A large, unfinished Seward Park basement is transformed into a suite for two growing children. A bathroom, TV room, and two bedrooms share the space with laundry, storage, and a mechanical room.
These clients contacted me about building out their unfinished basement to accommodate new space for their growing family. They asked for two bedrooms, a bathroom, a TV room, and laundry. To accomplish this, we had to move the furnace and the water heater into the adjacent crawl space, which was literally a dirt crawl space separated from the rest of the basement by an angled retaining wall.
To accommodate the moved appliances, we dug out half the crawl space and formed a new concrete room. Simultaneously we installed a French drain water collection system in the part of the basement to be finished. We moved the furnace and water heater inside this room and reconnected them. The basement floor was leveled with Gypcrete by Jane’s Gypsum Floors. Before we started framing we did a seismic retrofit on the exposed wood framed pony walls—bolting them to the foundation, clipping them to the rim joist and ceiling joists above, and applying plywood shear continuously.
To accommodate the two bedrooms we dug window wells, cut out sections of the concrete walls, and installed new windows that met egress requirements. We used pre-formed corrugated steel window wells, bolted to the sidewalls, for our final window well. We also replaced all the other basement windows.
After the walls were framed, we worked with our electricians to layout all lights, switches and outlets, making sure that all were well located, away from trim, above countertops, and generally in aesthetically pleasing locations. We made sure to sprayfoam all top plate and joist electrical penetrations as a fire-stop. All exterior and interior walls were insulated, as well as the ceiling for noise reduction.
After drywall was installed and finished our team went to work on finish carpentry. Historical trim reproductions were installed—matching the trim-work on the upper floors of the house. Paneled doors were ordered from Frank Lumber, and installed plumb and square. Reproduction glass knobs were used on all doors. Cabinets from Canyon Creek were used for the bathroom. Mirror and shower glass came from Northwest Shower Door.
This basement build-out cost $260,237.16 in 2022 dollars, and took six months.
