Pine Cone

Basements are something I have no experience with. Love the idea of that extra space in theory. What problems are associated with basements? Risk/warning signs to look out for when viewing properties? Heating options for basements and/or do they have central heating like the rest of the house? What about plumbing and sewage? I see a lot of houses online which are described as having a 'finished basement' with extra bedrooms and a bathroom. Would this require $$ to put in plumbing for toilet and watewater or do basements usually already have this from time house was built?

Twitcher1958

Around this area, heating covers basements too. Also houses aren't usually built with a finished basement but a 'rough in' is provided - basically the drains etc needed if you were to install a bathroom in the future, which means you don't have to go digging up the floor to install said services.

neilg14

We rented a basement for 18mths that had been newly renovated.
2bed, bathroom, kitchen/diner, lounge.
The 2 problems we had were,
1. We had no windows, so no natural light, or fresh air. It was like living in a cave.
2. We could not control the heating in the winter. The owner lived above and was toasty warm, whereas we were constantly cold and had to buy some electric oil radiators, luckily for us, it was an all inclusive price so we didn't have to pay the leccy bill.
My mate bought a new build with an undeveloped basement and he turned it into one room with a bathroom, did all the work himself apart from the wiring and it cost him $22K.

Souvy

Finished basically means that it's been drywalled, flooring has been laid etc. In other words, the basement is living space in the same way as the other floors are.

There will normally be some plumbing put in when the house is built because that's where the washing machine tends to go. There may also be additional plumbing in anticipation of an unfinished basement being finished.

A basement should have heating in it from the word go. Probably baseboard heaters. If it doesn't, or at least have the 220V wiring, you could be looking at chunks of money.

We had an additional bathroom put into our basement. That did require having the concrete floor dug up because the existing plumbing and drainage were in the wrong place for the new shower, sink and bog. I think the whole job came to about $15k (demo/construction, materials, plumbing, wiring, new window etc).

There are legal issues with having bedrooms in the basement. There has to be more than one viable way of getting out in case of emergency. Our place only had the stairs and a small window. A bedroom would thus have been illegal. We had a bigger window cut in, so the room I built is now a legal bedroom. Whether or not it can be described as a bedroom is another matter. I believe that bedrooms must have built-in closets. I purpose-built a closet for ours. It's a permanent fixture. I don't know if it counts as built-in.

You will often see real estate ads where the bedrooms are described as 3+1 etc. That means real bedrooms and other rooms that aren't really bedrooms but are used as such.

The biggy with basements is water. Things you do not want to see are dehumidifiers (evidence of damp) or sump pumps (flooding risk). Check water heaters. They don't last forever. There should be an indication on a heater of how old it is. Any sign of rust is a worry.

As an aside, if the water in the house shows any sign of running a bit brown, change the heater immediately.

You could possibly also invest in a damp meter. They are not expensive and will tell you instantly if a basement wall is damp because of infiltration or, even worse, a crack. The latter can be expensive to fix because it means digging right down to the foundations outside.

The meter can also be used elsewhere, like underneath all the windows in the house.

A basement inspection should also look at the electrical panel. Best leave that to someone who knows what they are doing.

dbd33

Something else to consider is headroom; older houses often have basements in which it's barely possible to stand up. The basement can be dug out (though it's not usual here to dig underground palaces endangering the structure above ground they way they do in London) but that's not cheap.

Souvy

I forgot about that one. My basement ceiling is lower than the others by a foot. Not really an issue for me. The ceiling is still above fingertip height.

dbd33

Another thought is that, if the house is on a septic system, then plumbing the basement will likely require some form of discharge pump. Turd expulsion pumps aren't especially noisy but the sound of one's discharge whistling overhead isn't something everyone enjoys.

Atlantic Xpat

Yes, thats correct. We have a sump under the basement stairs with a pump. The laundry room and downstairs loo empty into the sump & when the float reaches a certain level the pump engages and the sump is emptied to the septic. For a house on mains drainage presumably the output to the sewer is below basement level? Or might mains drained house have a sump and pump as well.

Less whistling turds than grinding of a pump every now and then (obviously linked to how much discharge is going into the sump) but YMMV or indeed your output might be more musical than mine....

BristolUK

Or the house raised as, I believe, a BEer did with a property not far from me.

dbd33

The current house has a sump pump for grey water which discharges on to the lawn. There's no toilet in the basement, the pipe to the septic is at shoulder height so, as in a previous house, any basement toilet would require a sewage pump.

I don't think I've lived in a house (in Canada) where the plumbing was originally connected to mains drains. The connection has always been the septic pipe re-routed.

Souvy

What a palatable conversation.

We'll be looking at a turd pump for my son's house (boonies and septic). The reno we are doing on the basement should at some point involve a bog. We don't have a clue what we should be looking for.

On a slightly related note, my next project up there (apparently) is re-doing the stairs down to the basement. False treads.

We have already bought the treads. Cutting and installing them should be a simple matter of careful measurement. The bugger is going to be cutting the nosings off the existing stairs to make the riser and tread flush. I'm not sure of the best way to do that.

Anyone done this?

Almost Canadian

Yes

Depending upon the width, use circular saw for as much as possible and then finish with a hand saw/jig saw for the bit close to the stringer.

From the sound of it you wish to put new treads on top of old ones. If this is the case, unless you are raising the flooring on the top floor, you will have a small step at the top. This may, or may not, cause you issues.

Shirtback

We (by "we" I mean the ex actually organized & executed) did this.

To the OP: a "finished" basement usually means livable rooms - that includes heating, plumbing etc. I would recommend verifying any building/renovation permits in the relevant jurisdiction.

And as others have mentioned, if on a septic tank system, I'd be having a good look at/investigation of depth of basement v depth & situation of septic & any pumping mechanism.

Shirtback

Depending on where one is in Canada, this might or might not be legal...

dbd33

It's certainly not a good idea.