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I don’t have one, nobody does in Vegas, but when I lived at my last house we had a daylight basement and it was the only place I really ever spent any time besides sleep and work in my upstairs. We never used the main (middle) floor except to make frozen dinners in the kitchen and leave immediately. We had an arcade machine, pinball, air hockey, fitness equipment I use all of the time even now (5-6 days a week), and two TVs for gaming / sports, plus a massage chair and the large sectional couch. That’s where we hung out always, so for us it was awesome! There’s a million things you can do just depending what your hobbies are.
I just finished our basement build out. Down there I have all my audio equipment, surround sound, and a huge TV hanging on the wall. Added a big couch, new carpeting, and custom bookcases to hold all of the nick-nacks and reduce clutter upstairs. We also have a closet down there for bulk food.
I used the brick panels from home depot instead of drywall, we might paint them eventually.
Try to get everyone to watch TV in the basement instaed of their rooms.
My suggestion is to finish the basement 75% and leave 25% unfinished with rack storage for things like bins with seasonal decorations, and old sentimental stuff - carefully stored in moisture proof bins.
We have a fully finished basement, and wish it had been set up with some unfinished space just for storage. When we first moved to Michigan, I thought may be like Texas - flat. But Michigan has rolling hills, so one side of our house has no windows facing west, and egress windows facing east and north and south from the basement due to the slope. The basement mirrors the upstairs, so basically we have a duplex. I keep thinking of how to convert it to a duplex so when we move, we can just rent this place out. Our basement has a large pool table room (came with pool table when purchased) with an alcove of gym equipment - 2 spinners (1 with arm exercise), a power rack, and a flat weight bench. Off from the pool table room we have a full kitchen with a bar set up for keg dispenser rack. This is the room beneath our kitchen and dining area. The room under our main floor laundry is a workshop where we have our back up generator, and battery packs for our Ego devices. From that room is the boiler sump pump room, and an adjacent large commercial sized redwood sauna that I have never used. There's a foyer area leading to the pool table room room where we set up lateral file cabinets, with old papers I know I need to get around to recycling at this point. Our basement room under our great room upstairs is a full library with built in shelving and a really cool fireplace that is on the lower stack under our upper fireplace. I set the library up with a 65" TV, two love seats, two Laz-Boy chairs, and two desks. There's another laundry room between two bedrooms downstairs in the basement, and a full bathroom. Basement has one full bath in bedroom area, and a half bath off from pool table room. We moved here when my son was 13, and he got the basement. So now I'm afraid he'll never leave. But I'm planning to move to a 1200 SF rancher, and turn this giant duplex home over to college kids and just rent out.
Both my kids are down in the library now playing Nintendo or Xbox. Son says wants air-hockey table instead of pool table. Guess will look into that option.
Keep in mind, basements flood from time to time. Cardboard boxes should never be stored on the floor, and beds should not be mounted on expensive wood frames - we have all basement beds on standard metal rolling frames. Don't have any antiques or valuable furniture set directly on the floor. Always picture possibly 6" of standing water in a basement if a water line burst. We lost nearly a million gallons of water last month from another burst pipe, but amazingly basement didn't flood. But our water bill just came in at $1900. I have a large dehumidifyer down there that pipes moisture to a floor drain. We also have portable pumps on hand for flood emergencies for WHEN one may happen.
Since you have a walk-out basement, I think you should finish out that area adjacent to your door to backyard, as that is an extension of your entertainment space. It can always be a playroom for grandkids some day. At least put in some carpet and finished walls, and a half or 3/4 bath. I like the idea of a little dog shower, if you have a dog - for easy dog grooming on-site. We are slowly doing a project to replace the ugly acoustic tiles in pool table drop ceiling with those fancy faux-tin ceilings made of plastic. I have the electrician putting in some nice recessed lighting. So go ahead and scrap the exercise equipment (easy to sell on CL), as it will be obsolete anyway, put in a 3/4 bath with a shower, and leave 25% unfinished. You may want to add some hook-ups if decide later to add a basement bar area as those are still popular I think - we use ours mainly as a pantry and do love the extra refrigerator. Since your laundry is on main floor, I wouldn't bother adding another laundry room downstairs, unless you want to add bedrooms down there for any reason. Our house has laundry rooms both in basement and one on the main level, but we have bedrooms both levels. Funny what you said about the "man cave" - my husband says wants a finished pole-barn at our new little mini rancher home I'm planning to build. Guess maybe I should plan a "she shed" too.
Last edited by PacificaViews; 07-05-2020 at 03:12 PM..
in my basement i have my laundry stuff (laundry shute, washer, dryer), my emergency supplies, a gasoline tank connected to a pump outside, big commercial freezers (like they have at food banks), an encased gasoline generator for when that power goes out, a big screen tv, a 5 person couch, and a homemade steam whistle that broke a long time ago.
basically my emergency base other than my jacked up trailer
Storm shelter, extra storage, plus it’s where you’ll find the household systems like the water heater.
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