Websites for framing carpenters.

The honest answer is that nobody can tell you for certain from a photo. What we look for is whether the joists above run across it or parallel to it, whether there is a beam or a wall directly below it in the basement, and whether it sits under a bearing point from the roof. We check from below and above before quoting, and anything structural gets an engineer's beam size before a single stud comes out.

For additions, structural alterations, removing a load-bearing wall, and most decks over a certain height, yes to the permit — and structural work almost always needs a stamped drawing to get one. We can work from your designer's drawings or point you to an engineer we work with. Framing without a permit is the thing most likely to surface at resale and cost far more to fix retroactively.

A typical addition is framed and sheathed in one to three weeks once the foundation is ready and the trusses are on site. Truss lead times are usually the long pole in the schedule, not the framing itself, so we get the truss order in as early as the drawings allow. Weather moves dates and we tell you when it does.

Sometimes, often not. Bounce usually means joists at their span limit rather than joists failing, and it is often fixed with blocking, a strongback or a mid-span beam. Real problems look different: a visible sag, cracked or split joists, a beam notched through for plumbing, or rot at the sill where the framing meets the foundation. We look before assuming either.

Not one that will pass or last here. Footings have to sit below the frost line or the deck lifts and drops every winter until the ledger tears at the house. There are approved systems beyond poured piers, but they all reach proper depth or bearing. Anyone offering to set posts on blocks on the ground is building you a problem.