Remodeling contractor in Montgomery, TX

Quick answer: Franco BuildWorks LLC is a Houston-based remodeling and construction contractor serving Montgomery, TX and the Lake Conroe area, including zip codes 77316 and 77356. We handle kitchen and bathroom remodels, full home renovations, room additions, drywall, tile, flooring, painting, and siding for the area’s lakeside homes, acreage properties, and master-planned subdivisions. As a service-area company with no storefront, we travel to your home.

Key takeaways

  • Franco BuildWorks serves Montgomery and the Lake Conroe communities across 77316 and 77356 as a Houston-metro service-area contractor — there is no showroom to visit, so we come to the home for the walkthrough.
  • Montgomery’s housing runs from 1970s and 1980s lakeside builds to 2000s and 2020s master-planned homes, so remodeling needs range from dated-finish updates to moisture and slab repairs.
  • Expansive clay soils common across Montgomery County drive foundation movement that shows up as drywall cracks, sticking doors, and separating tile grout.
  • Gulf Coast humidity and Lake Conroe flood exposure make moisture detailing — waterproof shower membranes, the right flooring core, sound siding — the difference between a repair that lasts and one that fails.
  • Most lakeside subdivisions sit in unincorporated Montgomery County, where POA architectural review and county floodplain and septic rules often matter more than a city building permit.
  • We handle the full remodeling scope here: kitchens, bathrooms, whole-home renovations, additions, drywall and texture, tile, flooring, painting, siding and stucco repair, and light commercial build-outs.

Remodeling & construction services in Montgomery

Franco BuildWorks LLC offers the full range of residential and commercial work to Montgomery homeowners and businesses. Each service has its own detailed guide:

Remodeling in Montgomery, TX: What Makes This Area Different

Montgomery is not a typical Houston suburb, and the homes here do not remodel like a tract subdivision inside Beltway 8. This is Lake Conroe country — larger lots, acreage tracts, gated lakeside communities, and custom homes that were often built one at a time rather than in a single builder run. That variety is the first thing that shapes any remodel. A 1980s waterfront house in Walden, a 2010s custom home in Bentwater, and a new build off FM 149 in the 77316 corridor each carry a different set of framing details, finishes, and moisture histories.

Because Franco BuildWorks is a service-area contractor based in Houston rather than a storefront in town, the work starts at your home, not a showroom. That fits how Montgomery is laid out: properties are spread across the lake’s shoreline, wooded acreage, and master-planned sections, and the honest way to scope a project here is to stand in the actual space. We walk the room, look at the substrate behind the finishes, and talk through what the house is telling us before anyone talks about a plan.

The point of a local page like this is not to claim a track record we have not earned in your neighborhood. It is to be straight about how Montgomery’s homes, soil, humidity, and permitting actually behave — so you can judge whether the approach fits your project.

Why Montgomery Homes Develop the Remodeling Needs They Do

Montgomery’s residential stock came in waves, and each wave ages into a different remodel. The oldest layer is the historic town core — Montgomery is known as the birthplace of the Texas flag, and the original district dates to the 1800s. Most homeowners, though, live in the lake-driven growth that followed. The late-1970s and 1980s brought the first big lakeside communities — Walden on Lake Conroe, April Sound over in 77356, Point Aquarius — with homes now 40-plus years old. These are the houses coming in for full kitchen and bathroom remodels, dated oak and laminate updates, popcorn-ceiling removal, and drywall repair where decades of settlement have left their mark.

The second wave is the 1990s-through-2000s master-planned push: Bentwater, Grand Harbor, Del Lago, and the acreage subdivisions off Highway 105 and FM 149. Many of these are larger custom homes with more square footage to renovate, two-story layouts, and finishes that owners are now ready to modernize.

The newest layer is the 2010s-and-later growth in 77316 — Woodforest, Emory Glen, Pine Lake Cove, Crown Ranch, Ridgelake Shores. These homes are young, but new does not mean finished the way an owner wants it: room additions, converted flex spaces, upgraded kitchens and primary baths, and correcting builder-grade shortcuts are common requests. Across all three waves, the through-line is space — Montgomery lots give room to add on and reconfigure in ways tighter Houston neighborhoods rarely allow.

