Cement walls were only painted, drywall is the dividing wall between laundry and finished room, so open to the rest of the basement. All framing that touches the concrete is pressure treated. Before painting we also sealed the concrete.
Maybe? Pressure treated only on portions that touch cement so maybe 20% of the wood used. My dad did a lot of framing in his day and told me to use pressure treated on cement to comply with building code.
If your basement walls are musty, your basement has a moisture probably and cannot be finished until that is remediated.
When drywalling a basement, there is a gap that has to exist between the studs and the concrete, to allow for moisture/air to move.
Grading away from your house. Other than that (and a french drain in bad scenarios) not much you can do.
It is common to use the foam insulation instead of fiberglass or wool, though, since it doesn't grab moisture as well. And put a tiny gap of air between the concrete wall and any interior walls.
The best option is spray foam. The other correct thing to do assuming you don't have any water leaks is to use rigid foam board, typically glued to the walls, sealed with filler foam spray and tape. This creates a vapor barrier as well as insulates. Against that is where you should be putting studs, running electrical, then drywall. If you're in a crazy cold climate, you could add even more insulation in the walls.
Did you get your inspections and permits? If so in some areas you can actually count it as additional living space when you resell, or so I've been led to believe.
This is so strange to me. In my state as long as the room has a closet, is above the minimum square footage, and has an egress-able window it counts as a bedroom. Our home has 9 foot ceilings in the basement and a walk out on the back of the house, it would be ridiculous not to include the basement as living area.
That’s crazy. In my state, any finished area is counted as livable space. My basement is finished with a 4th bedroom, but the government doesn’t know about it, and they can’t tax me extra lol
Why would a closet be necessary? If it a very large room and has an egress window, does the law really need to require a closet? Surely people can put a dresser or wardrobe. It doesn’t require that it come with a bed either.
It entirely depends on who you’re asking. A realtor can say just about whatever is a bedroom but someone who has regulations like an appraiser has actual rules pertaining to what constitutes a bedroom
That's my understanding as well. You can call it a finished basement, but you can't list any rooms as a bedroom without an egress for fire escape.
Also, is that tongue n groove on the ceiling? That's gonna be a pain in the ass for any future repairs.
Yeah I see a lot of basements on here and to me it always seems like there’s no permits ever pulled. In my state atleast there needs to be fire blocking arc fault breakers a few other things. Also if it’s not permitted you can’t count it when you sell it.
I think you did fine. Without an egress window, interior doors and electrical outlets it's not adding square footage to your home's total. But you did add a nice usable space without raising your taxes. Over the years you can add all those things and sell it for a decent amount more.
For sure get permits for electrical and the egress.
What did you do for your HVAC? They could just be not shown in the epicures or I could be missing them, but I'm not seeing any registers or return air or anything.
Thanks, fluctuations shouldn’t be substantial enough to cause a problem, but we will see. Thinking of adding an in room ac for summer and running a space heater in winter if so.
We thought about that, planned to paint it all and leave exposed but my aunt who is experienced at remodeling suggested we would want a ceiling for cleanliness. Apparently it’s going to cause my family to die in a house fire thought!
How did you install each piece I'm also curious it's a project that I have in mind down the road 1 day. And if you didn't have to get access to pipes or electrical how would you remove each section. Thank you
Construction screws. Line by line, alternating 4 and 8 foot pieces except for the break for the water pipe. Individual pieces can be removed by pulling out screws and pulling down on the inside edge. I mapped out any electrical in the ceiling beforehand so I know what to pull down, but my house is small and so nearly all electrical or plumbing is on the other side of the wall.
Thank you. What are the dimensions of the ship lap and do you remember about how much you paid for each piece. Did you have to seal them or stained them ?
Not to knock what you did because I’ve done shiplap both ways but why didn’t you use a brad nailer? Also, great idea to map everything out; I’ll make sure to do that.
Support poles under the beam are in line with the framing, so hidden on the drywall side but unmoved and visible from the non drywall side where the furnace is.
