Garage door costs in Milwaukee

Wisconsin treats the door between your house and an attached garage as a fire door, and it wants a label to prove it. The state's Uniform Dwelling Code says the door and frame, as one assembly, must be labeled by an independent testing agency as having a fire-resistive rating of at least 20 minutes. The only glass allowed in it is glass the door's listing allows.

Glendale, in Milwaukee County, repeats that rule on its own permit sheet. Under door replacement for homes, its "Do I Need a Permit?" guide answers "maybe" and says to call the inspection department. A permit is required if you change the size of the opening. The note beneath it calls for a minimum 20-minute fire-rated door and frame between the house and an attached garage. A new garage or garage addition takes a permit and a zoning approval, and may need a look from the city's Planning and Architectural Review Board.

The state code has lines for the big door too. The foam inside an insulated overhead garage door is exempt from the code's thermal-barrier rule for foam plastic.

And the overhead door can't be your way out. The code generally calls for at least two exit doors from a home's first floor. One of them may lead into an attached garage only if that garage has its own exit door to the outside, because an overhead garage door may not be used as an exit door.