Home Renovation in Anderson, SC
Anderson is its own city, not a Greenville suburb, and the renovation work down here shows it. People call it the Electric City because it was one of the first places in the country to run on hydroelectric power back in the 1890s, and that older, established core still shapes a lot of the housing. You’ve got historic homes near downtown, lake houses and near-water neighborhoods out toward Lake Hartwell, and newer subdivisions filling in around the edges.
Each one needs a different kind of work. Home values in Anderson have climbed about 111% over the last ten years, according to NeighborhoodScout, so a lot of people are putting money into the home they already own instead of buying up in this market. If you’re thinking about a renovation, addition, or whole-home project in Anderson, we work down here regularly. Our office and showroom are at 119 Woodruff Industrial Lane, Greenville, SC 29607, about 35 minutes up I-85. Call (864) 729-4141 or email [email protected].
One thing that trips up a lot of Anderson homeowners is figuring out who actually issues the permit. If your house is inside Anderson city limits, it goes through the City of Anderson’s building department. If you’re out in unincorporated Anderson County, it goes through the county instead. And if you’re near the water, there’s a third layer. The shoreline on Lake Hartwell is federally controlled, so any dock or shoreline work has to be authorized by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, not the city or county. Most people don’t find that out until they’re ready to start. We handle the permitting either way and pull it early so it doesn’t hold up the job.
Home Renovation Services in Anderson
We’re a design-build remodeling contractor, licensed in South Carolina and fully insured, and Anderson is one of the areas we cover regularly. What we end up doing depends a lot on which part of town you’re in. The older homes near downtown come with plaster walls, dated wiring, and layouts from another era. The lake-area homes are often second homes or places people retired into and want brought up to date. The newer subdivisions usually just need to catch up to current taste. Three different kinds of work in one city.
The call we get most is kitchens. In the newer subdivisions it’s usually a builder-grade kitchen nobody loves: oak cabinets, a tight layout, a wall closing it off from the living room. So the wall comes out, and a good share of the time it turns out to be load-bearing. The right fix is a beam up in the ceiling, not a post stuck in the middle of your new island. In the older downtown homes, the kitchen is small because that’s how they built them, and opening it up usually means dealing with whatever the plumbing and wiring look like once the plaster comes off.
Home additions are busy right now, same as the rest of the Upstate. If you locked in a low mortgage rate, you’re not about to trade it for a higher one on a bigger house, so you add on instead. A primary suite, a bonus room, a sunroom looking out toward the water. Anderson lots, especially the older ones and the lake properties, often have room for it. The things to watch are setbacks and how the lot drains, and on lake property, how close you sit to the Corps shoreline line. We check all of that before we design anything, not after.
Bathroom remodels in Anderson usually go one of two ways. The older downtown homes often still have one original bathroom with cast-iron pipes and the layout it came with. The newer homes have that builder vanity and cultured-marble shower the humidity has been working on for years. Either way, materials matter most here. We use plywood cabinet boxes and good setting materials, because the cheap stuff doesn’t survive Upstate summers.
Garages are a bigger part of what we do lately. An attached garage ties into the house structure and has to be done right, or you’ll see the gap from the street and feel the draft inside. A detached one gives you more freedom on where it goes, but it needs its own utilities and site prep. On the bigger Anderson and lake-area lots, detached garages and workshops come up more than they do in town.
Whole-home renovations usually start the same way out here. Someone buys a solid old house or an aging lake place, mostly for the location, and wants it brought up to date without it looking like every other flip.
A pretty typical job for us is an older home near downtown Anderson that a family bought for the lot and the character. They want it opened up and modernized, but they want to keep what made them buy it. So we rework the layout so the kitchen, dining, and living areas connect, plan around the old wiring and cast-iron drains we already know are back there, and save the trim and details worth keeping. We go through these room by room before we tear into anything, because the older Anderson homes are where the surprises hide.
How We Work
We’re a design-build firm. That just means one team does the design and the construction, so you’re not hiring an architect, waiting on drawings, and then trying to find someone to build them. We’ve watched that handoff go wrong too many times, so we stopped working that way. One team, one contract, one phone number, from the first talk to the final walkthrough.
Our designer handles the blueprints, structural drawings, and 3D models, so you can see the space before we pick up a tool. We cover the basics: layout, flow, what fits where. If you want deep color work or a really specific look, we’ll point you to specialists we trust.
Every proposal has an allowance for each category: tile, fixtures, sinks, faucets, and hardware. You can pick from our partners or find your own. If you buy something somewhere else, we pick it up, store it in our warehouse, and install it when that part of the job comes up. You don’t haul anything. What goes in your house is your call.
You also get a project portal from day one. The schedule, your material-selection deadlines, what’s still open, and every message with the team, all in one place. You pay through it with ACH. And we build past code on every project, not just to it.
Our Showroom
Don’t pick a cabinet off a screen or commit to a finish you’ve only seen in a catalog. Come see the real thing. Our showroom is about 35 minutes from Anderson, right at our Greenville office.
Most of it is about cabinets: door styles, how thick the boxes are, the drawer glides, how it’s all put together. Plywood versus particleboard matters more here than people expect, with the humidity. We keep tile, countertops, fixtures, and hardware out too. Seeing it before you sign anything is kind of the whole point.
119 Woodruff Industrial Lane, Greenville, SC 29607
(864) 729-4141 | [email protected]
Common Questions from Anderson Homeowners
Do I need a permit to renovate my home in Anderson, SC?
Yes, for anything structural or anything that touches electrical, plumbing, or mechanical work. If your house is inside Anderson city limits, the permit goes through the City of Anderson’s building department. If you’re in unincorporated Anderson County, it goes through the county. And if your project involves the shoreline on Lake Hartwell, that part has to be authorized by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. We handle the permitting and build that time into the schedule so it doesn’t hold up the job.
What is the most expensive part of a house to renovate?
Usually the kitchen and bathrooms. Not so much because of the stuff you can see, but because of what’s behind the walls: the plumbing and electrical, plus the cabinets and tile that take the most skilled work. In older Anderson homes near downtown, you can also hit structural surprises once things open up. The best way to keep it under control is figuring out the full scope before the work starts, not in the middle of it.
What are the best neighborhoods in Anderson, SC?
Depends what you’re after. For older character and history, the homes around the Downtown Anderson Historic District have real bones worth keeping. For lake access, the near-water neighborhoods out toward Lake Hartwell draw a lot of second-home and retirement buyers. For newer construction with some room, the subdivisions north and east of town tend to have it. We’ve worked across Anderson, and each area has its own quirks worth knowing before you start.
Can I stay in my house during a renovation in Anderson?
For a kitchen or one bathroom, most people stay. If you’ve only got one bathroom and that’s what we’re working on, you’ll want to make other plans for that stretch. Whole-home renovations are different. Most people would rather be out, but we can work room by room and keep you in the house if that’s what you need.
What’s the difference between design-build and a general contractor?
A general contractor builds from plans someone else already drew, so you’re the one lining up the designer and the builder. A design-build firm like BuildMasters does both under one contract: the design, the structural drawings, and all the construction. One team, one point of contact, and nobody pointing fingers when a design choice changes the build.
Let’s Talk About Your Renovation
If you’re thinking about a renovation, addition, or whole-home project in Anderson, get in touch. We’ll come look at the house, talk through what you want, and tell you straight what it’ll take.
119 Woodruff Industrial Lane, Greenville, SC 29607
(864) 729-4141 | [email protected]
We’ve been building and renovating around Upstate South Carolina for over a decade. The first conversation is free, and we’re not hard to talk to.