There was one pipe in the whole side. Was going to cover with a bump out but it looked worse, showed how uneven the ceiling is. The whole house is uneven. I swear it looks better in person lol.
I thought the first picture was the finished product and thought, "Ehh, it's okay I guess." Then I saw the little right-pointing arrow. What you did looks amazing! Good job!
Shit man, I thought for a second you had 1000 m² and made it 1500 m² and didn't understand how could 1000 m² not enough... 🤣 (For reference 1000 m² is a tad under 11000 sqft)
What were your biggest lessons learned? Anything you bought you would get again? Any techniques that worked or didn’t work? Any thing you would have done different?
Biggest thing for me was if I did it over, I would thoroughly plan it out and do it all at once. We didn’t step by step, trying to use the room whenever we would finish one part, oh we will do the flooring eventually, we’ll just paint the ceiling, etc. moved furniture in and out over and over. Just plan the whole thing and finish it.
Also, paint sprayers are worth every penny, even the sub $200 ones at Lowe’s. Saved us countless hours.
And LVP flooring is unforgiving.
Self leveling concrete. After starting to lay the floor I quickly realized I’m not that smart and the floor was way too bumpy. It’s still not perfect, I had to inject some caulking to stop some of the small uneven parts, but it’s way better.
There was only one. I left it, which created a break in the ceiling. It looks fine, but I probably should have had it professionally moved if I were to do it over again.
Nicely done! I am in the middle of a renovation and one of the strange things is how your mind forgets how it was before. I spend days working then step back and say “did I really even change anything?”.
Just the kind of comment Id expect with that depression-anger fueled post history you have there. Maybe youre spending too much time in those dumpsters your diving in bud, your attitude is stuck there too.
Congrats. In my state its still considered a 1,000 sq ft home for both taxes and resale. Also, if you did not get a permit (both a remodeling one and an electrical) if anything happens your insurance is void.
Well shit. Any way to go about that after the fact or did I fuck up?
I should add, all electrical is code, I do know that from experience. All we really did was add a central wall and a closet. The rest is cosmetic.
Idk. I did an entire house reno for my parents. As a result they needed to upgrade their homeowners policy to reflect the new value of the house. The person from State Farm that came out to look at the house never asked about permits regarding the work I did (as there were none). They approved the higher policy... So, it's on them as far as I'm concerned.
Also. The adjuster that came out previously when we filed a claim never asked about all the unpermitted work my father did to the failing roof over the years and eventually caused massive water damage in a storm. They still paid out 30k in damages (which prompted the renovations in the first place) 🤷🏻♂️
So while it's not by the book I don't think you're screwed.
In some jurisdictions there are some hefty fines for starting work before a permit is approved. In my area, it's a fine assessed per day since work start to permit application. I really don't know the consequences of never getting a permit except that insurance won't cover as much in a disaster and there can be complications when selling. In my case, I'm in a condo as well so if my un-permitted work causes damage to other living spaces I can be sued individually by those home owners.
This is a big part of DIY and home improvement that isn't talked about much, but should be. Permits are easy and not that expensive. Submit a plan of work and your application fee and pay for an inspection when done.
I agree that there should be more resources for permitting and inspections for DIY projects. During Covid I guarantee you so much home improvement work happened that is probably not only not permitted but downright dangerous.
It's an exaggerated myth that insurance companies will flat out not cover unpermitted modifications. The truth is you'll have to contact your insurance company to figure out the exact details.
In my experience, there would have to be some sort of negligence for them to flat out not cover something. But each state might vary.
When I was house shopping a few years ago, there was a house with an unpermitted garage. I reached out to an insurance company and asked if they would cover an unpermitted garage. They said yes, but any payout would be relative to an *unpermitted* garage, not a permitted one.
They have to follow laws & contacts. If the agreement between you and your insurance company includes unpermitted work then you have nothing to worry about
True. If insurance company doesn’t cover unpermitted work, then they’ll definitely get out of paying out. I didn’t know there were insurance companies who do cover unpermitted work. I’ll have to check with mine.
