Emily Alpert Reyes | (TNS) Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — Under the afternoon sun, Maggie Tran stopped one person after another on a hectic stretch of Skid Row, asking if they knew a particular woman.

No one seemed to recognize the name she repeated at tent after tent as she made her way along the block. “She could have a whole different name out here,” one person replied. “Do you have a picture?”

Tran shook her head before heading back to her SUV, disappointed but undeterred. It’s rare for Tran to find the people she’s looking for right away.

As a public health investigator, she searches for clues: An emergency contact number listed by a patient during a clinic visit. An old address saved in a database. The location of a homeless encampment where outreach workers found a particular person in the past.

Then she heads to the streets. Her job at the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health is to track down a crucial set of patients who slipped away from the health system: women of childbearing age who have tested positive for syphilis, a sexually transmitted disease that can cost newborns their lives.

Cases of syphilis have skyrocketed in L.A. County and across the country, with devastating results. Left untreated in adults, it can damage organs and infiltrate the brain, possibly leading to dementia and blindness. Men have suffered at higher rates than women, but a rise in cases among women has spurred particular alarm because newborns infected in utero can be stillborn or suffer enduring medical issues.

The disease can be stopped with antibiotics if detected and treated in time. Yet last year, L.A. County reported 136 cases of infected newborns — up from just four a decade earlier — including 13 that resulted in stillbirth.

Across the U.S., the number of such congenital syphilis cases reported annually among newborns ballooned from 335 in 2012 to 3,761 in 2022. The syphilis surge resulted in 231 stillbirths and 51 infant deaths last year in what one official called “an unacceptable American crisis.”

Tran is part of an L.A. County effort to turn those numbers around. Whenever someone tests positive for syphilis, the results must be reported to the county. Some patients are easily reached, but others cannot be found by public health nurses.

Those are the women whom Tran and her colleagues on the syphilis special investigation team are seeking. Finding them is crucial: Last year, 88% of congenital syphilis cases across the U.S. might have been averted with timely testing and adequate treatment, researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concluded.

When other efforts to reach such patients have fallen short, “our program is almost like a program of last resort,” said Magdalena Esquivel, chief of direct community services at the L.A. County Department of Public Health’s Division of HIV and STD Programs.

“Many of these clients have a history of trauma, mental health conditions, substance use, developmental disabilities — multiple reasons for fear and stigma around healthcare,” Esquivel said. “They may be doing transactional sex work” or have immigration concerns, and “some may fear losing kids.”

In a Westlake office building last month, Tran sat in her cubicle and scoured a host of government, healthcare and public records databases for any useful details. She recounted how one case had played out: Tran had combed through physician notes and found the phone number for the mother of a would-be patient, who told Tran it had been months since she had heard from her daughter.

The mother said the woman had been staying at a shelter when she last heard from her, but she didn’t know exactly where. Tran kept digging and turned up a possible address for the woman, but it led to an apartment complex that was locked. She wedged a letter in the door.

Even if the trail seems to have run cold, she keeps checking the databases for anything new. “There might be hope that if she tested again, maybe she had an address this time, or a phone number,” she said. “Or maybe she’s still at the hospital.”

Tran ferreted out a Social Security number for the patient from a confidential report about her test result, then plugged that into the databases. That turned up another test the woman had taken as an unidentified “Jane Doe,” shedding more light on the progress of her infection.

After roughly a week of sleuthing, she found the woman in another database: Jail bookings. Public health staff would go find the patient at the jail and offer her treatment. Because of the “Jane Doe” test results, they could assure her she would need only one shot.

“I’ll take this as a big win,” Tran said. “It’s rare to be able to find a patient this fast.”

Tran and her colleagues also help people get to the treatment they need. Behind the wheel of her white SUV, she hunted for a parking spot in an industrial stretch of the San Gabriel Valley, where she met a woman and her partner who live near railroad tracks. The couple piled into the back seat.

The woman, who asked not to be identified, said she had no idea she had syphilis before the public health team showed up to follow up on her test result. A message had been relayed to her earlier, but the county official did not say why they were calling.

When working the phones or hitting the streets, Tran does not explain why she is searching for someone, in order to avoid revealing sensitive information about their medical care.

“I can’t share,” she told one person at a downtown encampment, identifying herself only as being with the county. “We’re just looking for them.”

Holding back on details protects the privacy of the women Tran is seeking, but it can also be unnerving for people who fear they may somehow be in trouble.

The woman Tran picked up for an appointment said the efforts to reach her had initially felt “scary.” Whatever the county was trying to reach her about felt like “just adding one more thing to this life of mine,” she said as Tran drove them to a nearby clinic. But now “at least I’m fixing it.”

