5 Factors to Consider When Choosing Siding for Your New Home Addition

Creating an addition to your home can give you the new bedroom you need, a useful home office, or that man-cave you've been wanting. Adding to your home can be a nerve-wracking process though, and one where homeowners have a million decisions to make.

While choosing a house siding material for your home addition doesn’t sound like the biggest job, the choice you make will impact your budget, the style of your addition, and the overall look of your home. Take these five factors into consideration when choosing siding for your new home addition.

1. Initial Cost

Whatever siding material you choose, consider your budget and how much you want to spend.  When making a decision, the cost of materials will likely help you narrow down your choices quickly.

Average cost per square foot:

• Engineered Wood Siding — $3.50 - $8.00
• Vinyl siding — $0.75 - $2.70
• Fiber cement siding — $1.75 - $5.50
• Stucco siding — $3.00 - $8.00
• Wood siding — $1.00 - $10.00
• Brick siding — $12.00 - $18.00

2. Installation Costs

After buying the siding for your new addition, you'll need to take labor costs into account. While you may get a discount by buying from the same person that does the installation work, installation costs can put a damper on any project.

HomeAdvisor’s estimated installation costs per square foot:

• Engineered wood siding – $2.25 - $5.30
• Vinyl siding — $2.00 - $7.00
• Fiber cement siding — $0.75 - $5.00
• Stucco siding — $6.00 - $9.00
• Wood siding — $3.00 - $10.00
• Brick siding — $6.00 - $12.00

The cost to install wood siding, fiber cement and stucco may run higher due to paint and stain costs. Get this information from your installer before making a final decision to make sure the siding you choose is still in your budget.

3. Warranty

Warranties are an important factor when choosing siding for a home addition There are as many warranties as there are siding products to choose from. Look for the following in your siding warranty: How long does the warranty last? Longer is better…but keep reading!

• What is covered? Hail damage? Color fading?
• What are your remedies? Materials only? Materials and Labor?
• Is your remedy prorated? If so, the longer you own the siding the less you can recover if there is a problem.
• How reliable is the company giving the warranty? Will they be around to handle claims 20 or 30 years from now?

4. Style

Style is another factor to consider as you'll want the outside of the addition to complement the existing exterior of your home. This could relate to aspects such as texture, lines, and color. It may also relate to the style of home you own.

Blending exterior materials isn't unusual and can be quite appealing. Finding homes with engineered wood siding adorned with stone veneer is common in today's construction methods.

For older style homes, such as bungalows, it’s typical to see house siding designs that include a blend of stucco or brick siding on part of the exterior with wood siding on the remainder. Another example can be found on multi-level homes with the first-floor exterior offering brick veneer while the upper floor might be wood or vinyl siding.

There is a lot of flexibility in color and texture as well. Stucco offers a smoother overall texture while engineered wood siding gives the appearance of natural wood. Wood siding tends to offer a wider range of color options as well.

5. Endurance

One final factor to consider when choosing siding is how your home will look 10 years from the installation date. You may love bright pink stucco now, but is that a wise choice for your home and its long-term value?

This decision is up to the homeowner, but how your siding will endure trends can be important to you if you want to keep your resale value high. Even if you don't plan to move, you don't want to degrade the value of your home when you spend money on a renovation or addition project.