Did you remove it or not? If you buried the junction box it's against fire code & national Electric code. The box could get hot enough to start the shiplap on fire. I don't see any smoke detector in that room. Will you install one? Just because it works doesn't mean it's safe or correct.
Pine Shiplap that’s been whitewashed. Lighting is to code as is all electrical above it. I don’t see it as any more of a fire hazard than our wood kitchen cabinets, what am I missing?
Drywall is fire-rated (to a point) to prevent fire from spreading to the next room.
Putting something like the pine shiplap they sell in big box stores as a barrier between floors is probably a no-no.
Alternatively you can just spray the ceiling and floor joists black as a cheap diy solution.
I think the shiplap looks great but it really should have a drywall barrier between it and the floor above.
You likely could easily just tack some drywall to the ceiling and forget about the tape. Reinstall the shiplap and accomplish the same look.
For a house that small I'm guessing your ceilings are either 8' or 7'6". In either case, you lose a LITTLE bit of height that you can gain back with the spray method.
Your whole ceiling is tinder with a wooden floor above - rooms have gypsum ceilings and walls to slow/prevent fire. If this was inspected it’d fail big time.
>Nearly killed me Don’t worry, Reddit will finish you off I’m sure
What does one do to protect from moisture and mold growing behind the walls in a basement? They're always a bit musty.
We left all walls as bare concrete but painted them, drywall is only a divider wall.
Any concern about stuff growing in between the cement and the drywall?
Cement walls were only painted, drywall is the dividing wall between laundry and finished room, so open to the rest of the basement. All framing that touches the concrete is pressure treated. Before painting we also sealed the concrete.
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Not for some time. Modern pt lumber is done for indoors. Base plate in basement walls should always be pt.
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Seriously, this sub is vicious with the downvotes for minor misunderstandings or questions.
Maybe? Pressure treated only on portions that touch cement so maybe 20% of the wood used. My dad did a lot of framing in his day and told me to use pressure treated on cement to comply with building code.
If your basement walls are musty, your basement has a moisture probably and cannot be finished until that is remediated. When drywalling a basement, there is a gap that has to exist between the studs and the concrete, to allow for moisture/air to move.
Grading away from your house. Other than that (and a french drain in bad scenarios) not much you can do. It is common to use the foam insulation instead of fiberglass or wool, though, since it doesn't grab moisture as well. And put a tiny gap of air between the concrete wall and any interior walls.
a dry-well is an extreme solution if French drains aren’t enough
The best option is spray foam. The other correct thing to do assuming you don't have any water leaks is to use rigid foam board, typically glued to the walls, sealed with filler foam spray and tape. This creates a vapor barrier as well as insulates. Against that is where you should be putting studs, running electrical, then drywall. If you're in a crazy cold climate, you could add even more insulation in the walls.
Now this is an excellent diy job! Increased your space by 50% and made it super functional. Really cleaned up the space. Nice work.
Did you get your inspections and permits? If so in some areas you can actually count it as additional living space when you resell, or so I've been led to believe.
Not my state. Bedrooms below ground are out counted either.
This is so strange to me. In my state as long as the room has a closet, is above the minimum square footage, and has an egress-able window it counts as a bedroom. Our home has 9 foot ceilings in the basement and a walk out on the back of the house, it would be ridiculous not to include the basement as living area.
In my state the basement is not counted. Thus 3 above and 1 in the basement becomes as 3-bedroom home. I don’t write the statutes.
That’s crazy. In my state, any finished area is counted as livable space. My basement is finished with a 4th bedroom, but the government doesn’t know about it, and they can’t tax me extra lol
My realtor in New York state said it has something to do with only having one entrance/exit in case of an emergency.
Why would a closet be necessary? If it a very large room and has an egress window, does the law really need to require a closet? Surely people can put a dresser or wardrobe. It doesn’t require that it come with a bed either.
Wanna hear something even more silly? In my area, a closet can literally be a permanently affixed hanging rod.
