I would like to build a staircase to the attic from the livi...

[jbb381]

I would like to build a staircase to the attic from the living room floor, currently a pull down makes attic accessible. Would like to know what is the narrowrest and steepest stairs can be? I would make a new opening in the ceiling for the new stairs.

[Deckman]

By the IRC code, the normal maximum rise is 8-1/4" and the minimum run is 9". This is a steep stair but some juristictions allow steeper stairs if they are used strictly for access. you need to check the local codes.

[Allie12380]

We are also looking to add a stairwell. We have a small coat closet that sits above our stairs coming from our basement to our kitchen. We would like to remove the coat close in our foyer and make it into a set of stairs going to our attick and then finish the attick space. Ours is tall enough to stand up in; even when it is finished for about a space of 15X12 which would be able to include two windows added to our exterior (one in front and back of house).

I've been trying to find information out about the process of adding the stairs to attick over the stairs to basement. The new stairwell would sit above the exisitng basement one and be inbetween our Formal dining room and living room and be accessed from our foyer.

Any advice or places to look would be great that you found while you were looking into this question. Reallly at this point just trying to get an idea of just how big a project this is verses our potential return.

We want to find out about what it would entail before we move forward. We know we will have to remove the drywall in existing stairwell to get to studs but wonder if we would need to remove the drywall that is in our dining and living rooms too?