Syphilis can sometimes be treated with one shot of antibiotics, but if the disease is more advanced it can take three shots given roughly a week apart. Tran cautioned the couple that depending on test results, they might have to come back the following week.

“I’ll be keeping in touch with you guys,” she told them.

Missing the second or third shot means starting the series over, so public health officials have to keep tabs on hard-to-reach patients. And if clinics are short on bicillin — a key treatment that has been in limited supply this fall — some patients may need an alternative regimen that requires weeks of pills. That can be a challenge for patients who live in unstable conditions or have mental health problems, county officials said.

Public health researchers have bemoaned the soaring numbers of babies infected with syphilis as evidence of missed opportunities to serve vulnerable women, including those who are unhoused or grappling with drug addiction.

“The STD crisis has been worsening for more than a decade,” said Mario Pérez, director of the Division of HIV and STD Programs at the L.A. County Department of Public Health. Report after report shows that “we’re losing some control. The congenital syphilis crisis epitomizes that.”

The surging numbers are especially galling in a country that appeared within reach of wiping out syphilis around the turn of the millennium. Since then, tumbling rates of condom use, increased use of methamphetamine that loosens sexual inhibitions, underfunding of STD prevention and other factors have combined to reverse that progress, experts said.

The pandemic exacerbated the crisis, as day-to-day testing and treatment services were interrupted and public health teams were pulled onto COVID-19 duties. In L.A. County, for instance, routine syphilis screening for women at a county jail was suspended for roughly two years, and up to 75% of county STD prevention staff were reassigned at points in the pandemic, according to county reports.

“There are consequences when investments in public health are inadequate,” said David C. Harvey, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors. Right now, that consequence is “the death of infants.”

In California, pregnant patients are legally required to be screened for syphilis at their first prenatal visit, but some never get prenatal care at all. Others have no regular phone number or address that clinicians can use to follow up with their test results and ensure they get treated. Another challenge is that the syphilis spike has been tangled with drug addiction, and many people who use drugs are hesitant to seek medical care.

Pregnant people may be “scared of going to the doctor if they use drugs or are unstably housed” because they fear those things could affect their parental rights, said Dr. Rosalyn Plotzker, a preventive medicine specialist at UC San Francisco.

Plotzker and other researchers found that California babies born with syphilis were more likely to have parents who were homeless or who used methamphetamine. But if parents who were unhoused or using meth got prenatal care, the rate of syphilis prevention was much closer to that of parents without those challenges. The findings underscore that access to care is critical, Plotzker said.

Los Angeles County launched its syphilis specialized investigation team a little over a year ago, starting with two part-time investigators. It has since expanded to five investigators with the help of a nearly $4-million annual state grant for syphilis prevention, as well as other funds. Tran said the added staffing had eased her caseload, which now stands around 10 cases at a time.

Between September 2022 and October 2023, the syphilis team was asked to find 119 people who could not be tracked down by other programs and ultimately got 26 of them treated. The remaining patients could not be located, refused treatment, or were directed to other units or agencies.

The team also seeks out partners of the women they are assigned to find, aiming to get them treated as well.

To encourage patients to take the time to get treated, the investigators offer incentives such as gift cards to grocery stores and fast-food restaurants. If people need to take weeks of pills, the county can arrange for temporary housing in Skid Row to help ensure they finish the treatment.

As Tran drove the couple back from the San Gabriel Valley clinic, the woman said she was glad she had started treatment. She had learned about neurosyphilis, which can afflict the brain after an infection, and wondered if it was tied to a psychiatric episode that she suffered in the past.

Even if syphilis had not affected her at all, “I don’t want to be infected or infect other people,” she said. “I want to do the right thing.”

©2023 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Adriana Pérez | Chicago Tribune (TNS)

Over the course of millions of years, the earth regularly removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through a natural process called weathering, when exposure to the elements wears down surface rocks and silicate minerals.

But at the rate humans have been producing and releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, this process that happens on a geological time scale just isn’t fast enough to keep up.

A corn and soybean farm in the village of Buckingham, 60 miles south of Chicago, is providing the testing grounds for an Irish startup attempting to “enhance” weathering, thus shortening the process from millenniums to decades.

The Illinois trial, the first of its kind in the United States, is one of many efforts to leverage the potential of different materials to combat global warming.

“The whole carbon removal concept exists because we have to backtrack — we’ve gone too far,” said Maurice Bryson, founder and CEO of Irish startup Silicate. “The idea of this solution is, we’re using what’s already there.”

Last week, Silicate began covering over 100 acres of farmland with 500 to 1,000 tons of fine dust from ready-mix concrete that has been returned. Researchers at the climate tech company hope the concrete dust can permanently remove up to 220 tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and transfer it to the soil over the course of a year, the equivalent of CO2 emissions from almost 50 cars in one year.