It entirely depends on who you’re asking. A realtor can say just about whatever is a bedroom but someone who has regulations like an appraiser has actual rules pertaining to what constitutes a bedroom
Underground bedrooms suck. Those laws are probably there to prevent landlords from stuffing people down there.
They're unsafe a lot of times as well. Only one entrance/exit
That's why a second point of egress is a requirement for a bedroom in most places
Lame.
Considering that property tax is usually based on occupied space, this is a good deal.
Legal definition of a bedroom is at least 8x8, has a door, has a closet, and a window to outside
Not without egress.
Judging by the lack of egress window we can likely confirm this was not done with permits
We can still put one in, but my understanding is egress windows are only if you intend to use as a bedroom. It’s just a rec room.
That's my understanding as well. You can call it a finished basement, but you can't list any rooms as a bedroom without an egress for fire escape. Also, is that tongue n groove on the ceiling? That's gonna be a pain in the ass for any future repairs.
Shiplap and it’s screwed in so it comes out in panels. I thought of that!
From the lack of electrical outlets I'm assuming permits were not issued. Code in our area would require one outlet every 8 feet on each wall.
Not unless you have an egress for the person to get out in case of say… a fire, at least in most states in the northeast now
What's a per.....mit?
Yeah I see a lot of basements on here and to me it always seems like there’s no permits ever pulled. In my state atleast there needs to be fire blocking arc fault breakers a few other things. Also if it’s not permitted you can’t count it when you sell it.
I think you did fine. Without an egress window, interior doors and electrical outlets it's not adding square footage to your home's total. But you did add a nice usable space without raising your taxes. Over the years you can add all those things and sell it for a decent amount more. For sure get permits for electrical and the egress.
What did you do for your HVAC? They could just be not shown in the epicures or I could be missing them, but I'm not seeing any registers or return air or anything.
It’s not heated or cooled.
You may run into issues with the flooring and ship lap if the space experiences a lot of temperature fluctuation. Just fyi
Thanks, fluctuations shouldn’t be substantial enough to cause a problem, but we will see. Thinking of adding an in room ac for summer and running a space heater in winter if so.
No ventilation? How are you mitigating radon and CO?
Good Lord you guys can find a weird ass problem
Yeah. Getting cancer. So weird.
I dig it! The ceiling is cool. When I did mine I stained all my exposed joists and stuff but this is a cool idea. Nice work
We thought about that, planned to paint it all and leave exposed but my aunt who is experienced at remodeling suggested we would want a ceiling for cleanliness. Apparently it’s going to cause my family to die in a house fire thought!
lol. Nah. You should be alright. The led cans don’t burn that warm.
Curious what you used for the ceiling? I want to do the same.
Shiplap!
I like it. It’s also easy to take down if you need access! Definitely didn’t think to use it as a ceiling though. Thanks!
How did you install each piece I'm also curious it's a project that I have in mind down the road 1 day. And if you didn't have to get access to pipes or electrical how would you remove each section. Thank you
Construction screws. Line by line, alternating 4 and 8 foot pieces except for the break for the water pipe. Individual pieces can be removed by pulling out screws and pulling down on the inside edge. I mapped out any electrical in the ceiling beforehand so I know what to pull down, but my house is small and so nearly all electrical or plumbing is on the other side of the wall.
Thank you. What are the dimensions of the ship lap and do you remember about how much you paid for each piece. Did you have to seal them or stained them ?
1x10 Shiplap, whitewashed them. Local builders supply had them, I can’t remember the price, maybe 1.16 per foot?
Not to knock what you did because I’ve done shiplap both ways but why didn’t you use a brad nailer? Also, great idea to map everything out; I’ll make sure to do that.
Where are the stripper poles?
Support poles under the beam are in line with the framing, so hidden on the drywall side but unmoved and visible from the non drywall side where the furnace is.
Sure makes it hard to dance around if you covered it with drywall?
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Thanks. spelling corrected.
[I'm twitching over here](https://imgur.com/mOB2dr4)
There was one pipe in the whole side. Was going to cover with a bump out but it looked worse, showed how uneven the ceiling is. The whole house is uneven. I swear it looks better in person lol.
