new siding or a simple addition?

[confustication]

We have the opportunity to do one or the other for our home. All labor will be done at no cost by family members with the necessary skills. We will only need to pay for the materials, and it looks like we will be able to do that in the next few months (yay tax returns!)

The home desperately needs the siding, but we also very much need the space as we are in a two bedroom home with three children. The oldest is an eight year old girl, the younger are two boys 14 months apart who will share a room. The addition would be for a simple bedroom, with built in space for my office (I work from home about half time. Currently my computer is set up in the kitchen- which has significant impact on how much 'work' I can get done while working as without a door/separation, little people struggle with boundaries.)

Eventually it will all get done, but which would you choose to do first? I am inclined to do the addition, then side the whole thing after that is complete so it can all be done at once. However, there is some significant argument to be made for increased efficiency involved in residing.

Opinions?

The time/cost will be very close as the home is small, and the addition is to be a fairly simple one.

[HeatherAtHome]

Are you talking about just siding? Or rigid insulation + siding? Just siding on it's own wouldn't make that much of a difference in heating (I think).

As long as the siding isn't *too* awful, I'd go for the addition. Like you said, it's another bedroom & office space which means increased efficiency, more money & less stress.

And again, like you mentioned you can reside the whole thing later all at once.

[SuzyLee]

How bad is the siding? A friend of mine recently had to replace ALL the windows in her huose, bc they let the siding get so bad that it rotted around the windows and the windows were ruined. Some of the drywall inside the house around the windows was ruined too.

That said, if the siding isn't that bad, I would probably save until I could do both at the same time. You will have to do some kind of siding on the addition, and you want it to match the rest of the house. So save a few more months until you can just do it all at once.

[Usually Curious]

you will spend money on siding that will be ripped out when you add the room later.