This last three months, Michelle and I have been planning and working on finishing the basement. When we moved in our house almost a year ago, the basement was relatively untouched. To catch you up, the house was a one owner and she didn’t do a whole lot of improvements or projects during her 50 years of residency. This left us with a fresh slate to do whatever we pleased. Granted, the house isn’t big, so we just divided the basement in half to create one large, long room that will be finished. The other half will consist of two storage rooms and an existing laundry/ half bathroom in the middle.
Unfinished Basement 1
The planning phase was easy because of the natural layout with support beams running down the middle to create our divide. After we order and had our materials delivered, it was time to get started. Well, almost, I guess we had to get a building permit through the city first. My perception of dealing with permits and building codes was one of, “this is going to suck”. Surprisingly, they were super easy to work with and accepted my crude sketch for their records. I was in and out in less than 10 minutes with a building permit. If only the DMV was that easy!
Unfinished Basement 2
Thank God for family! Katie has been helping, or rather telling me what to do with all of her experience. Her great connections for tool rentals have also saved us many headaches and dollars. Installing the bottom plates took some time to layout and fasten. We choose to use a “power nailer” or one that uses .22 cartridges to shoot the nails into the concrete floor. I thought it was cool, but Tucker did not. He had issues for a couple hours and hid in the closet. After that, we put up the walls rather quickly.
Next, came the electrician part. He had a lot to do with tearing down the old wires and running outlets, recessed lights, and anything else needed for code. Just like our living room updates last spring, I was amazed at how fast they work. If there is anything I would rather let a professional do, it’s electrical and plumbing work. Thankfully, we know two great contacts.
Next up is having the inspectors do a quick “rough in” look before it’s on to drywalling.
Basement Framed 1
Basement Framed 2
Related posts:
