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No, they're not common because it's excessively expensive and impractical to dig down that far when our frost line in the Triangle isn't that deep. In the north you have to dig down further for your footings, yielding more displaced earth.
Your post is interesting because I'd never heard it phrased as "the frost line isn't deep enough". Usually they say "the water table is too high". Frost being a rare issue around here, it's usually the flooding of a high water table that is the consideration we tend to hear about.
The construction industry will find an excuse where they do I guess
Your post is interesting because I'd never heard it phrased as "the frost line isn't deep enough". Usually they say "the water table is too high". Frost being a rare issue around here, it's usually the flooding of a high water table that is the consideration we tend to hear about.
The construction industry will find an excuse where they do I guess
The water table thing plays into it, but really though it's all about the depth you have to excavate your footings down to below the frost line. You don't want your foundation to heave. In the north you are already having to excavate down at least 4 to 5 feet. At that point you might as well just excavate out an entire area for a basement.
It's not really an excuse. It's economics / efficiency. When you only have to dig down a few feet here for a foundation, why dig out an entire level of soil for a basement? That's expensive as hell.
The water table thing plays into it, but really though it's all about the depth you have to excavate your footings down to below the frost line. You don't want your foundation to heave. In the north you are already having to excavate down at least 4 to 5 feet. At that point you might as well just excavate out an entire area for a basement.
It's not really an excuse. It's economics / efficiency. When you only have to dig down a few feet here for a foundation, why dig out an entire level of soil for a basement? That's expensive as hell.
Understood -- I just mean that around here the bang-for-buck is something the homeowner of the future house can see and evaluate for themselves when building, and decide if they want to pay the premium for the basement. Economics of the decision aside, there is always pressure from folks saying "don't do it" (and perhaps rightly so) because of the flooding issues around here resulting from the water table. Paying a premium for a feature is one thing, finding out you paid a premium only to introduce a lifetime of costly maintenance issues is something else.
I think a lot of folks see a basement as extra storage, a proper storm shelter, a potential mother-in-law dungeon, a place for the pool table, a workshop, etc, and for those reasons the cost premium of a basement versus a crawl would not scare them away, they know it won't command the same dollar per sq ft. as true first-floor space would, but stack the extra cost with the potential problems (radon, flooding, etc.) and I think that's why people opt out around here.
There are a ton of basement apartments in Chapel Hill. They are typically rented to grad students or med students for several years in a row, so definitely not partiers — more the serious hitting the books quiet types. My next door neighbor has a basement apartment she rents out and neighbors across the street down the way do too. My next door neighbor had to spend $10,000+ to deal with water in her basement, too, and had to have it dug out all the way down to the foundation for waterproofing.
We have a basement and should probably do the same because we have had flooding issues after really heavy rains, too. I know a lot of people had problems with The Great Chapel Hill Flood of 2013. A friend had a foot and a half of water in his basement. He posted pictures of himself wading through it.
Some of the houses in my old Wake Forest neighborhood (Pemberley) had basements, but I noticed that they often had a weird damp musty smell down there regardless of whether they were finished or not.
Right now I'm trying to decide if I'm going to relocate to an area where I can build my dream ranch home and a big factor in that decision is finding an area that allows for basements. I work from home so I can literally live anywhere as long as I have access to high-speed internet. North Carolina was nice when I first moved down here in 2004 but now I feel it may be time to move on. I also want to live somewhere less humid which probably means I'll be heading back up North.
Some of the houses in my old Wake Forest neighborhood (Pemberley) had basements, but I noticed that they often had a weird damp musty smell down there regardless of whether they were finished or not.
Right now I'm trying to decide if I'm going to relocate to an area where I can build my dream ranch home and a big factor in that decision is finding an area that allows for basements. I work from home so I can literally live anywhere as long as I have access to high-speed internet. North Carolina was nice when I first moved down here in 2004 but now I feel it may be time to move on. I also want to live somewhere less humid which probably means I'll be heading back up North.
I hope the question doesn't seem nosy or prying, but I'm curious because of your wording -- does the humidity or lack of basements have anything at all to do with your reasons for moving? Trying to understand why either of those would, if you work from home?
Some of the houses in my old Wake Forest neighborhood (Pemberley) had basements, but I noticed that they often had a weird damp musty smell down there regardless of whether they were finished or not.
Right now I'm trying to decide if I'm going to relocate to an area where I can build my dream ranch home and a big factor in that decision is finding an area that allows for basements. I work from home so I can literally live anywhere as long as I have access to high-speed internet. North Carolina was nice when I first moved down here in 2004 but now I feel it may be time to move on. I also want to live somewhere less humid which probably means I'll be heading back up North.
Agree. Unless it's air conditioned and heated, a basement around here will need a dehumidifier to avoid the damp, musty smell.
I hope the question doesn't seem nosy or prying, but I'm curious because of your wording -- does the humidity or lack of basements have anything at all to do with your reasons for moving? Trying to understand why either of those would, if you work from home?
There are a multitude of reasons why I'm considering relocating outside of North Carolina. High humidity and lack of viable basements are just a couple of small factors, tbqh. The humidity is an issue, though, because even though I work from home I like to be outdoors as much as possible when I'm not staring at my computer monitor.
There are a multitude of reasons why I'm considering relocating outside of North Carolina. High humidity and lack of viable basements are just a couple of small factors, tbqh. The humidity is an issue, though, because even though I work from home I like to be outdoors as much as possible when I'm not staring at my computer monitor.
Ah ok. My thought were the benefits of a basement (square footage, storage space) are achievable other ways without the drawbacks, and the number of days the humidity would hinder outdoor activities in this area is usually more than offset by the number of days winter weather hinders them as you go further north. But, with all things like you said, it is usually the cumulative effect of many reasons that should drive a decision rather than one or two reasons.
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