Garland, TX · Dallas County
Decks in Garland, Texas
Deck building, repair, staining and patio covers across Garland — new construction, resurfacing tired decks, and covering patios that get the full afternoon sun.
01 — The area
Decks in Garland
Garland sits directly north of Mesquite and we work there routinely. It is a large, long-established city with a lot of mature housing, which means a lot of decks that have been through several Texas summers and are somewhere in the middle of their life.
The most common call from Garland is a deck that still looks acceptable from the kitchen window but does not feel right underfoot. That is usually a frame question, and it is worth answering before spending money on new boards over joists that are on their way out.
Mature trees are more of a factor in parts of Garland than in newer areas, and they cut both ways: welcome shade, and debris that packs between deck boards and holds moisture against the wood. Decks under heavy tree cover need their gaps cleared more often than most people do it.
02 — Garland
Ranch houses, shallow back yards, and getting the proportions right
A great deal of Garland is single-storey houses built between the 1950s and the 1970s, and they share a back-yard problem: the house is wide, the lot is not especially deep, and a deck sized to match the back wall of the house swallows the entire garden. The most common mistake we see here is a deck built to the full width of the house because that felt like the natural thing to do, leaving a strip of grass too narrow to use for anything.
The better answer in these yards is usually a smaller deck placed deliberately. Size it for what actually happens on it — a table and six chairs, or two loungers, or a grill with standing room around it — and it takes a third of the space while the yard still reads as a garden. We work that out from furniture and circulation, not from the dimensions of the house.
The second thing these houses give you is a back door close to ground level, which means a low deck. Low decks cost less, they need no rail at all below a certain height, and they sit far better against a single-storey roofline than anything elevated. The constraint is ventilation: a low deck laid tight to the ground with no airflow underneath is a deck that rots early, so the framing has to lift it enough to breathe even when the finished surface looks as though it is resting on the lawn.
Mature trees are the other factor in the older streets. Garland has a lot of them, which is a gift — it is shade you do not have to build or pay for — but it changes the material conversation, because a deck under trees collects leaf litter and stays damp in a way an open deck never does.
03 — Garland
Firewheel and the newer north-east: two-storey houses and raised decks
North-east Garland has a quite different housing stock, and the deck work changes with it. Two-storey houses on lots that fall away from the house often put the back door well above grade, and that turns a deck from a platform into a structure: taller posts, a proper stair run, a code-height rail, and the question of what you do with the space underneath.
Underneath is where the value sits in a raised deck, and it is routinely wasted. With a drainage layer installed between the deck boards and the ceiling below, that space becomes a shaded, dry patio — which in a Texas summer is frequently the part of the house people actually use. Retrofitting it later is possible but awkward and costs more; designing for it at the start costs very little.
Raised decks also change the stair conversation. A single long straight flight is the cheapest thing to build and the least pleasant thing to use. A flight broken by a landing, or a wider set of shallow steps that doubles as casual seating, costs more in framing and is the detail people mention most often afterwards.
Many of these neighbourhoods have an association that reviews exterior work. We prepare the drawing and the material schedule in the format they usually want, so the submission is not another job on your list, and we confirm what the association actually requires before anything is ordered.
04 — Garland
The eastern edge, where Garland meets the lake
Garland runs down to Lake Ray Hubbard along its eastern side, and the properties near the water get the one condition the rest of the city does not: open exposure. There is nothing between a lakeside yard and the wind, and the light comes off the water as well as out of the sky.
That has two practical consequences. Pergolas and shade structures need to be built heavier than they would be three miles inland, with posts and connections sized for wind loading rather than for appearance. And finishes work harder: reflected ultraviolet light plus constant air movement is tougher on a stain than the equivalent sheltered yard, so a finish that holds up for three years elsewhere may want refreshing sooner here.
The compensation is the obvious one. These are the yards where an elevated deck earns its cost, because the height buys a view, and where it is worth spending money on the rail — a cable or glass infill keeps the view that a solid timber rail would take away.
Anything close to the shoreline can sit under rules beyond the city's own, depending on how your property boundary and the water's edge relate to each other. We establish that before design rather than after, because it changes what can be built, not merely how it is built.
Services
What we build in Garland
Every service below is available across Garland.
Deck Building
A new deck is mostly a structural job wearing a decorative finish. We build decks in Mesquite that are enginee…
Deck Repair
Soft boards, a wobbly rail, a post that has started to lean, or a deck that just does not feel solid underfoot…
Deck Staining & Sealing
Staining is the cheapest thing you can do to extend the life of a wood deck in North Texas, and the most commo…
Patio Covers
A patio you cannot use from June to September is not a patio, it is a view. A solid cover is what turns the ba…
Pergolas
A pergola defines an outdoor space and takes the edge off the sun without closing it in or darkening the rooms…
Questions
Garland — asked and answered
My Garland deck is from the 1980s. Is it worth saving?
Often the frame is, even when the surface looks finished. We lift a board and look at the ledger against the house and the base of the posts, because those two decide it. If both are sound, new decking and a new rail on the existing structure costs a fraction of a rebuild and will give you years.
Do I need a rail on a low deck?
Below a certain height above grade, no — and low decks look better without one. That threshold is set by code rather than preference, so we measure the finished height at the highest point and confirm the requirement with the city for your specific build instead of guessing from a plan.
Can you build around the trees in the back yard?
Yes, and it is usually worth doing. A deck can be framed to leave an opening around a trunk with clearance for the tree to keep growing. What we will not do is set a footing inside the root plate of a mature tree: that is how the tree dies a few years later, and the shade is worth more than the extra square footage.
Does my homeowners association need to approve the deck?
In much of the newer north-east, yes. In the older parts of Garland, usually not. We find out which applies to your address before design, and where a submission is needed we prepare the drawing and specification for it.
Deck builders in Garland
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