Do you have a slab, crawl space, or the "rare" basement?

[just_sayin']

The rental house I'm in in Apex right now has a slab. I'm definitley glad we didn't buy this house. Slabs are a bad way to go. Most houses in NC have a crawlspace, which is good for storage and not sucking the heat out of your floors and making carpeted rooms feel like you are walking on pavement. It's very rare for a house to have a basement in NC because of the clay, and I don't think I have every seen a true "basement"... they are all walkouts/daylight whatever you want to call them.

[RaleighRob]

Originally Posted by raleighjayne

Rob, I think its because you've lived in older homes. Very few of the new construction, even more expensive homes, have basements. And if they do, they aren't true basements, they are walk-out or daylight basement because of the lot slope.

All of my friends and relatives who have new homes in CO, IL, MI, and MN all have full basements that aren't walkouts. I've always heard that its because the clay soil is so hard to dig in and because its so damp. It would be hard to keep a 'true' basement dry but easier if its a walkout/sloped lot.

Yeah, well that was part of my point of my post I suppose,....no one in my family back in Winston ever had enough money for a new house. LOL.
And back in Winston-Salem, the soil probably had a touch less clay than here. But, since they were usually the slope/walkout/daylighted basements, then perhaps the fact that the topography there is more hilly, helped make those more possible.

You need to get out of your ITB bubble and see how the majority of newcomers live. ITB really is a different world from the suburbs. Not better or worse, just very different.

To be fair,
A) I was raised in the suburbs.
B) Just about everyone I know ITB is a newcomer, of varying degrees---if not of NC then at least of Raleigh. In fact I only have two good friends who are native Raleighites...and they've pretty much always lived in North raleigh.

Basically I guess I was just mentioning how even long-time residents can learn something from these forums.
Basements being rare is something someone may never even notice without spending time shopping/browsing/touring/visiting/etc new homes.