Carbon dioxide removal is a technique by which carbon that is already in the atmosphere is removed through processes like enhanced weathering, reforestation and direct air capture, which uses engineered mechanical or chemical systems to capture carbon dioxide directly from the air. Earlier this month, The New York Times reported a California startup was the first to commercially market direct air capture in the United States.

But direct air capture is expensive. According to climate economist Danny Cullenward, it is also extremely energy-intensive and sometimes requires a lot of water.

And planting trees is not quick — older trees are more efficient at sequestering carbon than younger trees — or permanent — reforestation is a reversible solution because trees are not permanent reservoirs like rocks underground and they can release carbon again if cut down or destroyed in wildfires.

In theory, these pitfalls should not confront enhanced weathering, experts say.

“If it’s done well, it can result in very long-term, highly durable carbon storage,” Cullenward said. “And because you’re relying on essentially natural chemical processes without extremely energy-intensive production techniques, if you can figure out how to make this work, the pathway to scaling it is potentially a little bit easier and cheaper than it would be for some of the other competing carbon removal technologies.”

Decarbonization, or the reduction and removal of greenhouse gas emissions from the atmosphere, also encompasses other approaches like carbon capture and storage, where the gas is contained and stored before it can be released into the atmosphere.

This approach has become a point of contention in Illinois particularly over the past year after an Omaha company announced a project to build a pipeline that would transport millions of tons of liquid carbon dioxide from ethanol and fertilizer plants in South Dakota, Minnesota, Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois and store it deep underground in central Illinois.

Opposition from farmers, landowners and environmentalists eventually helped derail plans for the Heartland Greenway pipeline, a fight that encapsulates the myriad opinions on the most effective approach to decarbonization, which will likely be on display at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, later this month.

Scientists underscore the exploratory nature of decarbonization research: There is still much to understand and figure out.

“What I would emphasize is that it’s still early days for this,” said Frank McDermott, a professor in the Department of Earth Sciences at University College Dublin, who since 2021, has worked with Bryson as an independent scientific collaborator. “There’s a lot of efforts going on throughout the world at the moment, in Brazil and the United States and Europe adding various kinds of materials — rocks, basalt, steel slag, all sorts of materials — on soils. Concrete too.”

The science

To meet their ambitious goal, researchers at Silicate are simply leveraging a process as old as the earth itself.

“Weathering is a natural phenomenon. It occurs all around us,” McDermott said. “Everything that’s exposed to the atmosphere eventually breaks down — whether it’s natural materials like rocks and soils, or man-made objects, like buildings or monuments — they all degrade over time. It’s mainly because of acid from rainfall.”

As rain falls and dissolves carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, it forms carbonic acid, a compound people may recognize from the sparkling water sold at restaurants and grocery stores. Through weathering, carbonic acid reacts with rocks and minerals and is converted into bicarbonate ions that store carbon.

“We’re just hoping that when the (concrete) dissolves you get more of that bicarbonate, which is soluble in water, and it percolates through the soil, eventually into the rivers and into the ocean, where it gets stored,” said Ruadhán Magee, a postdoctoral researcher at Silicate. The bicarbonate can stay there for well over 80,000 years, he said.

Cement — one of the two main components of concrete — has high concentrations of calcium, a mineral that speeds up the weathering process.

After concrete dust is spread onto a large area of agricultural land, enhanced weathering will occur, removing atmospheric carbon at a faster rate than natural weathering would.

“It’s supposed to be like a sponge, soaking it up,” Bryson said.

Low cost, no maintenance

Researchers acknowledge it might seem counterintuitive that a grayish, human-made construction material could be good for the environment. But, besides removing carbon from the atmosphere, concrete dusted on cropland could also work as a soil pH amendment, offering benefits such as improved soil health and crop productivity.

“It’s something different,” said Erich Schott, the farm owner. “Which is fine … it’s how we learn.”

Agricultural lime has long been applied to gardens, lawns and fields to make soil less acidic and more alkaline, adding nutrients such as phosphorus and zinc for good bacteria to grow, as well as improving water penetration.

Applying concrete to cropland would ideally also be low-cost, as the material requires no maintenance after being applied to fields. And its supply would be readily available from the construction industry: Local concrete and materials company Ozinga is providing the milled concrete for the trial at Schott Farms.

In a very rough estimate, approximately 400 million cubic yards of concrete are used in the United States every year, according to Rick Bohan, senior vice president of sustainability at the Portland Cement Association, a nonprofit that promotes the research and use of cement and concrete.

