Is it bad not to have a basement?

The absence of a basement can also indicate an insufficient foundation that can heave seasonally with frost. This is why I wouldn't buy an older home that has no basement. That said, modern, slab-on-grade construction (concrete poured at ground level) has no basement, yet can function very well.

House plans with basements offer a safe haven in dangerous weather. These basements are more protected during tornadoes because they are built completely underground. Cooler temperatures. If you live in a climate where it gets very hot, you might opt for a house plan with a basement to provide a space for cooling off.

The basement is essentially a part of the foundation and helps keep the structure stable and safe to live in. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to safeguard it from water seepage which can develop major foundational problems including building settlements and cracks.

Building a basement in the house has a negative effect, because the basement is under the ground, due to which sunlight and fresh air cannot come here and there is a lack of positivity. However, if it is very important for you to build a basement at home, then pay attention to a few things.

Japanese homes typically do not have basements as a common feature. Basements are not commonly found in traditional Japanese residential architecture, and the design and construction of Japanese homes often differ from what is commonly seen in Western countries.

Con – moisture

With limited access to the outdoors through windows and doors, it's easy for basements to become damp. This can cause problems for people with asthma or create conditions for mold growth. In addition, basements are at greater risk of flooding, especially during a storm.

Many homeowners use the main living room as a more formal space for entertaining company, but also like the idea of a less formal living area for gathering. The basement can be that additional space for watching television, doing homework, or spending casual time with friends and family.

Except for Britain, Australia and New Zealand, cellars are popular in most western countries. In the United Kingdom, almost all new homes built since the 1960s have no cellar or basement due to the extra cost of digging down further into the sub-soil and a requirement for much deeper foundations and waterproof tanking.

The reason we have basements at all is because years ago people needed to have frost-free spaces before the days that heating systems kept homes above freezing all the time.

This scrap-and-build approach is a quirk of the Japanese housing market that can be explained variously by low-quality construction to quickly meet demand after the second world war, repeated building code revisions to improve earthquake resilience and a cycle of poor maintenance due to the lack of any incentive to ...

The main reason is that Australia doesn't have many hills or mountains where you can dig a hole and create a basement room. There are also many other reasons why Australians don't build basements: it's too expensive, there isn't enough space for them people don't want their homes to be dark etc.

Basement-dwellers, unkindly dubbed the "rat tribe" by the Chinese press, rarely see the sun from their rooms and often put up with mold and mildew on their clothes and bedding in the summer, but many make this space their comfortable home in their time in the capital.

Privacy: Basement bedrooms are often located away from the main living spaces of a home, which can provide added privacy and quiet. Coolness: Basements tend to be cooler than other parts of a home, which can be a benefit in warmer climates or during hot summer months.

The typical new single-family house in the U.S. is twice the size of the average urban or suburban dwelling in the European Union—more than 2,000 square feet versus approximately 1,000 square feet. Compared with their overseas peers, Americans simply have more space to wash up.

Whether you need planning permission for basement building at all depends on where you live, your property, and what exactly you're looking to build. If you're just looking to convert your existing basement, it is possible that you won't need any permission, unless the outside appearance of your home is being altered.

How much value does a finished basement add? Finishing a basement adds living space and increases the value of a property significantly. It's possible to add up to 20 - 30% of value to a property with a basement in the United Kingdom.

Some do, but it's not that common. Most parts of Britain have a relatively high water table, so creating a basement that does not flood is expensive and difficult. Tie this to many of the houses being built long before modern tanking methods or electric pumps were available, few were built with large basements.

Ample storage in a concrete basement frees up other, more expensive floor space in the house and garage. Plumbing, heating and wiring can be reached without crawling or breaking up floors. Concrete will never burn or rot and provides the best shelter against storms, hurricanes, and tornadoes.

Because one main reason for a relative lack of basement or cellar levels here, compared with continental Europe, is that there's a pretty high water table. Without modern technology to tank them, or a dry moat and drains, you'd have regretted your basement in the first wet winter.

Most older Okinawans have been on a plant-based diet since their childhood days. Their meals include stir-fried vegetables, sweet potatoes, soybean and tofu, which are high in nutrients and low in calories. They also observe the 80 per cent rule, where they have to stop eating when their stomachs are 80 per cent full.

A form of severe social withdrawal, called hikikomori, has been frequently described in Japan and is characterized by adolescents and young adults who become recluses in their parents' homes, unable to work or go to school for months or years.

Normally, the average lifespan of a house is between 50 and 100 years. However, it varies depending on its location and the quality of construction. Homes in areas with extreme weather conditions or natural disasters are likely to have shorter lifespans than those in more temperate climates.

Unlike American properties, basements are uncommon in British homes. Most houses in England built since the 1960s don't have basements – due to the high-water table in many areas, flood risk, and the popularity of concrete foundations.

Damp soil is the major culprit in most cases of missing basements in the southern states. Most parts of Florida, Louisiana, and eastern Texas have swaths of wetland or swamps or significant coastlines. So, there's just too much water underground to make basement construction feasible.

Attics help control temperatures in a house by providing a large mass of slowly moving air, and are often used for storage. The hot air rising from the lower floors of a building is often retained in attics, further compounding their reputation as inhospitable environments.

Housing blocks in Germany have cellars. That's practical because you can store things that no longer fit in your apartment downstairs. Even rented apartments usually have a lockable storage area in the basement.

While there is no legal guarantee to be granted access to basement storage when you rent an apartment, it is a common practice. As most Germans live in multi-family rented housing, storing winter coats or old files isn't as simple as parking them in an attic, as a typical American family in their own house might.