How Clay Soil and Gulf Humidity Show Up in Montgomery Homes

Montgomery County sits on the Gulf Coastal Plain, and much of the area carries expansive clay soils mixed with sandy loam. Expansive clay swells when it takes on water and shrinks when it dries, and that shrink-swell cycle moves foundations — most homes here are slab-on-grade, so the slab rides the soil. In a wet spring the ground pushes up; in a drought-stressed summer it pulls away. Over years, that movement is what produces the symptoms owners actually notice inside the house.

You see it as stair-step cracks at drywall corners and above doors and windows, doors and windows that stick in one season and swing free in another, gaps opening at baseboards or crown, and grout lines cracking or tile lifting on a floor that used to be flat. Those are not always cosmetic — sometimes they are the finish reporting on movement underneath.

Franco BuildWorks does foundation-related repair, not foundation engineering. The honest approach is to read the pattern first: cosmetic drywall and tile repair is straightforward, but recurring, directional cracking can mean the slab is still moving, and patching over active movement just hides it until it returns. In those cases the right first step is a structural or foundation evaluation before we refinish, so the repair holds.

Gulf humidity compounds all of it. Montgomery’s air is heavy most of the year, and moisture is relentless on wood trim, caulk joints, exterior siding, and anything behind tile. Details that get skipped in a drier climate — sealed penetrations, proper backer and membrane, breathable exterior repairs — are what let a remodel survive here.

Flood, Lake Conroe, and Getting the Moisture Details Right

Water is the defining feature of Montgomery and also its main construction risk. Lake Conroe is a reservoir on the West Fork of the San Jacinto River, and shoreline and low-lying properties carry genuine flood exposure. During Hurricane Harvey in August 2017, the San Jacinto River Authority made record releases from the Lake Conroe dam as the lake filled, and that water moved downstream toward Conroe, Kingwood, and Humble. Homeowners near the lake and in the floodplain live with that reality, and it should shape how a remodel is detailed near grade.

Where a home has flood history or sits low, we favor materials and assemblies that tolerate moisture rather than trap it. That is a design choice, not an upsell — the wrong material near a wet floor fails twice.

Inside every bathroom, the non-negotiable is waterproofing behind the finish. Tile and grout are not waterproof; a shower needs a proper waterproof membrane — a sheet or liquid-applied membrane over the backer board — so water never reaches the framing. Skipping that is the single most common reason a nice-looking shower rots out. On flooring, the material’s core matters: laminate has a wood-fiber core that swells permanently once water gets into it, so for ground floors and moisture-prone lake-area rooms, waterproof luxury vinyl plank with a stable core is usually the better call, with laminate reserved for drier upstairs spaces. These are small decisions that decide whether a remodel lasts through a Montgomery summer or fails in it.

The Services That Matter Most in Montgomery — and How We Approach Them

Montgomery’s mix of aging lakeside homes and newer master-planned houses draws on the full remodeling scope. Below is how Franco BuildWorks approaches the work most relevant here, honestly and to the substrate.

Kitchens and bathrooms are the most-requested projects in the 40-year-old lakeside communities, where layouts and finishes are ready to be brought current. In bathrooms especially, the waterproofing and the correct tile substrate come before anything decorative. Whole-home renovations and room additions fit Montgomery’s larger lots — there is often real room to add square footage or reconfigure, which tighter Houston neighborhoods rarely allow. Drywall, texture, and paint are constant here because clay movement and humidity keep producing cracks and worn finishes; getting the texture to match the rest of a room is its own craft, not a formality.

