San Jose · South Bay · Peninsula

You don't want to spend six figures and end up with something that looks like a shed in the backyard.

This is the guide for Bay Area homeowners who want a designer ADU — not a backyard box.

It walks you from zero — what the types are, what they cost, how permits work, how people pay for them — and then hands you a clear standard for judging which builders actually deliver a home that looks intentional.

Start with the designer ADUOr start from the very beginning
Wide exterior view of a detached backyard ADU with a low single-slope roof, vertical cedar siding, and full-height glazing facing a small garden courtyard
The whole point of this site: backyard buildings that read as architecture, not storage.

Why this guide exists

I went looking for straight answers about building an ADU in the South Bay and found two kinds of pages: city documents written for people who already know the vocabulary, and contractor landing pages that answer every question with "contact us for a free estimate."

So I started researching it properly — reading the code changes, comparing cost breakdowns, and looking hard at hundreds of finished projects to work out why some backyard units look like a considered piece of a home and others look like a shipping container with a door.

I'm not building one myself and I'm not an architect. I'm the person who did the homework first. Everything here is written for someone who started looking last week, and the only builders that will ever appear on the shortlist are ones that clear the same design standard laid out on this site.

Start here

The basics — what I didn't know when I started

The heart of it

The two pages that separate a designed ADU from a box

  • The signature piece

    How to build an ADU that doesn't look like an ADU

    Roofline, proportion, window rhythm, siting, materials. The specific, nameable reasons cheap ADUs read as sheds — and what the good ones do instead.

    Read it

  • The checklist

    How to choose a designer-ADU builder

    A reusable 8-point checklist for telling a builder who delivers the intentional look from a general contractor who will hand you a box.

    Read it

Coming soon

The curated builder shortlist

I'm working through Bay Area ADU builders one at a time against the checklist on this site. When a firm clears it, it goes on the list — with a note explaining exactly why. No paid placements dressed up as recommendations.

See how the list is structured

Want a shortcut?

Tell me your lot, your budget range, and the look you're after. I'll point you toward the builders worth your first conversation.

Get a quote or free consult