Why don't all houses have basements? (Denver: crawl space, neighborhood, construction)

[EscapeCalifornia]

Aren't they needed to get footings below the frost line? Scanning realtor.com, it looks like some houses around Denver don't have them.

[ColoWeb]

That is correct. Many older homes do. With the newer ones its all about price. Basement can mean $10-25K extra. So many people opt out of it.

[formercalifornian]

Most of the houses in my neighborhood are slab houses.

[EscapeCalifornia]

Originally Posted by formercalifornian

Most of the houses in my neighborhood are slab houses.

How is that structurally sound? I thought that was a big no-no in freezing climates and especially in Colorado's clay soils.

[GreenMachine]

Sometimes the ground does not allow for basements.

[Mikieo415]

You do not need to have a basement for a house to be structurally sound. A concrete slab is all that is necessary. Sometimes a foundation with a crawl space under the house is used as well. Freezing and thawing doesn't cause the ground to shift that much to have an effect. As long as the slab or foundation was installed properly, freezing will have no consequences.

[Mike from back east]

Originally Posted by GreenMachine

Sometimes the ground does not allow for basements.

That's true in any number of areas:
- High water table, as in low lying or coastal areas like Florida, where you only have to go down a few feet to hit water, water that will ALWAYS be there and make any basement a musty wet problem, or downright swimming pool.
- Rocky soil, as is many of the areas of AZ we visited. Putting in basements and pools there often requires jackhammers and/or blasting. Not cheap.

Then there are personal choice reasons:
- Cost
- Bad knees in older people who can't go up/down stairs
- Simply not needed by many people

[livecontent]

Where I grew up near the Great Lakes, everybody that I knew had a basement. It was smelly, always very humid, had sump pumps running all the time. Clothes that were stored there took on a smell; shoes got moldy.

Now I live in Colorado and every house I have had basements. Most of my relatives here have basements. They are all dry, no smells, no odors and you can store items there and they would be fine. In the summer they are great places to get away from the heat and keep your house cooler. In the winter, they keep your house warmer. Additional rooms fit nicely there with consistent temperature.

Yet in this area which is much better for basements--there are fewer basements. I have seen some basements here with sump pumps but mostly all basements would be dry. It is a curious fact why there are few basements. In a hot dry climate like here, and if the soil is easily dug, then basements and underground homes should be the norm. Certainly an underground home would be tornado proof and easier to heat and cool.

Maybe because basements were not needed for frost upheaval like New York. So, they made the houses cheaper and forgo the advantages of basements.

Livecontent

[tfox]

Basements are not necessary for reasons of the frost line, at least not in Metro Denver. Crawlspaces or slabs work just fine. In fact, even when you have a basement the garages are going to always be on a slab. It is true that the slabs do have to extended further into the ground here than in a warm climate, but there are also newer construction methods to mitigate that problem as well. More and more, builders are opting for slab construction.

However, a basement is a relatively cheap way to get lots of living or storage area; its cost as a percentage of the house is small, so for me it's be a fairly easy decision. The problems of dampness, etc are generally not a concern in Denver.

[oberon]

Yes, most homes here with basements or otherwise, are built on concrete slabs. As long as they're installed correctly and the ground's evaluated properly, there shouldn't be any consequences. Unfortunately, sometimes there are.