I’m in the dreaming stages, wondering about order of magnitude costs and design feasibility, and just though I’d throw it out here for suggestions, warnings, encouragement, discouragement, or whatever.
I have a 1919 CA bungalow, 1351 sq. ft. all on one floor, mostly crawl space underneath with a partial basement that’s too small to be really useful. Thinking about digging it out to create either a full basement, or else at least a much larger partial basement, with minimum 7′ ceiling (preferably 8′). At this point I’m still thinking unfinished, as I probably don’t have even enough money to do that, let alone finishing it.
More details:
The house is about 24′ wide and 55′ deep front to back. There is 16′ of clearance to the adjacent property line on one side (occupied by the driveway), and 4′ on the other side. The crawl space is about 32″ high, except under the front porch (contained within the foundation envelope), where it’s 6″-12″ lower. The rearmost 12′ or so of the house is an addition, apparently a back porch conversion of some type as the original T&G ceiling is still there. The detached 1.5 car garage is about 10′ behind the house, at the end of aforementioned driveway.
The partial basement was a retrofit, with retaining walls poured around about a 6’x8′ area under the addition (5.5′ ceiling), and an adjacent 10’x10′ area under the original house (6′ ceiling). The entrance to the basement is through an old-style “cellar door” at the back of the building, which the idiot former owners blocked off the bottom 4″ of so they could pour a second layer of crappy concrete over the entire back yard — about an inch or two above the top of the foundation. Because of the low ceiling height and the placement of the concrete entry stairs, you have to duck to prevent hitting your head on the rim joist when you go in (the clearance from rim joist bottom to the last step is less than 5′).
At this moment, the only utility that is sitting under the house is the water heater (it’s in the basement), but the electrical and gas lines from the street are buried. Also, next week I’m having central heating installed, and the new furnace will sit on a concrete pad in the crawl space, in front of (and fairly near) the basement retaining wall. Next month, the structural pest contractor will be redoing the front porch framing, treating for termites, and capping the foundation on one side of the house, as it’s below grade.
There is a sump pump in the basement now (with a friggin’ 6″ deep sump pit), and an old bathtub ring around the perimeter and up the water heater, but since shimming the float so that the pump engages before water tops the pit, we haven’t had any flooding. The pump discharges through a 50′ garden hose, so I don’t think we’re looking at tons of ground water here. Plus, there’s evidence that at least some of the water was coming from the stairs, not the ground.
Types of questions I’m mulling over include:
1. General price range and advisability of raising the house, excavating, and setting it on a new foundation; vs. digging out a larger area by hand and placing new retaining walls inside the existing foundation
2. Whether to leave the exterior entrance in the same location (but build it out better) vs trying to come up with some alternate location for it
3. Complications and extra costs involving the water heater and central heating equipment (gas, forced-air, will have a radial distribution with flex duct)
4. Minimal electrical wiring recommended for unfinished basement, for lighting and receptacles (and sump pump, furnace)
5. Whether there’s any conceivable way to get a set of stairs down to the basement from inside the house (more on the upstairs floorplan later)
6. Advisability of moving the laundry room and/or the back bathroom (which is plumbed all wrong and has an unusable shower anyway) down there, so I can have a more usable floorplan in the kitchen
and of course, a bazillion other things that branch out from these questions, regarding the eventual kitchen remodel (which I can’t afford either), teardown and rebuild of the garage, removal of all that $%#&@ concrete from the back yard and replacement with… what? You get the idea.
Anyway, any thoughts appreciated. There’s a guy coming out Monday to take a look and do an estimate — I made sure he understands I’m nowhere near the actual implementation phase at this point, just trying to get an idea of order-of-magnitude cost.
Replies
My parents and wife's parent both dug out their own basements back when absolutely no money to hire anything done. Think it took them 5 or 6 months of an hours or so work a day. Used 2 ft wide embankment in basement rather than trying to dig out from under foundation.
It is usually less expensive to go up rather than out, or in your case, down. It's the cost of concrete vs lumber.