“There is a certain amount of concrete that will always be wasted,” Bohan said. “And it’s a small amount, it’s probably in the single digits.”

According to the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association, approximately 1% to 2% of concrete is returned to suppliers, but most of it is reused to make new concrete or other products like landscaping blocks and barriers. Some of it is crushed and made into aggregate for fill and base material or as recycled aggregate in new concrete.

For Schott Farms, Ozinga is crushing concrete that has been returned, which according to the company accounts for less than 1% of their production. But that small percentage still represents “quite a bit of material,” according to Ryan Cialdella, Ozinga’s vice president of research and development.

The company will also scoop up fine concrete particles that settle in treated ponds after equipment is cleaned. Cialdella said Silicate’s trial will give what would have been waste products a “much more valuable endgame.”

Because of its synthetic origin, there are always concerns that spreading materials like concrete can do more harm than good to the soil.

Bryson said the company’s trials in Ireland complied with European Union liming standards, which require products used to lime fields or change the pH of the soil meet limits for the presence of elements like chromium and nickel.

“We’re pretty confident the material is safe,” he said. “We wouldn’t be putting it out there if we weren’t.”

Bryson said Silicate analyzes the concrete dust before spreading it to make sure there is no “nasty stuff” such as coal ash, which is sometimes used in concrete — or if there is, that it falls below certain levels to ensure its safe use. And as the company continues to test water samples from the fields where concrete is spread, Bryson said, researchers will keep an eye on possibly harmful leaching or contaminated water.

Measuring success

On a recent overcast morning, Bryson, Magee and a third Silicate researcher, Leo Hickey, walked with Schott through one of the soybean fields in his 5,000-acre farm. Tractor tire marks were still fresh in the mud since the beans had been harvested only a week before.

Hickey stopped next to a water sampler, which sucks in water through a vacuum from the soil. Then the researchers measured the temperature and soil pH and later analyzed the sample in a lab for the chemical reaction that produces the bicarbonate ions which store the carbon dioxide.

At the edge of a field closer to Schott’s farmhouse, where the only evidence of the recent harvest was the ears of corn scattered around, Hickey crouched next to a circular machine. It whirred as the top swung closed.

“There’s a constant flux of gases coming off the soil, and it’s just capturing that flux,” he explained.

The aptly named flux chamber draws air up from the ground, feeding the gases through a tubing system into a yellow box that sends information to two analyzers: the first for methane, carbon dioxide and water, the second for nitrous oxide.

Besides testing water and air, the researchers will also test soil samples and compare them with readings from nearby control areas to get a better picture of just how much carbon is actually being pulled from the atmosphere and into the soil.

Founded in County Sligo in 2021, Silicate has conducted similar projects it says have shown “huge promise” across Ireland, including on barley, oat and cauliflower crops.

Silicate says it is able to remove almost 5 tons of carbon dioxide per acre each year.

For its projects in Ireland, Silicate has measured the carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere and sold carbon credits to private companies.

Buying carbon credits is a way for companies and people to compensate for their greenhouse gas emissions. They can do so by purchasing credits in carbon markets from companies like Silicate, which reduce emissions or remove them from the atmosphere to combat climate change.

But skeptics say that carbon credits cannot replace actions such as transitioning energy production away from polluting fossil fuels to clean renewable sources. This is because quantifying how much carbon has been successfully removed is an intricate challenge, said Cullenward, who has often criticized the carbon offsets industry.

“It is very difficult to make a claim about either avoiding emissions or removing CO2 from the atmosphere,” he said. “And there’s lots of different ways that uncertainty in those claims can manifest and lots of different reasons why those claims can be suspect.”

In the carbon offsets market, people often say they are doing something new when in reality they’re just taking credit for something that’s already happening, Cullenward said.

Another problem with the carbon credit market is that it doesn’t take into account how long carbon will be removed from the atmosphere. If it is rereleased within a short period of time, the benefit is minuscule.

“There’s this disconnect,” Cullenward said. “And when you justify permanent pollution with temporary benefits, eventually the bill comes due and the atmosphere gets screwed over.”

Enhanced weathering potentially offers permanent storage of the carbon it removes. But measuring how much is actually removed from the atmosphere will not be an easy feat.

“I’m not trying to say this is a bad idea,” Cullenward said. “But what I’m getting at is how hard it is to quantify the climate outcome, even if you think you’re actually correct. You know this is good, you just don’t know how good it is.”

Despite its promise, enhanced weathering raises a lot of big questions, said Freya Chay, program lead at the nonprofit Carbon Plan, which uses open data to analyze the scientific integrity of climate solutions such as carbon offsets and removal.

At Carbon Plan, Chay led the development of a tool that offers around 30 methods to estimate the net carbon removal of enhanced weathering at various stages.

