Architecture, structural engineering, LADBS permits and construction under one roof. We remodel older Los Angeles homes where opening up a plan means solving the structure first, and we stay accountable from the first drawing to the final inspection.
One Team From Drawing to Final Inspection
From the first conversation to the final walkthrough, here is what each stage of the process actually involves.
Most Los Angeles remodels get assembled out of parts. You hire a designer, then an engineer, then a permit runner, then a general contractor, and you spend the next nine months translating between four companies that each price their own risk. Every handoff is a place where responsibility turns negotiable. When a plan checker rejects a detail, nobody owns the correction.
YD Group is a design-build firm. Architectural design, structural engineering, LADBS submittal and construction all sit in the same office. The people who draw your set are the people who have to build to it. That is why our drawings tend to draw fewer plan check corrections, and why there is nobody to point at when something needs solving.
Full interior and exterior reworks. Mid-century houses that need the layout rethought, properties going back to the studs. This is where structural capability earns its keep, because opening up a plan almost always means taking out something that is holding the roof up.
These two rooms carry the most value per square foot and the most hidden complexity. Move plumbing, take out a wall or change a window opening and a cosmetic job becomes a permitted one. Knowing which side of that line you are on before you start is the difference between a project that runs and a project that stalls. We cover both in detail: when a kitchen remodel needs a permit in Los Angeles, and what a bathroom remodel actually costs here.
Room additions, second stories, garage conversions and layout changes that add usable square footage instead of just refinishing what is already there. If you are weighing an addition against a separate unit, our comparison of an ADU against a room addition walks through how the returns differ.
Older LA housing comes with its own constraints. Historic overlays, unreinforced framing, and hillside lots where the Baseline Hillside Ordinance decides what can be built at all. On these projects an in-house engineer stops being a convenience and becomes the reason the job is possible. If you own a designated property, look at the Mills Act in Los Angeles too. It can change how the property is assessed while you are doing the rehabilitation.
Almost every remodel a homeowner gets excited about involves taking out a wall. Open the kitchen to the living room. Lose the partition. Widen the opening. On paper it reads as one demolition line item. In an older Los Angeles house it is usually a load path, and replacing it takes a beam, posts running down to the foundation, and stamped calculations before the City approves anything.
That is where remodels stall. A contractor with no engineering support has to stop and go find an engineer mid-project, with the walls already open. Our structural engineering team is down the hall, so we answer the load path question during design instead of finding it during demolition.
Cosmetic work rarely needs a permit. Structural changes, plumbing and electrical relocation, new window and door openings, and anything that changes square footage almost always do. How long that takes has less to do with the City’s stated review period than with how many correction rounds your drawing set generates, because each round restarts the clock.
We prepare the set, submit it, and carry the corrections through to issuance rather than handing the file back to you. For a wider view of how this model compares with the traditional route, see our guide to design-build firms in Los Angeles, or the cost side in remodel versus build new.
We would rather show you finished projects than describe a process. A full house remodel in Sierra Madre, a home remodel on Davies Way, an apartment remodel on Wilshire Blvd, and a remodel with an addition and pool on Comstock Ave are all documented with photographs of the finished work.
Our city pages get into the local detail: kitchen and bathroom remodeling in Sherman Oaks, and kitchen and bathroom remodeling in Pasadena, where permits go through Pasadena’s own building department rather than LADBS.
We work across Los Angeles County and into Orange County, from the Westside and the San Fernando Valley through the Verdugos, Central LA and the South Bay. If your project includes an accessory unit, our ADU construction and ADU design pages cover that side of the work.
YD Group is a premier architectural design and engineering firm specializing in custom home plans, ADU blueprints, and city submittals.
We begin our design process by conducting an extensive client interview.
Then, we have our first site meeting at the client’s home or property.
We review imagery and visual inspiration to draw out the client’s style.
After getting all the plans approved and ready for construction.
We collaborate closely with you at every stage, from investigation to inspiration.
Discover our commitment to blending aesthetic.
Explore our diverse range of projects that push the limits.
Let’s discuss your goals and see if we’re a good fit for your project.