Hi, ChrisG1.I doubt if the existing foundation will support two floors, although I could be wrong. I believe it's unreinforced concrete, although everyone who's looked at it says it's in good shape.I don't know if the first floor framing will support a second floor or not. It's fully dimensional lumber, but certainly was not sized with a second floor in mind.Then there's the matter of finishing. I've got lath and plaster walls on the first floor -- can't be easy to fish wiring through them to go upstairs. Likewise, how to get heating ducts up there? Plumbing if I move the back bathroom or the laundry room to accomodate stairs? Somehow adding an unfinished basement seems less odd than adding an unfinished second floor, and even if finished, it's got to cost less than finishing the second floor.It's a good thought, though. In a lot of ways I like it better than a basement. Seems more disruptive, though, what with no roof and all while it's being built...OTOH, the house is probably due for a new roof in a couple of years anyway.Rebeccah
You raise some good points. Either way it is not going to be cheap. Couple of points, many times it is easier to gut the first floor to accomadate the utilities and such. Two by fours on 16" centers wiil accomadate a second floor, it was the norm years ago, although some towns may require you beef it up, more for insulation purposes and you definately need a staircase,may not always be pracitcal but it could be a spiral staircase but as my first boss told me you can't carry an engine block up a spiralstaircase, ha ha. In my area this would run about 70-90k, nothing special but nice.
----- In my area this would run about 70-90k, nothing special but nice. -----Ouch.It'll take me at least a year, possibly two, to come up with what I might want in the way of a second story. By then I ought to know whether or not there's going to be any money. If I don't spend it on something else first. :)But if I go up, I can put a library and an art studio up there, and we'll actually use them. That should free up some space in the garage and then there would be a place to put all that stuff that's in the yard. Maybe a guest bedroom and another bath, too. Oh, and there's a hole in a closet wall that maybe could be used to fish electrical wiring; and a chase with a large, unused flue (old gravity furnace eons ago???) in the kitchen, that could probably be used to run heating supply duct.
Hi Rebeccah,
I was reading more of your posts and just wanted to put in my $.02 here.
I used to "flip" houses in SF a few years ago and we found out the hard way that unless you just really love the "charm" of plaster walls, the best thing to do was rip-out the old lath and plaster and just be done with it. We could usually do this in one day, and if your carefull, you can usually get about 1 floors worth in a large dumper. Its messy but with plastic sheeting and great, repeat, great dust masks the mess can be controlled.
Then, you can insulate, move fixtures, put in modern wiring and plumbing. Wire for networking, alarm, cable etc. We got to where we could get this all done rather quickly if we subbed the drywall work. This also gives you the ability to see where any repairs might need to be made or where we could maybe move a wall or closet, enlarge a bathroom ( I guess people never had to squeeze past a spouse in the loo in "the day") Once, we found a really cool "time capsule" in a bathroom wall. We re-sealed it in the wall with the addition of some contemperary stuff as well.
This would also give you the chance to assess the feasibility of adding a second floor later. I would usually frown on adding a second floor on a craftsman style house just for purely architectural reasons but I know of a house in Berkeley (on upper Euclid I think) that had a second floor put on and I think even Greene and Greene would have approved. So it can be done well.
In the end, it soulds like this is going to be a labor of love so take your time and have fun and keep us posted. Don't be afraid to show off your gem. I once read an OpEd piece about a guy that used to hate it when his friends would move to SF and then toast to their good fortune of living in the City. Then he was transfered from N.Y. to the City himself and now he finds that he spends his days hanging out and toasting to his good fortune to live in SF!
Good luck on your home.
