However, an old, old house does not always come with these…so you hire someone to redraw it, or best…you do it yourself…far less mistakes!

Step one,

is to measure your house, inside and out, and get all your dimensions….including location of all doors and windows, thickness of all walls, and floors.

Beware…errors here, propagate into your new addition…

…or errors can confuse you when you are doing 3D drawings, ,,,merging surface areas, and sidings, that are off by only an inch or two.

For me the hardest thing was

declaring a nominal thickness of exterior walls… 5” or 6” etc.. and measuring exterior width of house, does it include siding?

Or do you measure the cement foundation?  It is only an inch or two different…but these 2 inches drive you crazy.

I often measured with a laser…old pros go old school with a measuring tape… The front of my house was about 43 feet wide…+/- 2 inches… I was able to work with errors at that level…really 2 inches over 43 feet….close enough.

Measuring roof peaks did required a laser

Inside dimensions were less than an inch error, over 15 feet.  Inside dimensions are easier, since you have flat walls, and can even measure internal wall thickness etc…

You learn a lot about your house as you measure …

and appreciate the level of perfection your framer achieved 60 years ago…so this time lets you warm up to every aspect of your house, walk in the builders shoes, appreciate how consistant he was, and the thinking of the original architect/builder.

As you can see from my floorplans…I measured the bejesus out of it…

Pic here