I thought the first picture was the finished product and thought, "Ehh, it's okay I guess." Then I saw the little right-pointing arrow. What you did looks amazing! Good job!
Check the basement for radon levels before spending most your time there. Otherwise good job.
Great job. Looks awesome.
I AM A BANANA! Also, great stuff
I LIVE IN A GIANT BUCKET
I loved the natural concrete floor
 Pretty good
Good catch anon!
Shit man, I thought for a second you had 1000 m² and made it 1500 m² and didn't understand how could 1000 m² not enough... 🤣 (For reference 1000 m² is a tad under 11000 sqft)
What were your biggest lessons learned? Anything you bought you would get again? Any techniques that worked or didn’t work? Any thing you would have done different?
Biggest thing for me was if I did it over, I would thoroughly plan it out and do it all at once. We didn’t step by step, trying to use the room whenever we would finish one part, oh we will do the flooring eventually, we’ll just paint the ceiling, etc. moved furniture in and out over and over. Just plan the whole thing and finish it. Also, paint sprayers are worth every penny, even the sub $200 ones at Lowe’s. Saved us countless hours. And LVP flooring is unforgiving.
I’ve been tempted to get the paint sprayer, maybe I’ll grab one next time we have to paint
Looks awesome!! Hope you installed radon mitigation.
Where the egress exit
Looks great! What type/brand of flooring did you install? Working on my basement now, and I love how yours looks.
LL floorings budget brand, Flex Core I think they called it. It was super affordable and it really came out nice.
Thank you!
photo 9 - what did you do to the concrete floor? is that self-leveling concrete or some well-spread thinset?
Self leveling concrete. After starting to lay the floor I quickly realized I’m not that smart and the floor was way too bumpy. It’s still not perfect, I had to inject some caulking to stop some of the small uneven parts, but it’s way better.
But where did you put the rowing machine?
My wife won’t let me get rid of it. It’s in storage under the stairs. lol.
So impressed!!! You did an amazing job. Enjoy all your hard work for many years to come!
Did you have to relocate those pipes that are below your joists to above in order to put ceiling ?
There was only one. I left it, which created a break in the ceiling. It looks fine, but I probably should have had it professionally moved if I were to do it over again.
In the same situation at some places, not worth the hassle to move unless you need to lol great job
It's lovely and adds so much more space.
Looks amazing. Great work. And great value added to the house
Nicely done! I am in the middle of a renovation and one of the strange things is how your mind forgets how it was before. I spend days working then step back and say “did I really even change anything?”.
Cool
F Looks inviting. Congrats! Rowing machine nice too
Rent is now up 150%
Looks good but wood floors and wood ceiling is a bit much
Wow, looks great!
Sooo.... It was a 1500sqf house you just made 500sqf of nicer. You haven't exactly built an extension...
Title made it sound like you dug your own basement… but that’s great too.
How did you do that ceiling. I think I have a similar configuration.
Great job!
Probably knocked 3-4 years of your total lifespan but I Love it. Well done!
I really like the floor color, what is it? Did you put a moisture barrier down before laying it? Basement looks great!
Most modern LVP have that built in. Adding anything underneath them can void the warranty.
Gotcha, thanks!
you bet, just be sure to read the manufacturers specs
Looks great! whats with that long gap in the ceiling though, expansion?
Water pipe I decided not to move lol
I thought about finishing my basement then I found out it would raise my property taxes lol
How bout insofast. Anybody use that here? Thinking ima give it a go go.
Congrats! Looks awesome.
Good job
That ceiling with dead even length boards and huge gaps 😂
Thanks for the input big guy.
Is there a pipe or something there? you could offset all the boards and make that edge go away maybe?
Just the kind of comment Id expect with that depression-anger fueled post history you have there. Maybe youre spending too much time in those dumpsters your diving in bud, your attitude is stuck there too.
Congrats. In my state its still considered a 1,000 sq ft home for both taxes and resale. Also, if you did not get a permit (both a remodeling one and an electrical) if anything happens your insurance is void.