Terence
--- I would usually frown on adding a second floor on a craftsman style house just for purely architectural reasons but I know of a house in Berkeley (on upper Euclid I think) that had a second floor put on and I think even Greene and Greene would have approved. So it can be done well. ---This house is not craftsman style. I call it a California Bungalow because of the low roof slope and the floorplan of the original house, but it really doesn't have any craftsman details, unless you count the built-in in the dining room. All of the trimwork has been painted multiple times. It's had a kitchen and bath remodel some time in the past, new windows in the living room, and metal awnings and railings in the front probably dating to the 50s? The house really didn't show well at all when I bought it. Doors that had been sawed off a the top and/or the bottom to accomodate unsquare openings and the previous carpeting, locksets that didn't function, mismatched baseboard and other trim in places,really sloppy painting jobs in the past including one with dark green paint that has left its traces on all of the windows and in many other places, 100% broken sash cords with many windows painted open at odd angles because of the loose fit, an ugly gas log set in the fireplace (with the gas valve in the firebox behind the logset, go figure), ugly popcorn ceilings everywhere, you should have seen the panelling in the master bedroom,cheap-cheap-cheap cabinetry in the kitchen with an unsecured base cabinet next to the stove and an unsecured and unfinished plastic laminate counter atop it (the end cap was in a plastic bag above the stove), peeling vinyl flooring in the kitchen and laundry roomg, an unfriendly kitchen layout that I still can't figure out how to remedy, back bathroom done within the last decade to the same exacting standards and with the same high quality materials as the kitchen cabinets (and not vented properly, to boot),plumbing leaks, really scary electrical splicing, termites, an unsafe heating system,the horrendous concrete job in the back yard, a garage that is probably 2-3 years away from falling over (well, maybe more now that we've diverted rainwater away from the sills with a trench drain at the door), ugly old Bilco type basement door made of wood, that they chopped the bottom of the door off of and raised the threshold of with PT wood so they could pour more concrete above the foundation,...Yet, underneath it all is a basically nice house. Nothing stellar, nothing that will ever make it into House Beautiful or one of the architectural magazines, but except for the kitchen it has a very usable floorplan, and the house is basically structurally sound.Our street (San Pablo Ave. in Oakland) is a commercial street for miles, but our block happens to have 9 houses in a row, all of them variations on a theme as far as styling goes. All of them have had additions at one time or another, some going up and some going back. So if we did a second floor that was set back from the front of the house a bit, it would definitely fit in with the style of the neighboring houses.However, none of our neighbors have a ton of money, nor do we. Most of the work that has been done on our block in the past 2 decades has been in large measure DIY and/or on-the-cheap. The work we have done on our own house is noticeably amateur, not even highly skilled amateur, but it does the job and looks better than it did before we got our hands on it.--- the best thing to do was rip-out the old lath and plaster and just be done with it. We could usually do this in one day, and if your carefull, you can usually get about 1 floors worth in a large dumper. Its messy but with plastic sheeting and great, repeat, great dust masks the mess can be controlled.Then, you can insulate, move fixtures, put in modern wiring and plumbing. Wire for networking, alarm, cable etc. We got to where we could get this all done rather quickly if we subbed the drywall work. This also gives you the ability to see where any repairs might need to be made or where we could maybe move a wall or closet, enlarge a bathroom ---If/when I do the major kitchen remodel, this will happen. But if I can't come up with a place to put the washer and dryer, or the clothes that are hanging in the two closets that bump out in to the kitchen, then the kitchen remodel will have to be a minor one, do-it-yourself, with better quality cabinets, new flooring, and a new washer (the old one is rusting), and the floor plan left pretty much as it is.
I think I know just where your house is. I lived/worked/studied in Berkeley for 12 years and have been in Seattle area for about 7 but I get down to the Bay Area a few times a year. Always make it a point to visit Ohmega Salvage and a few of the other places I love and miss. I ALWAYS get a burrito at Picante and of course have to drop in at Fentons for some ice cream. Wow, I'm homesick again....
Well, back to business.
It sounds like you've got a lot to think about.
A lot of houses in that area suffer from "remuddeling" but none of it is fatal. I would start getting some design ideas together to try and map a strategy of what you want things to look like. This will help you in deciding what work is going to suit your needs and how to approach any construction. I would recomend going on one of the House Walks around the area. There are always some going on in Berkeley that are fun.
You are in luck as your area has a lot of contractors that specialize in the kind of work you are looking for.
Go ask around at Ashby Lumber (say HI to Vince for me) or Truitt and White. You are going to get to know these places well anyway so you might as well start there.
Reading about your doors and walls reminds me of an old fraternity house I worked on in Berkeley. The center of the house had sagged over the years and needed to be supported better. The entire 3-story house was supported by full dimensional 2x14s (in REDWOOD) that spanned the entire house. We jacked up the center to level and poured in a pony wall. After that every door in the place and many windows had to be replaced. Over the years as the place sagged, the doors were shimmed and trimmed to keep working and now they all looked cock-eyed and wouldn't come close to shutting. We had to float a new floor in the bathrooms as the slope was now something you could sled on. Fun.