The complexity of this tool alone encapsulates some of the challenges with quantification.

“We’re talking about processes related to soils, waters, biology, chemistry and environment. These are geochemical systems that are variable through time and space,” Chay said. “We’re also talking about a carbon removal approach that can have really large delays — both spatial and temporal delays — between putting that (concrete) down and actually removing carbon from the atmosphere. So it’s just a really complex system.”

The brains behind the trials at Schott Farms are acutely aware of the challenges associated with quantifying enhanced weathering results, especially given the researchers’ limitations of only being able to measure carbon removal at the farm.

“Then, what happens to the carbon?” said McDermott, Bryson’s research collaborator. “Does it all eventually make its way into the oceans, which we hope? Or do we lose some of the CO2 back into the air during transport, in rivers and streams? … I think all of us, all the companies involved and the researchers, are pretty much at the stage of focusing on the initial part, and most of us haven’t had a chance to look at more downstream stuff.”

A win-win for air and soil

Bryson said the carbon credit practice at Silicate might soon become an old model if the concrete dust proves to be beneficial for cropland.

“We might try and do all of that without selling carbon credits,” he said. “We’re providing with such value to the soil with this material, that maybe the carbon that we remove then leads to incredibly beneficial changes in pH. So we wouldn’t have to sell the carbon we removed, we’d just let that happen.”

If Silicate changed its business model from selling carbon credits to selling a service to farmers with carbon removal as a co-benefit, Cullenward said, that would be an innovative approach to carbon offsetting.

“This is music to my ears,” he said. “Because it has proven extremely difficult for even the most well-intentioned carbon (crediting) applications to appropriately quantify the climate benefits of interventions. And one of the things about enhanced weathering that is potentially so appealing, is that it is one of the few areas of carbon removal where there’s a very clear private benefit to landowners.”

If all goes well at the Schott Farms trial — considering the new crop types, soil composition and moisture levels the group of Irish researchers is working with — Silicate hopes to expand operations across Illinois and the region next season in late September and October, when farmers apply lime to their fields.

Their goal is to be able to eventually remove 50 million to 100 million tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in the Midwest each year.

“It’s really important that we don’t say it’s all solved,” Bryson said. “It’s important for all of us in this space to be honest with each other. And the honesty is, there’s this huge potential here. But there’s work to be done that we’re getting on with doing.”

Cullenward emphasized that efforts to remove carbon from the atmosphere are still in the early stages, and the benefits have not been proven. People often say carbon removal is a central part of the climate mitigation story, he said. “It is not.”

These new approaches should not be equated, he said, with tangible, near-term opportunities to reduce pollution like using clean energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, “which need to be the vast majority of our focus.” That doesn’t mean carbon removal won’t become important in the long term, especially when it comes to stabilizing planetary temperatures.

“This is a civilizational-scale exercise we’re going through,” Cullenward said. “There are things that are at the beginning of the journey; there are things that are mature and ready to go.”

Climate experts believe it will take many different approaches in concert to slow global warming and stabilize the climate.

“We see a lot of innovative ideas that bubble to the top, and I always encourage people — it’s worth looking at these things. But for so many of them, you really have open questions about scalability, energy, feasibility, the economics,” said Bohan of the cement association. “I don’t ever want to dismiss any of them because I’m a big believer that it’s an ‘all of the above’ approach. That’s how I look at this. Is this going to change the world? Probably not. But that doesn’t mean it’s not worth looking at and researching.”

adperez@chicagotribune.com

©2023 Chicago Tribune. Visit chicagotribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Erik J. Martin | Bankrate.com (TNS)

Detached structures are a great way to add space and value to your home. Whether it’s a workshop, storage space, garage or accessory dwelling unit (ADU), the presence of a detached structure to your property could positively impact its worth.

While the long-term benefits are great, detached structures are expensive to build. If you do not have the funds to pay upfront, there are financing options available. Let’s look at the ins and outs of these add-ons.

Should you borrow to finance a garage or detached structure?

You can, of course, pay for your detached structure in cash, but considering that they can cost well into the five figures — even up to $110,000 in some elaborate cases — that might not be the most feasible option.

Some scenarios when it might make sense to finance your detached structure project include:

•If you don’t have all of the cash needed to pay the full cost of the project.

•If you have equity in your home that can be tapped to fund the project.

•If you have a solid credit score and will be able to obtain a competitive interest rate on a loan.

•If you have a plan to pay back the money and are disciplined about doing so.

How to finance your additions

Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to finance your addition that can be budget-friendly. Many personal loans come with repayment terms of one to 10 years, while home equity loans and HELOCs could have repayment periods of up to 30 years. With both options, you’ll be responsible for making consistent monthly payments or risk the health of your credit score. Bear in mind, you’ll be paying back interest on top of your loan amount.

