(1)  There are many factors to consider when deciding to finish your basement.  What does your family want from the new basement?  Are you looking to add a bathroom, kitchen or bedroom(s) as part of your plan.  Do you want primarily a play area, home theatre or work-out room?  Do you have enough square footage to meet your primary plans.  How much will it cost and how long will it take to finish the project?

(2)  Specialty design/build consultants are able to consider your needs, provide accurate measurements for the overall plan and specific room configurations and will design various plans or even blueprints to fit your requests.

(3)  From drawings or plans, you can choose the ideas that best fit your needs and requirements to come up with a final plan to implement.

(4) Once the final plan is agreed upon, your designer/builder can determine what the cost of the project will be and provide more details on the timeline “start-to-finish”.

(5)  Be careful to consider any I-beams, HVAC duct trunks, furnaces, water heaters, plumbing, water meters, sump pumps, window wells, the height of your ceiling and the existing floor conditions and flooring alternatives as parts of your overall plan.

(6)  Your design/build consultants should be focused on making these type of restrictions (as noted in item # 5) disappear into the design of your basement finishing plan, while accomplishing your goals for the space to be finished.

(7)  For any construction project, safety is an important consideration.  Make certain that all necessary building permits, potential variance applications and building code inspections are complete.  All building and fire safety codes should be strictly followed.

(8) In most cases, all or most items in the basement should be moved to another room (assuming space is available), garage or even a temporary storage facility.  This way, damage to your valuables or disturbance to the construction team is kept to a minimum while construction is taking place.

(9) Almost all basements suffer from a lack of natural light.  Since many basements are recessed in the ground, it can make it difficult to install additional windows in the walls.  Sometimes, what openings there are usually have to be placed near the ceiling, at such an angle that they aren’t conducive to allowing sunlight.

(10) Lack of natural sunlight can be overcome by making certain that there is a wealth of artificial lighting in the rooms.  Overhead fixtures will provide the greatest illumination, although you may want to experiment with the various shadow effects you can create with floor lamps, before having other alternative lighting options installed.  Mirrors placed opposite existing windows can also multiply the amount of sunlight you can transmit through the room(s).