One other word about selecting a contractor. Try and visit some jobsites for any contractor you are thinking of working with. Is the crew working in a way that squares with what your expectations will be? Its important (at least to me) that there is a good 'fit.' Of course that is not always possible and I'm sure by reading these posts you can see what contractors are up against as well. That said, if you have the time to do some research, your work will come off a lot smoother.
Good luck and keep us posted.
Terence
Yep, I bet you do know where my house is. No other block quite like it in the whole city.Thanks for the suggestions. How do I find out about House Walks?I figure major work is at least a year or two away, but I'll keep Ashby Lumber in mind. I should know where Truitt and White is, but for some reason it escapes me at the moment. Is it visible from the University Ave exit off I-80?Very good idea about visiting job sites. What kinds of things would I be looking for?I think the main thing is going to be spending lots of time with my design software, trying out ideas. Then, once I have a couple of them, I can start shopping either architects, engineers, contractors, or a combination to assess feasibility and ballpark costs. I don't have the kind of money to throw around, or the kinds of references for contractors and architects, that I did back when I was in Illinois planning to build a whole new home. The planning is my big thing. I want to keep change orders to an ABSOLUTE minimum, because it's the only way to keep a lid on costs.
Hello,
Heck I believe that I live in the same neighborhood as you. I live on 29th St. between West and MLK.
Let me tell you about a great resource for home owners that want to be more handy. Its in Berkeley and its called the Building Education Center. http://www.bldgeductr.org/ They have a ton of classes they offer all geared to home owners that want to learn to do the work themselves. They have two-day intensive work shops plus one day classes and one evening classes. Take a look at their schedule and PM me if you want any specific advice about which classes are worth taking.
One thing I learned from a class there is that in Oakland its easier and cheaper/faster to raise the existing house and build a new story on the the bottom. In our neighborhood most of the houses are 1.5 stories and so making them 2 full stories is pretty easy.
I know a great foundation guy and a great demo-hauling company that would take care of your back yard problems in a flash. Again PM me if you want their specifics.
We have done a lot of the work that you are currently contemplating so you might want to take a sec and check out our website for before during and after shots. http://www.madmadscientist.com/galleries/house/index.htm
Not to toot my own horn but I saw from your profile that you are a tech worker. I wanted to show you what a couple of tech workers can do when they put their minds to it.
Our backyard was a total mess now it looks like this, http://www.madmadscientist.com/garden/
http://www.madmadscientist.com/pond/
Some light carpentry we did http://www.madmadscientist.com/nicheweb/niches.htm
One more of the more recently finished rooms http://www.madmadscientist.com/redroom/redroom.htm
Maybe showing your hubby some of this stuff will get him motivated?
Daniel Neuman
Oakland CA
Crazy Home Owner
Edited 10/19/2005 7:16 pm by madmadscientist
I see you got a great reply from Daniel Nuemanm so it looks like you are on the right track. For the Berkeley house walks, try giving their Rec department a call and also the Architecture Department at the U.C. (Go Bears)
Just within a few blocks of campus you will find homes designed by Green and Green, Julia Morgan, John Galen Howard and many many others. There are a lot of great homes in North Berkeley, Alameda and North Oakland/Piedmont also. You won't be lacking for ideas and inspiration.
Have fun.
Terence
ps. Berkeley has a tool-lending library also. I think its on Milvia. Check them out.
Junkhound's parent's method is tremendously more cost effective than paying to have the house lifted and all. At least around here more cost effective. This isnt an area of rapidly rising house prices, and no one is going to value the house in a manner that will compensate for those kind of costs.