HELOCs

Home equity lines of credit — or HELOCs — can be a good way to finance a detached structure or any home improvement. HELOCs give you a line of credit to pull from (essentially like a credit card) based on the amount of equity you have in the home. You usually have 10 years to borrow from your line, and you’ll repay what you borrowed (plus interest) over the following 20 years or so.

Keep in mind that HELOCs have variable interest rates — they reflect moves by the Federal Reserve to raise or lower rates — so the amount of interest you pay could rise over time.

A HELOC could be a good option if:

•You have great credit that allows you to score the best possible interest rate.

•You have substantial equity in your home.

•You don’t know exactly how much money you need for your project or how long it’ll take to do.

A HELOC could be a bad option if:

•Your income isn’t reliable, and might not be able to handle a monthly obligation.

•You plan on selling your home soon, which requires paying off your credit line immediately.

•You don’t have strong credit.

Home equity loan

Like a HELOC, a home equity loan uses the equity you’ve built up in your home. However, a home equity loan is an installment loan, meaning you receive all of your funds at once and repay it in equal monthly installments.

Typically, the loan amount you can borrow is no more than 80-85 percent of your home equity. You’ll have to start making payments right away, but your interest rate and the monthly payment will never change.

A home equity loan could be a good option if:

•You need all of your funds upfront and/or you know the exact amount you’ll need.

•You have substantial equity in your home.

•You prefer fixed monthly payments.

A home equity loan could be a bad option if:

•You don’t have at least 80-85 percent equity in your home.

•Your financing needs change throughout the construction project.

•You don’t have strong credit.

Cash-out mortgage refinance

A cash-out mortgage refinance is the process of replacing your existing home mortgage with a new, bigger mortgage, then taking out the difference in cash. You can use this cash for any purpose.

Keep in mind, a cash-out refinance completely replaces your existing mortgage and may change your repayment timeline or monthly payments. It’s generally best to do this only if you can get a lower rate on your mortgage, or improve the terms in some other way.

As with your original mortgage, your monthly payments will be steady (assuming you opt for a fixed-rate loan). “In this way, the cash-out refi provides protection from rising rates in the future, which is an advantage over a HELOC,” says Glenn Brunker, president of Ally Home. The cash-out refi’s interest rates may be lower than those of home equity loans, too.

A cash-out mortgage refinance could be a good option if:

•You can obtain a better interest rate than you currently have on your mortgage.

•You want to revise or change your current mortgage terms.

A cash-out mortgage refinance could be a bad option if:

•You don’t qualify for a lower rate than your existing mortgage loan.

•You prefer to keep your current mortgage terms.

Personal loans

A personal loan can also be a solid option if you’re looking to add a detached structure to your property. The good thing about these loans (when compared to a home equity loan, for example) is that they don’t require collateral. And the proceeds from a personal loan can generally be made available very quickly, sometimes in as little as a few days.

The drawback, though, is that they typically have higher interest rates than home equity products. They also come with shorter terms than HELOCs, so you’ll likely need to repay the money faster.

The amount you can borrow for a personal loan (and the interest rate you’ll get on it) will depend largely on your credit score, income and other debts. So if your credit is less than stellar, you might consider financing your project another way.

A personal loan could be a good option if:

•You don’t want to put your home on the line by using it as collateral.

•You need the money quickly.

•You have a solid credit score or a creditworthy co-signer.

A personal loan could be a bad option if:

•You need to repay the loan over a longer period.

•You don’t have strong credit, and so won’t get the most competitive rate.

Home renovation loans: FHA 203(k), Freddie Mac CHOICERenovation, Fannie Mae HomeStyle

Renovation loans can be good choices when looking to improve your home. Often these products are combination mortgages and loans: that is, they simultaneously provide financing both to buy a residential property and to renovate it — which includes building additions or new detached structures.

FHA 203(k) loan

One go-to is the Federal Housing Administration (FHA)’s 203(k) loan. Because they’re backed by the FHA, these loans come with low interest rates and aren’t too hard to qualify for.

The FHA also allows for 203(k) refinancing, which would allow you to refinance your existing mortgage into a 203(k) loan. This would give you the funds you need to pay for your improvements while also keeping you to a single monthly payment.

However, like all FHA loans, your property must meet minimum requirements to be eligible under a 203(k) refinancing loan. For example, the detached structure must meet the program’s list of eligible activities and your home’s value must be within FHA’s mortgage limit.