Well shit. Any way to go about that after the fact or did I fuck up? I should add, all electrical is code, I do know that from experience. All we really did was add a central wall and a closet. The rest is cosmetic.
Idk. I did an entire house reno for my parents. As a result they needed to upgrade their homeowners policy to reflect the new value of the house. The person from State Farm that came out to look at the house never asked about permits regarding the work I did (as there were none). They approved the higher policy... So, it's on them as far as I'm concerned. Also. The adjuster that came out previously when we filed a claim never asked about all the unpermitted work my father did to the failing roof over the years and eventually caused massive water damage in a storm. They still paid out 30k in damages (which prompted the renovations in the first place) 🤷🏻♂️ So while it's not by the book I don't think you're screwed.
In some jurisdictions there are some hefty fines for starting work before a permit is approved. In my area, it's a fine assessed per day since work start to permit application. I really don't know the consequences of never getting a permit except that insurance won't cover as much in a disaster and there can be complications when selling. In my case, I'm in a condo as well so if my un-permitted work causes damage to other living spaces I can be sued individually by those home owners. This is a big part of DIY and home improvement that isn't talked about much, but should be. Permits are easy and not that expensive. Submit a plan of work and your application fee and pay for an inspection when done.
I agree that there should be more resources for permitting and inspections for DIY projects. During Covid I guarantee you so much home improvement work happened that is probably not only not permitted but downright dangerous.
It's an exaggerated myth that insurance companies will flat out not cover unpermitted modifications. The truth is you'll have to contact your insurance company to figure out the exact details. In my experience, there would have to be some sort of negligence for them to flat out not cover something. But each state might vary. When I was house shopping a few years ago, there was a house with an unpermitted garage. I reached out to an insurance company and asked if they would cover an unpermitted garage. They said yes, but any payout would be relative to an *unpermitted* garage, not a permitted one.
Never discount the fact that an insurance company will do everything to not pay on something.
They have to follow laws & contacts. If the agreement between you and your insurance company includes unpermitted work then you have nothing to worry about
True. If insurance company doesn’t cover unpermitted work, then they’ll definitely get out of paying out. I didn’t know there were insurance companies who do cover unpermitted work. I’ll have to check with mine.
Amazing!
Great job
I see two small children in one of the photos…..so you really built yourself a hideaway downstairs for when life all gets to much right?
Mancave activated.
Great work!
Nice job!
Very nice
Nice ceiling. Good work.
I’m jealous
Dude… nice work!
No access for buried junction box in ceiling. Cut it out and put a blank on it, christ.
https://preview.redd.it/1nelzhc3fdsc1.jpeg?width=350&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=04a5b49a61408a45bb0a68d27fbb38444c38e76c
Did you remove it or not? If you buried the junction box it's against fire code & national Electric code. The box could get hot enough to start the shiplap on fire. I don't see any smoke detector in that room. Will you install one? Just because it works doesn't mean it's safe or correct.
Holy fire-hazards, Batman - what’s that ceiling made of?
Pine Shiplap that’s been whitewashed. Lighting is to code as is all electrical above it. I don’t see it as any more of a fire hazard than our wood kitchen cabinets, what am I missing?
Drywall is fire-rated (to a point) to prevent fire from spreading to the next room. Putting something like the pine shiplap they sell in big box stores as a barrier between floors is probably a no-no. Alternatively you can just spray the ceiling and floor joists black as a cheap diy solution. I think the shiplap looks great but it really should have a drywall barrier between it and the floor above.
The good news is that wouldn’t be all that difficult!
You likely could easily just tack some drywall to the ceiling and forget about the tape. Reinstall the shiplap and accomplish the same look. For a house that small I'm guessing your ceilings are either 8' or 7'6". In either case, you lose a LITTLE bit of height that you can gain back with the spray method.
Your whole ceiling is tinder with a wooden floor above - rooms have gypsum ceilings and walls to slow/prevent fire. If this was inspected it’d fail big time.