Another note: Since my parents and in-laws both did that task, 10 years ago finally had the chance to do the same on son's first house. Parents had carried everything out in buckets, at least I had a way to wheelbarrow it out . 146 (or was it 164) wheelbarrows of 6 cu ft later $ over 30 cu yards was dugout. Dug graveled channels under the floor w/drainpipe, able to go to daylight for a drain. 2 ft thick, 4 ft high embankment. $670 worth of concrete for the embankment, a few bucks for nails and insulation, scrounged everything else. Spent about 2 hours a day for 3 months digging, finishing, probably worth 35-40K of the 60 K increase on house sale price when son sold it a year later (big stock option bonanza and housing upgrade for them, Seattle, 1998 <G>).
Anyway, those 3 months sure beat any other kind of exercise, dropped from 220 to 185# from the digging.
So, if we (my fiance and I) do the digging ourselves, how close can we go to the foundation without worrying about the the dirt under the foundation footers spilling out and undermining?Does one do this in sections and pour the concrete retaining wall for one section before moving on to the next?I have no idea how deep the foundation goes, but seeing as this is pretty much a frost-free part of the country, I doubt it goes far. As far as the soil itself, we're in a "soil liquefaction zone" as far as earthquake risk is concerned. Which also makes me wonder how long I want to take with the digging, since it seems to me the susceptibility of the foundation to earthquake damage will be increased while there is earth missing next to it.Drainage is another question altogether. My lot is pretty flat, and there's no place to daylight anything placed under a basement floor. I'd have to pump.Rebeccah
>> So, if we (my fiance and I) do the digging ourselves, how close can we go to the foundation without worrying about the the dirt under the foundation footers spilling out and undermining? << No one here can answer that withoug knowing a lot more about your soil type, etc. and really an in person examination is what is in order.
Here is a concept for you though. In theory the pressure on the soil from your footings spread out at a 45 degree angle from the bottom of footers.
You have a lot of unknowns. Would suggest you dig out by hand a 3-4 ft wide section and see how firm the soil is and how dep you footing goes. I recall pop did his in 4 ft sections at a time - dug the whole thing out to within 4 ft of the walls, then dug to within a foot of the existing (brick) foundation and poured 4 ft at a time. letting each section cure for a week before the next section. The one I did has the footing 3-1/2 ft down, so the embankment was 4 ft tall.
i'm a building inspector in ky, in both earthquake and frost area's. given what you have already said, i would contract with a structural engineer to oversee the project. you might find a whole host of problems when doing this. i have seen a couple of these done in my jurisdiction and on both i have required them to have an engineer. on both projects they ran in to significant problems.
Thanks, guys. I've also been thinking about it and thinking I really should get an engineer involved, even if DH and I do the hand digging ourselves. I'm pretty sure there will need to be rebar in the retaining walls and they'll need to be tied to the foundation.That's if we do it at all. DH doesn't like basements and doesn't understand why I want one. Mostly it's because we need more room for "stuff", but he's got a point. It's either a lot of work or a lot of money just for more storage space. As it is, he just uses the back yard. Sigh. Ditto for workshop space. He uses the garage and the yard, and the living room, and probably wouldn't use the basement were it available. I probably wouldn't use an office if it were down there, either.Of course if we gut the kitchen and start moving walls around, we might lose the laundry room and/or the second bathroom, in which case we would need the basement for those. But that's even more money.Like I say, just in the dreaming stages at this point...
we need more room for "stuff
Why didn't you say so. Most places you can build as many 120 or 200 sq ft sheds as you want! Lotsa storage. Do a thread search, lots of shed threads.
we need more room for "stuff
-----
Why didn't you say so. Most places you can build as many 120 or 200 sq ft sheds as you want! Lotsa storage. Do a thread search, lots of shed threads.
-----
Small yard. The whole property is a little under 4000 square feet.
The house is 1351 sq. ft, the garage is about 360 sq feet, the driveway about 100 sq ft, and the front yard about 500 sq ft. That only leaves about 1000 sq ft for the back yard plus nooks and crannies around the perimeter of the house.The weather here is quite mild, and we actually like to spend time outside in our back yard, even with the crappy concrete, and we've removed the back 1/3 of it to make a nice productive little vegetable garden. DH already uses most of the yard not occupied by the patio furniture or the garden for storage.I'd like to be able to move out of the main house a bunch of *my* stuff, someplace where it won't get lost among the stray pieces of lumber, plastic, metal, tools, art supplies, and found items that DH accumulates (he's an artist and handyman). Also, I'm currently renting a 10x10' storage unit at a self-storage facility (down from two such units before I bought the house). It would be nice to be able to stop paying for that and have everything close by.A shed is not out of the question. It would provide shelter and might facilitate improved storage aesthetics (or not), but it doesn't add any usable space to the property.
undermine a section of footing at a time and concrete it, say 2 foot wide until the footings are all done. As to how close you can dig without disturbing footings if you were not to concrete, unless your on sand, I would use the 45 degree rule.
