Can we extend our deck past the house?

by Bruce
(Iowa)

We plan to build a deck on our house. The back of our house is straight all the way across. Extending out of the middle of the back of our house is an enclosed sun room that is 14 feet wide and 18 feet out from the house.

When walking from the house into the sun room, the sliding door that leads outside is on the left. When going outside from the sliding glass door on the left, the back of the house on that side is about 10 or 11 feet across.

So picture an L shape, the short part of the L is the back of the house (our dining rooms outside wall) and the long part of the L is the sun room wall (14 feet from the house to the outer corner of our sun room).

I would like to extend the deck a couple of feet beyond the corner of the house (along the dining room outer wall) in order to gain more square footage for our deck.

My plans were to then plant something taller in that corner of the landscaping to balance out the extension so the deck does not look silly from the street. My wife thinks it would look bad to extend the deck beyond the corner of the house. I have seen a few deck photos online where people have done this and it looked fine.

We also plan to extend the deck on the long part of the L about 4ft to 6 ft beyond the end of the sun room. What would you advise us to do about extending past the corner of the house?

Our yards are not wide so we are limited on the width of the deck. Yard dimensions are 70 x 140. The deck will be about 3' above the ground since our backyard slopes slightly. Thank you for any help that you can give to us.

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