Building a detached ADU in Los Angeles

[Sarah Purdum]

Hi guys,

We are looking to build a detached 1200sqft 3 bed, 2 bath adu behind our house in Reseda, CA (the valley north of Los Angeles). We have a budget of about $250,000 and we would prefer that it be 2 stories to preserve some of our backyard. (800sqft first story, 400sqft second story. The bathrooms would be directly above each other) We have drawn up a basic floorplan ourselves but we would still have to hire an architect etc. What is a reasonable cost for the project/ cost per sqft to accomplish this?