I was going to do that at my house, but then the footings wouldn't be continuous--would that be a problem? Seem like if one two foot section wanted to settle, it could and then that part of the wall would be unsupported.
when you excavate beside an already concreted section drill holes and use a two part product to fix steel reinforcement, then place concrete. Also don't give the sides a neat finish, but rather something to engage with, apply your imagination to this principle and you'll have a monolithic structure. An edge here, a protrusion there etc..
Thanks--I wondered about steel reinforcement, but didn't know how to connect to the previous pour. Drilling holes and epoxy should do it. Another project for as soon as I can get to it!
How about leaving steel sticking out the side of each section you do, to link up with the steel in the next one?
-- J.S.
You would probably want to hammer it into the earth, because if you excavate to give the steel the clearance you may as well pour concrete there as that section would be unsupported. Depends on your substrate I suppose.
Ther have been several threads here about the subject. You could probablt find them with some dilligent searching.
Bony fingers.........
Just to give you some idea of costs and keep in mind that your conditions and local costs can make a huge difference, around here to raise a house, excavate and pour a new foundation and hook everything back up would cost 30-50k. It could be a lot more if your access is poor.
If you decide to do it by hand, I would recommend (your building inspector may require it) that you have a local engineer design the retaining wall and any connections to the existing foundation/house.
If you do it by hand and do the work yourself, you could do it for under 4k including the engineer's work.
How about renting small excavation equipment? There are a lot of small pieces of equipment that dig pretty well. I have even seen basements dug out with a bob cat under an existing house. What could take months can be done in a couple days. There will be a lot of safety issues to look at and you will need a good equip. operator
You've probably thought of this, but it sounds like you want to do an awful lot to that house--maybe you'd be better off selling it and moving to another house that suits your needs better? I'm viewing this from afar, so may be missing reasons that you want to stay in this house and remodel rather than move.
Hey, Danno.Numerous reasons for not moving up to a bigger or different house.1. This is the SF Bay Area, and this is my first house. This is all I can afford. Home prices here are absolutely ridiculous, still rising, and I've locked in a good mortgage interest rate (fixed for 30 yrs).2. I spent well over a year looking before I made an offer on this house. Everything even remotely in my price range was a compromise. If I weren't complaining about the lack of space, I'd be complaining about the commute, or the unsuitability of the location for running a business out of the home. If it weren't the kitchen layout that I hated, it would be some other aspect of the floor plan.3. It's totally a seller's market here. Homes sell "as-is", with no contingencies, in less than a month after putting them on the market, with multiple offers and usually over asking price. I'd be buying a pig in a poke.4. I hate to move. I just got this house a year and a half ago.5. Probably the most important one. I've always wanted to either build a home or renovate one. By doing all of this planning, and following through on selected items, I'm indulging my fantasy. So far, DH and I have done the following: - pulled up the carpeting, sanded and refinished the hardwood floors in the LR, DR, front hall, and 2 BRs
- restored the windows in those same rooms
- removed the popcorn ceiling texture from those same rooms
- removed the plaster from the LR ceiling and replaced it with drywall
- removed the fake wood panelling and multiple layers of wallpaper from several rooms, and repainted
- knocked out 1/3 of the back yard concrete and planted a vegetable garden
- installed a precast polymer concrete trench drain in front of the garage door to prevent flooding, pouring our own sump pit at the end and pumping the collected surface water to the garden
- had the electrical service upgraded from 60A to 200A, the unsafe wiring in the kitchen and other newer areas of the house redone, a new 90A subpanel placed in the kitchen and a 60A subpanel in the garage with a 240V circuit for an electric kiln
- had two major plumbing leaks repaired and a laundry sink installedIn a few days, we're having gas forced-air central heat installed and those nasty floor furnaces removed, and in a month or so the front porch framing is being replaced, the foundation is being capped on one side (and possibly in a couple of other areas), and the ground around the foundation is being treated for termites.If I still have any money left next year, the question is whether to proceed with a kitchen remodel; garage teardown and rebuild; basement; or back yard concrete removal, regrading, and some kind of hardscape. In all likelihood it will be a very limited kitchen remodel, because I don't know of any more "hidden" sources of funds I can tap.If I had unlimited funds, I'd probably do the basement first, then move the stuff out of the garage and do the garage teardown and back yard landscaping together, and finally the more extensive kitchen/back bathroom/laundry room remodel.Rebeccah
What you say makes sense. For one thing, I didn't know where you were located (should have looked at your profile!). I visited my brother several years ago (early 80's) when he lived in S.F. and he showed me a teeny house on a teeny lot and asked what I thought it would sell for. I said something like $40,000 and he laughed and said you couldn't buy the lot (even back then) for that.
