenty-eight weeks, three bathrooms, and new HVAC across the whole second floor. What we appreciated most was the honesty at the beginning: they told us what wouldn't fit in our budget and helped us decide what to cut, rather than promising everything and surprising us later.
We work with a third-party lender that offers 12-month 0% promotional financing and longer fixed-rate terms for projects from $10,000 up. Approval takes a day or two and doesn't affect the proposal price. Ask at the consultation and we'll walk you through it.
Every project comes with a written two-year workmanship warranty, on top of the manufacturers' warranties on the products we install. If something we built isn't right, we come back and fix it.
Every town on the list is within about twenty-five minutes of the shop, which matters because the lead carpenter is on site by seven and stays the full day.
The honest answers, the same ones you would get at the house.
One firm handles both the design and the construction under one contract. You aren't hiring an architect, then bidding out the drawings, then refereeing between the two when something doesn't fit. We draw it knowing how we'll build it, and we price it knowing what's in the drawings.
An allowance is a dollar figure in the proposal for something you haven't picked yet, like tile or a faucet. Ours are listed line by line with the quantity and the unit price. If you choose something above the allowance, you pay the difference; below it, you get a credit. Nothing is buried in a lump sum.
We write a change order that spells out the cost and any schedule impact, you sign it, and only then does the work proceed. Change orders are priced before work continues, not after, so there's never a surprise invoice at the end.
We pull every permit in our name as the contractor of record and schedule every inspection. You'll usually need to sign the application as the homeowner, and that's about it. Unpermitted work can hold up a sale and void insurance coverage, so we don't do it.
Usually, yes. For a kitchen we set up a temporary kitchen elsewhere in the house; for a bath we make sure there's a working one. Whole-home renovations are sometimes phased so a floor stays livable. We'll be honest at the consultation if we think you should move out for part of it.
A deposit at signing, then progress payments tied to milestones such as rough inspections passed or cabinets installed. Final payment is due after the walkthrough and the punch list, not before. The schedule is in the proposal so you can plan for it.
Tell us about the house and what you have in mind. We reply with a few questions and a time to come and see it.
Call (503) 555-0142 · Mon–Fri 7am–5pm · Sat by appointment
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