My name is Maggie Reinbold, and I live in Poway, California.
My mom, Opal, lives in a one bedroom apartment.
Well, it’s really expensive for her to live there.
So what we’re thinking about now is bringing my mom onto our property.
This is a perfect lot that’s situated, I think, well
in size and location for her to come and live with us.
When I first retired, I would not have entertained
the idea of moving into a granny flat next to my kids.
I’m really independent and have a very busy life.
The idea of moving is terribly stressful.
Maggie said to me, “Mom, think about it.
If you moved in next door, it would mean the world to me.”
And then, of course, I get the value of having
the opportunity to,
you know, be, be more in their lives.
I basically raised my kids, for the most part,
from the time that Maggie was in the third grade.
I was the chief quality officer for a health system here in San Diego
County and had been doing that work for about 25 years.
It was a very busy life.
And so when I retired, it took me some time to find my footing.
And the plan originally was to go from a three bedroom house
and two acres into a one bedroom apartment.
So I spent about six months downsizing,
and it was really, really hard.
My husband, Brad, and I, we’ve got two daughters, Wren and Phoebe.
We are a tight-knit family.
My mom lives about 15 minutes from us, and she and I have a good, close
relationship. We enjoy each other’s company.
We help each other with lots and lots of things.
So the idea of being able to bring her where she’s really just always here,
all the time, where she can help take the kids, that’s really wonderful
for two working parents who really do have demanding jobs.
And then obviously, as she ages in place, us to be able to help her as well.
We’ve been talking about the possibility of this for two or three years now.
And one night I kind of visualized myself in this,
this granny flat that we talk so much about.
And I felt
safe, and I felt, sorry.
I’m going to get choked up.
You know, I felt so lucky.
You know, if this really worked out,
I would probably feel the most safe and secure I’ve ever felt.
So. Sorry.
I don’t know where that came from.
So we’re really hoping that we can make it a reality.
Brad and I are both biologists, and as part of that, we’ve
obviously dedicated our professional lives to that work of conservation
and sustainability.
Building an ADU on a property,
it makes perfect sense to show everybody that you can positively contribute
to the housing crisis with your own lot and without,
you know, putting in jeopardy native habitats and native species.
So, Mom, how are you really feeling about everything?
Gosh, it’s just, it’s a little overwhelming at this point.
There’s this giant,
giant pile of work that has to be done between here and there.
But you know what?
I just have to take one bite of the elephant at a time.
Mm-hmm.
I’m sure. And, you know, we’ll be there to help you.
Oh, yeah.
One, you know, a big concern,
you know, from the get-go that's probably made this process
prolonged of our decision-making is, is the idea that it’s a lot of money.
So we’ve been talking to different contractors.
We’ve been looking at different ideas.
Hi, my name is Bob Sommers, and I’m the director
of planning and estimation for SnapADU.
I’m Leslie Sommers, and I’m the sales manager.
Hey you guys.
Thanks for having us over today. It’s a great setting.
It’s a wonderful piece of property. Thank you.
What we’d really like to do is hear a little bit
about your guys’ vision for the property.
Tell us a little bit about what you guys are thinking.
We want the homes to match each other.
We’d love her to have everything that we have in the main house, just smaller.
So a full kitchen, a standalone washer and dryer,
a full bathroom, a separate bedroom for her.
And so she can conduct all of her business and also her social affairs.
Yeah, we have quite a few different plans in our one bedroom, one baths.
One of the things that I’m concerned about is I really want there
to be room to do things with my grandkids.
Yeah, that sounds fantastic.
We try to look at every cubic foot, not so much every square foot.
We try to design all of our plans with minimal hallway space.
We typically like to vault the ceilings
everywhere we can to just to make the light large
and to make the rooms feel big.
You know, one of the things that I,
I’m struggling with is I have a wonderful piece
of family furniture that I would just hate to have to get rid of.
So I’m wondering, is that feasible in, in 500 square feet?
Yeah, absolutely.
Our floor plans are very open. Yeah.
So there’s a lot of, a lot of this space can be allotted to the, to the rooms
itself. Great.
Yeah.
More than anything, please take advantage of this view.
Yeah. I just love it here. So beautiful.
Yeah, absolutely.
So you guys have given us a lot of great information.
Should we have the budget talk? Let’s do it.
Well, in general, projects right now, one bedrooms,
are starting at around $300-325,000, all in.
And the timeframe for the ADU is generally about 10 to 12 months.
That could work. Good. Yeah, it sounds great.
That is something we’ve been waiting on
for a while to see if this is a reality for us or a dream that we can get,
that finally may come true, so. Mom, are we really gonna do this?
I think we are!
I have to make sure that everything’s going to fit.
But I couldn’t be more excited.
It just depends on the day, or the day of the week,
the time of the day, which emotion’s popping up to say how I feel.
I mean, in the end, there’s nothing but positives here.
Welcome, it’s great to see you again.
Come in, come in.
Wow, it looks great.
Welcome, welcome.
Wow, it’s beautiful, Opal. Thank you.
Wow. Isn’t it great?
I am so thrilled with the kitchen.
The layout that you guys did is, I mean, there’s space for everything,
and I didn’t think I’d have room for all my stuff, and I do.
And it just. It’s ... I feel.
I don’t feel like I’m in a small space at all.
I'm just, I’m just thrilled.
I think that there’s something
about the vaulted ceilings that just opens it up.
I love the fact that the kitchen
and this great room are so close together.
I can cook dinner and sit at the table and look at my wonderful view,
and it feels so large.
I just am amazed.
Well, do you want to see the rest? We’d love to.
Yeah. Let’s go have a look. All right.
Come on in, guys.
Here’s my little office bedroom.
Oh, this is nice. It’s just beautiful.
And I love how you had room for that nice piece over there.
You know, I’ve had that piece since the very first house I ever bought,
and it was a knotty pine piece that I painted.
And I was just so thrilled.
It absolutely perfectly fits.
Here’s the bathroom.
It’s a great space.
I’ve got the terrific walk-in shower.
And one of the things I really like
are the shelves that are built into the shower.
And again, the ceiling is high, so it just feels roomy in here.
It looks really great.
The incredible piece of this is that we did this all in less than a year.
It was like 11 months from beginning to end.
And that’s incredible to me.
And we stayed on budget, and, I mean, I just couldn’t be happier.
I have spent a lot of time on my own in my life.
The things that I gathered around me that I really love,
really were my nest, or my,
the place that I built for myself to feel safe and comfortable,
and getting rid of those things was really hard.
But the idea of being lean and mean and being able to just
not have
to be so surrounded by things really sounded good to me.
ADUs transform people’s lives tremendously.
For Opal, it brought her here, so she has her own space.
She’s completely independent of the family, yet
she’s right here next to the family and she gets to live in her home
and see the grandkids whenever she wants to,
but then ultimately has her own independent living area.
It’s my mom’s place. It’s not our place.
And she has her own beautiful little setup, but she’s so close by.
That gives me peace of mind.
She’s right there.
And so, you know, really, everybody wins.
You know, Grammy, I cannot wait to have a slumber party
because then we get to make popcorn and all that stuff and we can watch a movie.
Oh, that would be really fun. What movies do we think we want to watch?
I’ve had such a full life, but I feel like I’ve just gained a new one
just through the strength of relationship with my family.