Three Different Rooms, One Word
"Sunroom" gets used for three quite different things, and which one you want changes the cost, the build and how much of the year you get out of it. Worth settling before anyone quotes you.
- A screened porch. Roof, posts, insect screen. Open to the air, bug-free, and the cheapest way to gain an outdoor room. Spring through autumn.
- A patio or porch enclosure. The same structure closed in with sliding vinyl glazing instead of screen. Panels open for airflow and close against wind and rain, which buys you March and October. More on enclosures.
- A true sunroom addition. A proper room: footings, framed walls, a roof tied into the house, glass, heated and cooled, counting as living space. The most expensive of the three by a distance, and the only one that is a building job rather than a screening one.
Most people who call us asking for a sunroom want the second one. We will tell you which is which at the measure rather than quote you for the most expensive of the three.
Which One You Probably Want
In our experience most people who ring up asking for a sunroom are describing the second one. A patio or porch enclosure gets you a room you can use from March through October with the panels closed, and opens right up in summer. A screened porch is the simpler, cheaper version of the same idea. Those two are what we do, all day, and have since 1997.
A true four-season sunroom is a bigger build — footings, framed walls, a roof tied into the house, heating and cooling. We take those on, but we are straight about how: the structural work goes to a builder we trust and we handle the glazing and the screening. It is a longer job and it costs considerably more than enclosing a porch you already have.
Which is why the first conversation is worth having before anyone quotes anything. We will tell you which of the three you are actually describing.
Built for North Georgia
The problems worth designing around here are afternoon sun on a west elevation, spring pollen, and summer humidity. Glazing choice and orientation do most of that work — a room that cooks from two until six is a room nobody sits in, however well it is built.
How Long, and How Much Disruption
For a screened porch or an enclosure, two to three weeks from the first visit to finished, and less of that at your house than the number suggests. An extruded aluminum enclosure is fabricated on site over a day or two; a panel porch is assembled at the shop from your measurements and then installed in hours.
If Something Moves Later
Call us. We stand behind the labor, and we walk the finished job with you before we leave.