  • [Kitchen remodeling](/kitchen-remodeling) and [bathroom remodeling](/bathroom-remodeling) — layout, cabinetry, tile, and, in every wet area, a proper waterproof membrane before the tile goes on.
  • [Full home renovation](/full-home-renovation) and [room additions](/room-additions) — well suited to Montgomery’s larger lots and acreage tracts where there is room to expand.
  • [Drywall installation & repair](/drywall) and [texture](/texture) — with matched texture and, where it counts, a Level 5 skim-coat finish for walls under raking light near big lake-facing windows, and Level 4 for typical textured walls.
  • [Tile](/tile) and [vinyl plank & laminate flooring](/flooring) — waterproof vinyl for ground-floor and moisture-prone rooms, laminate reserved for drier upstairs spaces.
  • [Interior & exterior painting](/painting) and [siding & stucco repair](/siding-stucco) — detailed for Gulf humidity so caulk joints, trim, and exterior repairs are sealed and breathable.
  • [Commercial build-outs](/commercial-build-outs) — for the small-business and retail spaces along the Highway 105 and FM 149 corridors.
Montgomery home remodeling

Permitting Reality: City of Montgomery vs. Montgomery County

Permitting in Montgomery depends entirely on which side of the city limit line your home sits on, and a lot of the area is outside it. Inside the incorporated City of Montgomery, building permits are issued and inspected by the city, and remodels that touch structure, electrical, plumbing, or an addition’s footprint typically require them. That is the straightforward case.

The larger reality is that many of the well-known lake communities — Bentwater, Walden, April Sound, Point Aquarius, Grand Harbor and much of the surrounding acreage — are in unincorporated Montgomery County. In Texas, counties have limited authority to enforce a general residential building code in unincorporated areas, so there is often no county building permit for an interior remodel the way a city would require one. What does apply county-side is meaningful: floodplain development permits for work in mapped flood zones near the lake, on-site sewage facility (septic/OSSF) permitting when a project affects the system, and driveway or culvert access permits on county roads.

For most homeowners in these communities, the binding gate is not the county at all — it is the property owners association. Communities like Bentwater, Walden, and April Sound run architectural control committees (ACC) whose review of exterior changes, additions, and even some visible work is frequently stricter than any government requirement. The honest guidance: confirm your city-limits status early, plan for POA architectural review where it applies, and treat floodplain and septic rules as real if you are near the water. We build the project to fit those requirements rather than around them.

What to Look for in a Montgomery Remodeling Contractor

The lake-area market draws a wide range of contractors, and the differences that matter are not always visible on the surface of a finished wall. A few things are worth checking before you hand over a Montgomery home.

First, look for someone who talks about what is behind the finish. In this climate, the membrane behind the shower tile, the flooring core near grade, and the fire-rated assembly over a garage all matter more than the paint color — for example, a garage ceiling beneath living space should be finished with 5/8-inch Type X fire-rated drywall, and a contractor who does not mention details like that is not thinking about the whole house. Second, look for honesty about foundation movement: a contractor who promises to make clay-driven cracks disappear forever without addressing the slab is selling a cosmetic patch. Third, expect straight talk about permits and POA review rather than a shrug.

You should also be wary of anyone leaning on superlatives, guaranteed outcomes, or pressure. Franco BuildWorks does not publish prices, review counts, or claims of a track record we have not earned in your specific neighborhood — the scope and the number come from seeing your actual home. Ask any contractor how they handle the moisture and soil realities described on this page; the quality of that answer tells you most of what you need to know.

Scheduling, Access, and How Site Visits Work Around Lake Conroe

Because Franco BuildWorks is a service-area company without a physical office to visit, the process is built around coming to you — which suits how spread out Montgomery is. Homes here sit along miles of shoreline, down long private drives, on wooded acreage, and inside gated communities, so the first step is simply arranging access and walking the space together.

Gated and POA-controlled communities — Bentwater, April Sound, Point Aquarius, Walden and others — usually require advance notice at a manned gate or a visitor pass, so we coordinate that ahead of a visit rather than showing up cold. For lakeside and acreage properties, we plan the walkthrough around real access: where materials can stage, how equipment reaches the work area, and how a project sequences without cutting off the parts of the home you still need to live in.

