Basement or Cellar? How can I find out? (Amsterdam: apartment, houses)

[ny_queens_111]

How can I find out if I have a basement or a cellar. I know that a basement is 50% above ground, and the cellar 50% under.

But in my case, in the front of the house, the 1st floor apt is on ground level, and in the rear, the basement is on ground level.

[SobroGuy]

Umm...I pretty much go by the basic definitions. Typically a cellar has no windows and is completely underground..dangerous to say the least. Basements typically are habitable in that they can have full size windows and be mostly above ground with multiple means of egress. My basement has 2 means of egress (front of the house and backyard), and full size windows on 2 sides. My neighbors with cellars are completely underground and they access it through 2 doors which open into the ground in either the front or back of the house.

[bellakin123]

A basement is basically finished (or mostly finished) living space. Cellars are storage rooms that can be either underground or partially buried. The key distinction here, is they are intended for cool storage only, such as a fruit cellar or wine cellar and not for living space.

[DitmarsNY]

check the CofO of the house on the DOB site

[ny_queens_111]

The basement has a door that opens directly into the street in the back, and also a full sized window. it's basically like a first floor apt. But in the front is completely underground. There's like a 9 ft diff in elevation from front to back. Besides the door in the back, it also has a door on the side that goes into the garage, and another door that goes up the stairs and into the hallway on the first floor.

I am sure it's not a legalized apt, but I want to look into it if I can legalize it as an apt.

[SeventhFloor]

Originally Posted by ny_queens_111

The basement has a door that opens directly into the street in the back, and also a full sized window. it's basically like a first floor apt. But in the front is completely underground. There's like a 9 ft diff in elevation from front to back. Besides the door in the back, it also has a door on the side that goes into the garage, and another door that goes up the stairs and into the hallway on the first floor.

I am sure it's not a legalized apt, but I want to look into it if I can legalize it as an apt.

So your house is on a hill or something? It basically goes down to percentage.

When I was a project manager, I had a job at the Amsterdam Houses in Manhattan. They were proposing to renovate the community center. For those unfamiliar with the topography of the area, Amsterdam Houses is built into a rock outcropping. Meaning that in the building I worked on, as you entered the building, it was totally above ground, but if you kept walking to the back of the building, you would be completely underground. I had to classify the floor of work as the cellar, as the majority of the community center was actually underground.

[ny_queens_111]

Sound like the same kind of setup. The house has one extra floor when you look at it from the back. I'm trying to figure out how to calculate it if it's a cellar or basement. Something with the average of both elevations maybe?

It looks habitable, but I doubt you can decide just by the way it looks.

[Kefir King]

Originally Posted by ny_queens_111

The basement has a door that opens directly into the street in the back, and also a full sized window. it's basically like a first floor apt. But in the front is completely underground. There's like a 9 ft diff in elevation from front to back. Besides the door in the back, it also has a door on the side that goes into the garage, and another door that goes up the stairs and into the hallway on the first floor.

I am sure it's not a legalized apt, but I want to look into it if I can legalize it as an apt.

Semantically speaking, I would call that space a BASEMENT.

[ny_queens_111]

It does look as an apartment, not even a basement one, but it is labeled a cellar. That's why I need to know how I can exactly find out.