We are a general contractor in Bangor, ME for houses already standing: additions, kitchens, baths, whole-house renovations, and the sills and beams that hold them up. The Census Bureau's 2020-2024 estimate dates about 41 percent of Bangor's housing to 1939 or earlier, so every price we write starts below the finish.
A Bangor remodel starts below the finish because the city's median house was built in 1954, and what sits under its floors decides what a new kitchen or addition can carry. Price the structure first and the number holds after the walls open.
West Side and East Side foursquares, Victorians and two-families checked from the cellar up
Broadway, Tree Streets and Whitney Park houses planned around the Historic Preservation Commission
Lots within 250 feet of the Kenduskeag Stream or the Penobscot checked against the shoreland rules
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Three jobs come up most in Bangor's older neighborhoods, and each one starts with the frame of the house.
About 70 percent of Bangor's housing units were built before 1980, and paint in a house built before 1978 may hold lead, which puts the work under the EPA's lead-safe renovation rule.
We renovate structure first, then wiring and plumbing by the licensed electricians and plumbers Maine requires, then finishes, one floor at a time so most families can stay in the house.
An addition is only as good as the house it leans on. Bangor's code page sets a 5-foot frost depth and a 70-pound ground snow load, so the footing goes deep and the new roof is framed for that load and matched to the old pitch.
City code allows one accessory dwelling unit per lot, up to half the main home or 1,000 square feet, whichever is smaller, with the Code Enforcement Officer's approval.
Sills rot where wood meets wet soil, and Bangor's 2022 comprehensive plan says upkeep on the city's older buildings has not kept pace with code needs.
Level the floor before you tile it: we raise a sagging floor a little at a time on jacks, then sister new lumber to the notched joists and set a pressure-treated sill on the old stone.
Our Bangor general contracting work adds these three services to the three above.
Bangor enforces the Maine Uniform Building and Energy Code, and its building permit page says additions and basement finishing typically need a permit. The renovation fee is $52 for the first $2,500 of work plus $7 per $1,000 after that, about $385 on a $50,000 job.
We start down cellar at the sills and the carrying beam, then check the floors, the venting and any wiring a wall gives away.
Your architect or our design partner draws the work, and once you sign the written price and contract, we file with Bangor Code Enforcement.
A weekly update runs to the last day, and that day ends with a room-by-room walkthrough together.
Wayne Cobb
Owner, General Contractor Bangor · Bangor, Maine
The person who checks your sills is the person who answers for the job.
Wayne Cobb grew up in Hampden and started as a carpenter's helper in 1990, pulling plaster out of old houses on Bangor's West Side during the week and framing camps on Pushaw Lake on weekends.
Fifteen years of opening old walls taught him where remodel budgets go: a sill rotted under a bathroom, a carrying beam notched for a drain line, an addition hung on a house that was never level. In 2005 he narrowed the work to remodels and additions on older homes and started pricing the structure before the finishes.
Wayne still looks at every house himself before a price is written. He checks the sills and the carrying beam, runs a level across the floors, and tells you plainly what the house needs before you pick a tile.
Maine does not license general contractors, so there is no license to show you. What you get instead is a house checked before it is priced, a written number before work starts, and a phone that gets answered.
More about WayneYou choose a general contractor in Bangor, ME by how much of the house they want to see before they quote, from the cellar stairs to the attic hatch. A price written from the kitchen doorway is a guess with a number on it.
On Broadway, in the Tree Streets or at Whitney Park, ask how they work with the Historic Preservation Commission, which reviews additions and alterations; a Certificate of Appropriateness costs $55.
Get it in writing either way: Maine's home construction contract law makes any job over $3,000 a written contract both sides sign, with the initial down payment limited to a third of the price. The state licenses no general contractors, so that contract and the cellar visit tell you who you are hiring.
A Bangor remodel is as likely to be for a landlord as for an owner who lives in the house, since about 53 percent of the city's households rent (ACS 2020-2024). A two-family gets the same cellar-first look as a one-family.
Bangor's shoreland rules apply within 250 feet of the Kenduskeag Stream or the Penobscot River, where the shoreland zone sets new buildings back 75 feet (25 downtown) and holds the first floor a foot above the 100-year flood. The city's FEMA flood zones run mostly along those waters, Penjajawoc Stream and Osgood Brook.
A Bangor project needs its permit before the first wall opens, since work begun without a permit can draw a stop work order and a double fee. Historic district applications are due 17 days before the commission's monthly meeting.
Remodeling a Bangor kitchen costs $14,000 to $75,000+ and remodeling a bathroom starts at $12,000 per bath, both averages across many projects and never a quote for yours.
| Kitchen scope | What it usually means | Average range |
|---|---|---|
| Cosmetic refresh | Painted cabinets, a new counter, faucet and light fixtures | $14,000 to $22,000 |
| Mid-range update | A new cabinet run and counters, the sink where it was | $22,000 to $40,000 |
| Full gut | Plaster off, old wiring out, a new layout | $45,000 to $75,000+ |
Averages across many kitchens, not a quote; an old wall can hide a drain or a wire that bumps a job up a row.
One bathroom remodel in Bangor runs from a $12,000 floor for a small bath with basic updates to $25,000 to $35,000 at the top with extensive tile. A full gut with rot repair adds $8,000 to $10,000, and the subfloor and any plumbing that moves set where a bath lands.
We price a Bangor addition only from drawings because four things set its cost and none shows from the street: the footing, the tie-in to the old roof, how the new rooms get heat and, off city sewer, whether the septic can carry another bedroom. Most land inside the growth boundary has city sewer; the rural land outside it generally does not.
The layout choice moves a Bangor kitchen most: keep the sink and range where they stand and the budget stays low, or move them and new plumbing and patching follow. Cabinet grade comes next.
We start on your Bangor house with a free estimate request, then a visit to the cellar and the rooms you want changed. Tell us the neighborhood and roughly when the house was built.
