Home Additions & ADUs in Arlington, TX

Plenty of Arlington families are in the house they want and simply out of room. Between settled school zones and today's mortgage rates, moving rarely pencils out — so the question becomes how to add square footage that reads as if it were always there. In the mid-century neighborhoods around Fielder and Woodland West, that's often a primary-suite addition or a bumped-out kitchen on a 1960s single-story; near UTA and downtown, where a deep college rental culture has always made backyard units and garage apartments part of the fabric, the conversation turns more often to an accessory dwelling.

What Arlington actually allows for ADUs

Here Arlington is more accommodating than many of its neighbors, and the specifics matter. The city's Unified Development Code permits both attached and detached accessory dwelling units in single-family zones by special permit. A detached ADU can run up to 800 square feet and 20 feet tall; an attached unit up to half the main home's floor area. Only one ADU is allowed per lot, the owner (or a family member) has to occupy either the main house or the unit, and converting a garage means replacing the parking it took. We confirm what your specific lot and zoning allow before anyone designs to it.

Build out, build up, or add a unit

Building out at grade is cheaper per square foot but spends lot coverage and leans on your setbacks; building up preserves the yard on a tighter lot. Either way the connection is structural. Arlington's expansive Eagle Ford and Grand Prairie clays mean a new slab has to be engineered and doweled into one that's settled for fifty years, and a second story needs an engineer to confirm the existing framing can carry the load.

The permit, and the fee due at submittal

Any change to square footage needs a building permit — including enclosing a patio or finishing a garage into living space. Arlington charges a non-refundable plan-review fee of 35% of the building permit fee on residential permits, and the application isn't considered received until that fee is paid at submittal — so it's a cost we line up before filing, not a surprise mid-project. Permits run through the Arlington Permits portal (ap.arlingtontx.gov) under Planning & Development Services at 101 W. Abram Street, and the state-licensed trades pull their own permits for the addition's plumbing, electrical, and HVAC.

One team owns the seam

The whole promise of an addition is that it looks like it was always there — a coordination problem, not a single trade's task. Matching brick to a wall weathered for decades, marrying the roofline, and sequencing the engineer and trades under one plan is what a general contractor exists to own. The Remo Guys is based in Allen, insured and bonded, and has added onto homes across Arlington and the metroplex since 2019. For questions on your parcel, the city's Planning & Development Services line is 817-459-6502.