Sounds like you're looking at it as an investment and if you are willing and able to do your own work, more power to you!
I know in parts of California, people buy million dollar houses and demolish them and build new.
Sounds like you've already done a lot of work and done it well.
Good luck in the future.
Cheaper to go up, rather than down. I'd put on a second story.Regards, Scooter"I may be drunk, but you're crazy, and I'll be sober tomorrow." WC Fields, "Its a Gift" 1934
Hi R,
Iv'e seen this type of project done many times in both Berkeley and in the City. There was a time a few years ago when it looked like every other house on Union St. was getting a garage put in underneath. I know there are many contractors that specialize in this kind of work that you could talk to to get some ideas regarding feasability and costs. I don't think we are supossed to post recomendations here but I know of a few in the area that do that kind of work.
One word of caution, a few years ago, a couple of guys were killed when part of their job caved-in and they couldn't be dug out in time. The inspection department really clamped-down on under the house kind of work for awhile. I haven't lived in the Bay Area for a few years (still kicking myself) but I would think that there is a whole process you would have to follow.
If you have to go to all the expense of digging out or raising anyway, you might consider maximizing your value and get the most out of the job with a great basement anyway. I can't imagine in SF it wouldn't pay for itself.
Sounds like a job anyway.
Good Luck
Terence
Hi, Terence --Thanks for the thoughts.I know there's been a lot of this kind of work done in Berkeley -- I still see houses up on cribbing from time to time, and a couple of years ago there were a lot of them.If you have any specific suggestions of reputable companies, maybe you could send me an e-mail: rprastein at earthlink dot com.I don't know why I have such a thing for basements -- maybe because I grew up in the midwest, and they were de rigeur.Anyway, one guy came out this morning to scout the place out for an estimate. I had told him up front when I scheduled the appointment, I'm not ready to do anything yet, just getting ideas. He didn't impress me much. Young guy, didn't sound knowledgeable or experienced. I asked whether they would underpin or build out a ledge like the existing partial basement has, and he just kind of said it was my choice. No discussion of pros or cons either way. He had that kind of nervous, looking around trying to remember what he needs to do next look while he was looking at my basement. Oh, and I looked the company up on the CA Contractor's State License Board web site and through google. The company's been licensed for about a year, and the owner (an engineer)'s previous company went bankrupt.I expect the estimate will be worth what I'm paying for it, will be a lowball that doesn't include *any* of the likely or possible complications that can arise, and won't itemize in any detail what they would do or how they would do it. So in the absence of any additional information, I'll take twice that number as the low end of the price range. He did say the labor to do the digging would comprise most of the cost.
In 1992 my brother in law had the same problem with his 2 bedroom . Little cubbyhole of a basement with enough room to stand in front of the furnace and hot water heater.
He had the house lifted by a pro, who arranged for all the utilities to be cut and later reconnected. They poured a full basement with 9' walls, which "instantly" doubled the square footage he had. Then sat it back down without a hitch....$25,000.... He says it's probably the best money he ever spent, made the whole house work and be more livable. best of luck with yours...BUIC
You've said you're looking at a garage teardown/rebuild in future....have you given any thought to putting a loft or apartment above the garage? You can get quite a bit of space for the money, and finishing it off would give your man a good place to do his art stuff, and a bit of storage could be had as well. Might not substitute for basement space, but it'd still be pretty useful.