Freddie Mac CHOICERenovation Loan/Fannie Mae HomeStyle Renovation loan

There are also private sector loans for renovations and combo purchase/rehabs. The Freddie Mac CHOICERenovation loan is one that allows you to both buy and rebuild. The Fannie Mae HomeStyle Renovation loan or mortgage is another.

In general, these loans are designed for any home renovation or repair that is affixed to the property and adds value to it. Detached structures count, as long as they are permanent fixtures.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac may require tougher qualifications than a government-backed loan: higher credit scores, bigger down payments. For instance, Fannie Mae credit checks are fairly robust. Not only will the lender check your credit score, but also evaluate how often you carry a credit balance versus paying the balance off each month. You must complete renovations within 6 months (Freddie loans) or 12 months (Fannie loans) of approval.

A home renovation loan could be a good option if:

•You’re buying a place that needs substantial rehabbing.

•You want to refinance your existing mortgage.

•You have your plans ready and are prepared to start renovations quickly.

A home renovation loan could be a bad option if:

•Your home/property or construction project doesn’t meet the FHA loan requirements, or you don’t meet the lender credit requirements

•You’re not ready to begin work within 30 days of closing.

•The project is likely to exceed the designated time period for completion.

Detached structure cost expectations

The costs and expenses you’ll need to cover will depend on the specific detached structure you’re looking to build. While some structures cost as little as a few thousand dollars, others can run as high as $100,000 if you get all the bells and whistles.

Overall, the cost of each detached structure will depend on the following factors:

•Your use of professional contractors

•Required site preparation (to remove trees or level the land)

•Presence of windows or doors

•Electrical and plumbing needs

•Nature of roofing, framing and siding materials (metal costs more than wood)

•Any permits required

•The foundation you’re using (will you need a concrete foundation poured?)

•Any paint, stain or decorative elements

Here’s a little more about what you can expect with each type of detached structure.

Carports

If you don’t have a garage or just need extra space to store a vehicle, a carport can be an easy and affordable choice. They can also be helpful if you need a rain-protected loading zone for kids, elderly residents or family members with disabilities.

The biggest downside to a carport is that it might require permits from your city. These can be tedious and sometimes costly to obtain. You will also need to check with your homeowners association and read your deed restrictions to ensure that carports are allowed in your specific community.

Cost-wise, HomeAdvisor estimates a carport runs between $3,190 and $9,806, with an average price tag of about $6,436. Among the factors that can affect price are site preparation, unit size, permit costs and presence of a concrete slab. Fixr reports a similar range in the national price — $2,000 to $10,000 — with most folks forking over an average $8,439 for an installed 18’ x 18’ x 8’ galvanized steel carport on a 4” thick concrete slab with two walls.

Boat shelters, a related structure, will typically cost more due to their larger size and higher height.

Detached garages

Detached garages can serve many purposes: workshop, band studio or of course a place to store your car or anything else. In fact, the National Association of Home Builders’ “What Home Buyers Really Want” 2019 report found that 85 percent of homebuyers rank garage storage as a home feature they want most, and 36 percent consider it an essential feature for their future home.

Anticipate paying between $19,200 and $45,000 for a two-car detached garage, per HomeAdvisor, which estimates that the average cost per square foot will be $40 to $70. A one-car detached garage may set you back as little as $11,500 versus $31,000, which is the expected starting price for a three-car detached garage. Fixr calculates that the typical homeowner pays, on average, $52,830.).

Accessory dwelling units (ADUs)

An ADU represents a secondary form of housing built within or adjacent to your single-family home on the same lot. It can be attached or detached. The key point is that it’s an independent living space, with its own entrance, bathroom and kitchen facilities.

A detached ADU is likely going to be the most expensive structure you can add to your property. Expect to pay $100,000 and up to have a detached ADU built on your lot, based on HomeAdvisor data. Angi reports that an ADU costs, on average, $82,500, or around $150 to $300 per square foot, with a typically sized ADU measuring between 600 and 1,200 square feet.

Storage sheds and barns

Sheds and barns are also popular detached structures that can be used for both storage and personal space. A trend is the “she-shed” or “man-cave” addition, which offers residents a private at-home retreat — a grown-up version of a kid’s playhouse (another fun use of a shed).

The best thing about sheds is that they’re typically quite affordable. Most sheds span $1,500 to $10,000 in cost, according to HomeAdvisor, although a small prefabricated shed can cost as low as $300 versus a custom upscale shed that may ring up for at least $33,000. In general, most shed buyers pay between $4,000 and $6,000. Fixr, meanwhile, reports that the average cost runs $5,653 for a 10’ x 12’ shed — figure $50 per square foot for a custom build, though kits run about half that.

