Fire pits - permanent or portable?

[mrspez07]

We’re having our patio redone right now and while we didn’t incorporate one, we had the discussion. Portable is good if you think your interest might change, it’s also less expensive. This will allow you to make the seating area something else in the future. Permanent will look nicer and be more $ to install, but will be integral, it also will be able to be customizable to size and type.
Either way, please consider doing gas instead of wood. Wood smoke is a nuisance for your neighbors who have their windows open in the summer and may be a health hazard for those with breathing problems.
ETA: also depends on the size and space you have. You’ll want to make sure either way you have enough room to walk around it and the seating.

[lilac05]

We have a built-in. If we ever get around to fixing the area, I’d do a portable one. We have no seating flexibility, and the entire area feels weird to use if we aren’t using the fire pit. I’d love to be able to move the pit out of the way to add a table when we have bigger groups.

ETA:  I think the built-in looks much nicer.  We get lots of compliments on the area...but it’s just not as functional for us.

[auroraloo]

We have a portable gas that matches our patio. I like that it's portable because we can put it on our porch at times too.

[ssmjlm]

We have built in, but we have a pretty big patio, so it doesn't detract from usable space. Allow me to AW it some more:

Apparently I don't have any pictures with furniture, but we have 3 adirondack chairs around the firepit opposite the sitting walls and then a rectangle table with 4 chairs and a bench on one long side.  And even with that, you have a good 4' of walkway against the house/deck steps.

[sandandsea]

I’m doing a portable one. I’m not sure how often we will really use it and don’t want to run gas lines.

[ssmjlm]

RockNVoll , the only thing we knew we wanted was a walkway from the driveway around the back and for it to basically span the back of the house for symmetry. We got 2 quotes for pavers and 2 quotes for concerete. Both paver companies provided catalogs with photos from the paver companies and renderings of what we had discussed.

The biggest surprise for us was the cost of doing a gas built-in vs wood. The gas line is extremely expensive to run, even though our tank is on the side/back of our house (it's right on the side of our screened porch, so not a long trench/pipe run).

Our landscaper had a setup of various patterns and colors at their office, so we were able to see things installed, out in the elements. They also recommended to go ahead and do lights because they are too difficult to add after. We did add pathway lights to the walkway since those are freestanding and it was easy to tie into the existing box.

ETA: I found a post with the basic budget. Pavers were $13/sq ft for both quotes we received. Concrete was more.

1000 sq ft of pavers- $13,000
2 walls (they are 15') -$3800
Firepit - $750
10 lights with box - $2650
One step with small pad (threw in a light for us) - $700

[ssmjlm]

RockNVoll, I will say that doing it after being in the house for over a year was worth it b/c we could see how we used the backyard.

Not sure on your timeline, but we found calling at the end of the summer/fall was better and two companies offered a "winter" discount if we did it during their slow season of Jan-Mar. Since we don't have cold winters it's not an issue here.

[treedimensional]

I am pretty adamantly anti-firepit. It would require gas lines installed, because no way am I going to build and tend a fire when I really just want to enjoy a glass of wine on my patio; and if there are gas lines, you can't change seating layout. Give me a couple of portable patio heaters any day. They work well and require virtually nothing of me. They can be moved around very easily and don't obstruct interactions with guests. Firepits and hot tubs can both go away permanently as far as I'm concerned.

[allhis]

Our backyard is good sized so we are going to end up doing both. We already have a built in fire pit that just burns wood that is nearer to our pond. We use this one when it’s going to be a longer evening of fishing, marshmallow roasting, etc.
We are currently working on a patio right off our house which will have a gas fire pit for those nights when we just want to flip a switch for the heat and ambiance. We decided to go with a concrete model so it isn’t very portable but could move if we wanted. I’ll take pics when that area is soon completed, I’m really excited about it
Here is the model we bought. www.target.com/p/pipestone-42-rectangle-concrete-gas-fire-pit-gray-project-62-153/-/A-53767620

[kate1482]

Built in! When we had our sprinklers installed my dh had the trenches dug deeper for the gas line. We use it all the time and you just need to turn a key for it to be on/off. I don’t think we would use it nearly as much if it was wood burning.

[YahYahs]

We have a built-in wood-burning fire pit at our new house, just as we did in our old house. My DH loves tending to a fire (as do our neighbors who join us around it), so gas wasn’t an option lol.

[mrspez07]

One item to consider is a portable gas. As previously mentioned wood burning is problematic (tending, smoke, etc). If you want easy but not commit to a location, etc, there are ones that use the propane tanks and turn on and off easily. Not as decorative as permanent, but much easier than wood.

[sandandsea]

May 1, 2019 22:34:12 GMT -5 mrspez07 said:

One item to consider is a portable gas. As previously mentioned wood burning is problematic (tending, smoke, etc). If you want easy but not commit to a location, etc, there are ones that use the propane tanks and turn on and off easily. Not as decorative as permanent, but much easier than wood.

Yes this is our plan. There are some pretty cool options available too.