Jason
Hi, Jason.Yes, I thought about it a few months abo when I was dreaming about what we could do with the garage and the back yard. :)Actually, I think that's a great idea, possibly better than any of the house addition ideas. I wouldn't have to worry about disrupting my living space while the work is going on (although I'd have to come up with a place to put all the stuff that is currently in the garage for the duration). I wouldn't have to worry about the adequacy of the foundation to support a second floor, I wouldn't have to worry about not having a roof while construction is in progress, I wouldn't have to worry about my house caving in. I wouldn't gain a library, but I'd gain an art studio in close proximity to where DH works right now. If I could plumb it for a plaster sink and a toilet, that would be great, too. And somehow, I think the whole thing would be cheaper than an addition on the house. And if they could do it without disrupting the trench drain we went to such trouble to install, then that might be a good time to dig up the buried electrical conduit to the existing garage and tee it to allow wiring for some exterior lighting.
You can do the basement dig yourself if you're young and strong enough, and really want the exercise. I did a little piece of footing under my place three years ago, probably the last time for me.
The way to approach it is just like a house mover would, only on a smaller scale. Get a piece of steel (mine's 12 ft of w8x15, you may want to go longer and stronger), build up cribbing under the ends of it to transfer the weight of the house to it for a section, then dig and pour that section of the new wall. Put the house back down on the new wall, and move the steel and cribbing along to the next section.
You need an engineer who knows your local soil conditions to design the finished product, and to tell you how to do your temporary supports. You'll also need a jack to lift the house, a 20 ton Norco works fine for me. Crib and shim as you jack, so it never has far to fall if the jack fails. If you go with a bigger piece of steel, a come-along will help a lot for moving it around in the crawl space. Mine's only 180 lbs, so it's not too hard to just shove along.
Another thing you have to think about: how is the middle of your floor supported? Are there piers and posts in the crawl space holding it up? If so, there's more to be re-designed and re-done.
-- J.S.
---Another thing you have to think about: how is the middle of your floor supported? Are there piers and posts in the crawl space holding it up? If so, there's more to be re-designed and re-done.---There's a foundation wall in the middle. I started another thread with a question about that wall. I assumed that the wall above it in the house was a roof-bearing wall, but I noticed this morning that the wall in the house is offset by about a foot from the wall in the crawlspace. So does that mean it's NOT a bearing wall, and the central foundation wall is only supporting the weight of the floor?Anyway, that central wall adds enough complexity that I don't think I want to do this myself. If I have to stay 4' out from the wall for the initial excavation (assuming I want to go 4' deeper than the existing foundation), on either side, then I only have 4' of working space - or does the "angle of repose" stuff only apply if the house is actually resting on the foundation that you're digging out?I don't think DH has the attention span to keep working on this for months at a time, when he's not the one that wants a basement, anyway. Right this minute, I'm leaning more towards the "loft above a new garage" idea.Where does one get a jack to lift the house, though? Nothing's completely ruled out at this point.
> I noticed this morning that the wall in the house is offset by about a foot from the wall in the crawlspace. So does that mean it's NOT a bearing wall, and the central foundation wall is only supporting the weight of the floor?
No, not in a house built in 1919. The code requirement that bearing walls stay within one joist depth, or else be engineered with wet stamped drawings, doesn't go back that far. It's very likely to be a bearing wall, supporting the wall above,the ceiling, and maybe even the roof. But that's not a fatal problem. You might even get it designed so that you do that part last, and it becomes the final home for the big piece of steel that you use for the rest of the job.
The 45 degree angle thing is generally pretty safe, but if you're on particularly mushy ground, it may not be. On extremely hard ground like I have, you can cut it even closer than that. Your engineer can tell you how close you can dig.
> Where does one get a jack to lift the house, though?
I got mine from Otto Service Co. in Burbank, CA. Maybe they can point you to a vendor up North there.... Their web site is:
http://www.hyjacks.com/
-- J.S.