By insulating your new finished basement you will create a cozy space that will actually improve the energy efficiency of your home.  Believe it or not, most new homes didn’t get basement insulation until recently.  This is crazy since up to 30% of your home’s energy loss is through the basement walls.  So in this […]

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We’ve been walking you through our finished basement project.  In this post we will discuss our quality checklist for the mechanical rough-ins.  Since we are adding a theater/rec room for our finished space, we don’t have any plumbing to inspect.  If you have these in your new basement design, now would be the time to […]

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  With the state of the economy today, people are looking for ways to save money.  Many people have moved in with relatives until they can get back on their feet.  So what is the least expensive and quickest way to add finished space to your home?  Finishing your basement is the quickest, most cost […]

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The most important element in creating a quality finished basement is the framing.  All of the finishes you see when the project is complete are affected by the rough carpentry quality. So what kinds of things can go wrong if the rough carpentry in your finished basement is done in an inferior fashion? Ugly Tile […]

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If you’re planning on finishing your basement as an owner-builder, it’s a good idea to have a written schedule.  This schedule lists each activity in the order they are to be completed and shows the time allowed for each.  In this post we will discuss why you need a schedule, the critical components and time […]

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We’ve been talking about how to go about finishing your basement as an owner-builder.  In our last post (Getting Bids for your Finished Basement, part I) we discussed the importance of the bid package and how the bid sheet gives your  subcontractors a specific format for submitting a bid.  This format allows you to easily […]

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We have been talking about how to go about finishing a basement.  In this post, we will discuss how you go about getting bids from subcontractors.  You will send out bid packages to a minimum of three subcontractors per activity.  So, you will send out a package to three different drywall companies, three different trim […]

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If we are going to put time, effort and money into finishing our basement, we need to make sure we take steps to keep the moisture out.  There is nothing worse than having to remove new carpet, drywall, and insulation because water made its way into your home.  Here is a checklist I use whenever […]

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Hopefully you were able to watch our last video in our basement finishing series titled Pre-Planning for Your Finished Basement.  Now you are ready to move on to creating the plan for your new space.  The plan is necessary to allow the subcontractors and suppliers to properly estimate material and labor quantities.  So, this plan will […]

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So you’ve decided you want to finish your basement.  Yesterday we posted Part I of a series of videos to make this an easy project for an owner-builder.  Today, we posted a new video titled Pre-Planning for Your Finished Basement, Part II.  In this video we review all of the things to consider before you […]

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