Building a Patio - Part 1

My wife and I live in Orlando, FL. We have a modest home with a reasonably sized back yard, which is fenced in from our neighbors on all sides. But, we didn't have a patio. What good is having a house in Florida, where it is sunny almost every day, without having a patio? We thought about building a deck but decided that we didn't want the deck to become a large projectile during a tornado or hurricane. So, patio it was.

Being the frugal guy that I am and wanting to learn more about home improvement, I decided to build the patio myself. So I started my research. We decided to build a concrete paver patio in an L shape. I figured it would be pretty easy to find all the materials. I was wrong. There are a ton of patio contractors out there that would love to quote you a price and build your patio but surprisingly few places to buy the materials yourself.

There are five main materials that go into building a patio. They are:

• Landscape fabric - Landscape fabric isn't mandatory, but you can lay it down on the bare dirt after you have finished your excavation and help ensure that no weeds come up through your patio. Make sure you put it only on the bare dirt and NOT between the limestone and mason sand layers!


• Crushed limestone - There are a bunch of websites that talk about the different types of rock that you can use as a base rock for a patio. I went with a 1/4" crushed limestone that the lady at the rock yard said that most people use for patios (many websites recommend 3/8"). It seems to have compacted quite well.


• Mason (or Leveling) Sand - If you buy this at Home Depot, it is called Leveling Sand and they sell it by the bag. Many other places call it masonry or mason sand. It is an extremely fine sand that is used on top of the limestone and between the cracks in the pavers once they are laid.


• Paver edging - You want to make sure that you get paver edging and not landscape or garden edging. Paver edging is typically much more flat than other types of edging so that the paver lay directly against the edging.
• Pavers - Yes, you need pavers! They come in all shapes, sizes, and cuts so choose them according to your liking.

As far as buying the materials:

• I bought the landscape fabric and pavers from Home Depot. I did find out later that there is a place, Paver Systems, in Orlando that has a large collection of pavers and does sell them to the public but they do not have a showroom in Orlando. Their only showroom is in Jacksonville. Besides Paver Systems, I only know of Home Depot and Lowe's as paver dealers in central Florida.
• I had to buy the mason sand from Home Depot as well. I'm pretty sure they charge twice as much when compared to going directly to a sand yard, but I didn't have a truck and no company will deliver less than about 6-8 tons of material. I only needed a little over a ton so I ordered the bags of sand from Home Depot and had them deliver the sand at the same time as the pavers.
• I bought the crushed limestone from Florida Rock (407-858-5416). I had 8 tons of limestone @ $36.50/ton+tax+delivery delivered by them and the process went very smoothly.
• I went to Paver Systems to buy the paver edging. Home Depot and Lowe's only had landscape edging. Paver Systems is a dealer of Snap Edge products, which sells the appropriate type of edging.
• The final, big cost of the project was a dumpster. We needed somewhere to put the excavated dirt. We found AFAB Orlando, a family owned dumpster rental business. The owners were super nice. They rented us a dumpster for $275.00 for seven days, which included drop off and pickup. Remember to ask for a dumpster with doors on one end. You can't throw wheelbarrows of dirt over the side of the dumpster!

That takes care of the main materials needed for the patio. In my next post, I'll discuss some of the other tools and materials needed for building the patio and the planning that the wife and I did to figure out the size and layout of the patio.