Serving both the 77316 and 77356 zip codes means covering everything from the newer Woodforest and Emory Glen side to the established April Sound and Walden lake communities. Travel across the Montgomery area is part of the job, and we plan schedules with that drive built in so timelines stay realistic. When you are ready, the next step is a conversation and an on-site walkthrough to look at the actual conditions — no showroom trip required, and no number quoted before we have seen the space.

Neighborhoods and zip codes we serve in Montgomery

We work throughout Montgomery and nearby areas, including these neighborhoods:

  • Bentwater
  • Walden on Lake Conroe
  • April Sound
  • Grand Harbor
  • Del Lago
  • Point Aquarius
  • Woodforest
  • Longmire on Lake Conroe
  • Lake Conroe Village
  • Emory Glen
  • Pine Lake Cove
  • Crown Ranch
  • Ridgelake Shores
  • Town Creek Crossing
  • Buffalo Springs
  • Clear Water Cove

Zip codes served in Montgomery: 77316, 77356.

Montgomery remodeling FAQ

Do you serve Montgomery zip codes 77316 and 77356?

Yes. Franco BuildWorks serves both — 77316 on the newer Woodforest, Emory Glen, and FM 149 side, and 77356 across the April Sound, Walden, and Lake Conroe communities. As a Houston-metro service-area contractor, we travel to the home rather than working from a storefront.

Do I need a permit to remodel my home in Montgomery, TX?

It depends on where you are. Inside the City of Montgomery limits, the city issues and inspects building permits for structural, electrical, plumbing, and addition work. Much of the lake area is unincorporated Montgomery County, where a county building permit for an interior remodel often does not apply, but floodplain and septic (OSSF) permits can — and your POA’s architectural review usually does. We confirm which rules apply before starting.

Are foundation and soil problems in Montgomery as serious as inside Houston?

The same expansive clay soils that move foundations across the Houston metro run through Montgomery County, mixed with sandy loam. Most homes are slab-on-grade, and the shrink-swell cycle shows up as drywall cracks, sticking doors, and separating tile. We repair those finishes, and when cracking looks like active movement we recommend a foundation evaluation first so the repair actually holds.

My home is on Lake Conroe — what flooring should I use on the ground floor?

Near the lake and at ground level, waterproof luxury vinyl plank is usually the better choice because its core stays stable if it gets wet. Laminate has a wood-fiber core that swells permanently once water reaches it, so it’s better reserved for drier upstairs rooms. In a flood-exposed home, choosing moisture-tolerant materials near grade matters even more.

Can you work within Bentwater, Walden, or April Sound POA architectural rules?

Yes. Many Montgomery lake communities run architectural control committees whose review of exterior changes and additions is often stricter than any government requirement. We plan projects to fit that review — coordinating gate access and passes as well — rather than working around it.

Do you handle both older lakeside homes and the newer subdivisions?

Yes. The 1970s and 1980s lakeside homes in Walden and April Sound often need full kitchen, bath, and drywall updates, while the newer 77316 subdivisions like Woodforest and Emory Glen more often want additions, reconfigured spaces, or upgrades to builder-grade finishes. We work across both.

How do site visits work if I’m out by the lake or behind a gate?

We come to you. For gated and POA-controlled communities we arrange gate notice or a visitor pass in advance, and for acreage and shoreline properties we plan the walkthrough around real access and material staging. There’s no showroom to visit and no number quoted before we’ve seen the actual space.

Do you do commercial build-outs in Montgomery?

Yes. Alongside residential remodeling, we handle light commercial build-outs for small-business and retail spaces, including along the Highway 105 and FM 149 corridors near town.

Nearby areas we serve

Serving Montgomery, TX and the surrounding Houston metro

Tell us about the space, the scope you have in mind, and your timeline. Franco BuildWorks reviews the details, checks availability, and contacts you to confirm an appointment.

Request Your Estimate Appointment or call 346-229-9538.