Got a barn in mind instead? (Traditionally, a barn was a structure to house livestock, but now there are mini-versions for suburbanites, which function more as storage units or additional rooms.) A barn will likely range from $20 to $150 per square foot, including labor and materials, HomeAdvisor indicates. The typical price span for a barn is $1,597 to $4,967.

The pros and cons of financing detached structures

As with any major purchase or expense, there are pros and cons to using a term loan to finance the project. Adding a detached structure to your property is no exception. Loans offer a lump sum windfall that make it easy to get started on an upgrade — but it may be wiser to in some cases to use savings or other types of debt.

Pros

•Several options offer better, cheaper ways to borrow, especially compared to credit cards.

•You can reserve your savings, have cash available for other expenses.

•Loan interest may be tax-deductible, if you itemize on your tax return.

Cons

•You have to meet approval requirements and qualifications.

•Applying for a loan can be time-consuming and delay the start of your project.

•The interest you pay can significantly increase the overall cost of your project.

•You are incurring additional debt that can hurt your financial profile.

How to estimate your costs

The expense of building a detached structure depends on the size of the structure you hope to build, as well as the materials and finishes you select. Several home improvement sites can help you outline the materials your project will involve and what these items will cost. These sites detail how much a garage project may run you per square foot, as well as what you can expect to pay for permitting, roofing materials, drywall, framing, different types of garage foundations, siding materials and more.

Also significant: If you are using a prefab kit — easier if you’re doing it yourself — or aiming to construct from scratch.

If you decide to skip the DIY route and hire a contractor to handle your detached structure project, it’s important to have a firm understanding of what you hope to achieve, says David Steckel, a home expert with Thumbtack, a home renovation site and contractor search service.

“Do you want to have a small office space or do you want to create a new living area that can be rented out?” he asks. “This goal is translated by the general contractor into a scope of work budget, which provides an explicit, line by line, description of what work is going to be completed, a rough estimate as to what level of finish, and a cost for everything.”

When reviewing potential contractors, do background checks with the Better Business Bureau and check that the company has a contractor’s license. It’s also a good idea to obtain references from previous clients or read Yelp and Google reviews.

How much value can a detached structure add to my home?

It’s difficult to estimate what kind of return on investment you can expect by adding a detached structure to your home. But it’s safe to assume that a well-built garage, carport, shed/barn or ADU will increase your property’s value to some extent. Anything that enhances the living space or functionality of the property generally does.

Per Porch.com, a residence with an ADU located in the largest cities is typically priced 35 percent higher, on average, than a property without one.

When it comes to other types of detached structures, the extent to which they can increase your home’s value will depend on the size, quality and overall condition of the structure.

“Generally speaking, a new detached garage will probably add between 5 percent to 20 percent to a home’s value, while a major shed can add between 2 percent and 10 percent to a home’s value,” says Jasen Edwards, a real estate agent and chair of the AgentAdvice.com Agent Editorial Board in Austin, Texas. “Expect a new barn to add between 5 percent to 15 percent value versus 2 percent to 8 percent for a new carport.”

Cam Dowski, a Realtor and founder of WeBuyHousesChicago, says “adding a two-car garage to a house without one could add about $20,000 to the value of the home.”

Return on investment reflects the cost of a project, but the nature of the project itself is more important. Austin Beachy, who handles marketing at Sheds Unlimited in Morgantown, Penn., notes that a new shed can add decent value but not as much as a garage. “For example, if the cost to build a new shed is $10,000, it could add between $5,000 and $7,000, or 50 to 70 percent of the total building cost, to the value of your home,” Beachy explains. “A new garage, on the other hand, can provide a greater return on investment in the range of 60 percent to 80 percent of the cost of the garage’s construction.”

Bottom line on financing detached structures

Borrowing money to finance a detached structure could be a good idea if you have a plan in place to pay off your debt.

Fortunately, there are many ways you can borrow to build a garage, ADU, barn or shed. But it’s important to estimate your labor and material costs thoroughly to determine how much you need to borrow. Shop around to find the right contractors and materials, and compare bids carefully.

Do the same with your financing: It’s wise to shop around with a few lenders. Doing so will allow you to compare rates and find the cheapest way to finance your detached structure. With the right planning and preparation, you can better ensure a satisfactory outcome on the addition, while adding to the versatility and value of your property.

Key takeaways

•Detached structures (garages, sheds, carports, ADUs) can enhance your home’s fair market value, especially if they increase the usable or liveable space.

•A detached structure can be financed via a HELOC, home equity loan, cash-out refinance, personal loan, renovation loan or credit cards.

•There are pros and cons to each financing option, based on the interest rate, your home equity stake and other factors.

•Costs to add a detached structure can vary widely, depending largely on size, features and whether they require professional labor.

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Additional reporting by Lara Vukelich

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