Many Chicago-area homeowners are squeezing every inch of usable living space out of their basements, choosing high-end designs on par with upper levels.
The day Mark and Jean O’Banion of St. Charles made the decision to put money down on a swimming pool for their back yard was the same day severe tornado warnings forced the family to take shelter in their unfinished basement.
“Talk about miserable,” says Jean O’Banion. While huddling in the dank space, she recalls, “My husband and I looked at each other and agreed it was a sign: Finish the basement first.”
Two years later, their basement is anything but cold and miserable. Full of natural light from windows facing the back yard and painted a cheery yellow with white trim, “the space is very inviting,” says O’Banion. “We’re down here all the time.”
With two bedrooms (one used as a play area and study, the other for an au pair), full bath, full kitchen with cherry cabinetry and a large family room/entertainment area, the 1,500-square-foot basement does not say “basement.”
Interest in upgrading basements is escalating as a remodeling priority, according to John Habermeier, chief executive of West Chicago-based Synergy Builders Inc., contractor for the O’Banions’ basement project.
“In the last five years, there’s been a tremendous shift in what people want when finishing basements,” says Habermeier. “It’s not just about utility and function any more, you know — the glaring fluorescent light hanging from the ceiling, and maybe a rec room and workshop.”
Now people want a space that’s as inviting as the upper living areas: more usable for entertaining with luxe amenities, finishes and feel.
There’s also more light brightening basements, from increased wattage and larger windows.
“Five years ago, the standard was one can light for every 80 square feet. Now it’s double that,” says Habermeier. “We’re also doing a lot more zones of lighting — ceiling, wall sconces and table-top lighting.”
Also, window-well size requirements used to be 2 feet projected and 2 feet wide. New rules, implemented in 2005, make that 3 feet projected and 3 feet wide.
The changes, says Habermeier, even affect what people call the space.
“It used to be just the basement,” he says. “Now, it’s the lower level.”
A full basement build-out — including bedrooms, bathroom and kitchen — can cost $55,000 to $75,000, depending on the square footage, according to Habermeier.
For Joan Carver, the 1,000 square-foot finished basement in her hundred-year-old clapboard home in Roscoe Village serves a dual role. It includes a bar and efficiency kitchen for entertaining and a steam room and media room for relaxation.
“We wanted the basement to be a retreat, where we could relax and have a mental health day,” says Carver. “We wanted to make it easy to maintain — the tile floor helps with our three large dogs — and simple to entertain down here.”
Eric and Jessica Bruozis built a large family/entertainment room and a potentially-rentable apartment (1,400 square feet combined) beneath the late-1800s brick two-flat they converted into their single-family Chicago home four years ago.
“Family meal times are important to us,” says Eric Bruozis. “We wanted to have conversations around the kitchen table with our two children, and didn’t want a television or Nintendo in there competing.”
Putting the family room downstairs — with a plasma TV, custom built-ins, cabinets and hardwood floors — was the solution.
The remainder of the lower-level space — with kitchen, full bathroom, bedroom and play room, may evolve to become a small apartment. For now, the kitchen is only used for parties, the “front room” is full of toy-laden shelves, and the bedroom is a work-out space.
The Bruozises wanted a design that could grow and change with their needs.
“That’s important when designing basements,” says their architect, Todd Main of Bauhs Dring Seglin Main Ltd. Architects and Planners. “We always have people fill out a wish list for the space, taking into account both how they want it to work now, and how they envision it later.”
Many homeowners see finishing basements as a better way to gain living space than doing an addition.
“It was more affordable, say $50 a square foot, as opposed to $250 or more with an addition, and just made more sense,” say Francine and Frank Quintero of Glenview.
“We live in a ranch, so building up we would have sacrificed the beauty of our cathedral ceilings,” Francine explains. “It would also have made the small rooms positively claustrophobic.”
Instead, the couple finished their basement to add play space for their two girls, plus entertainment space, and a home office for Frank Quintero’s kitchen and bath business.
“When you live in the city you, have to make the most out of every inch of space,” says Joan Carver. “There was no room to build onto the back of our house, and we figured we were paying taxes on all that raw space in the basement, so we should do something to make it usable.”
Finishing the basement, Carver gained about 1,000 square feet — about one third of the total size of the home. Challenges for project architect Christopher Turley included the need to excavate two feet lower to achieve comfortable 8-foot ceiling heights, plus adding underpinning.
“When working on basements in an urban setting, underpinning is one of the most challenging aspects because you’ve only got about three feet between the structure you’re working on and the neighboring lot. You have to be careful not to undermine that.”
Turley also relocated the basement staircase from the back to the front of the house, and damp-proofed basement foundation walls to prevent water seepage. Adding better ventilation and natural light, Turley also replaced glass block windows with operable windows.
Eric Bruozis, who acted as general contractor on his home, had to excavate two feet lower (ceilings are now 8 feet) and underpin the structure.
Providing a moisture barrier, and avoiding off-gassing that comes with some insulation materials, Bruozis insulated with a chemically inert spray insulation. He floated high-grade laminate wood flooring over the radiant-heated embedded concrete floor below.
Because the house is in a historic district, windows in front had to stay exactly where they were, “but in back of the house, in the family room, we were able to position the windows to let in light and to avoid under-stair views,” says Bruozis.
All families chose furniture, finishes, crown molding and baseboards in keeping with the rest of the house.
At the Quinteros, Italian-made built-ins and furniture fit with the modern style of the ranch home. At the Carver house, Mexican artwork and tiles are the accents. Both the O’Banion and Bruozis basements have a breezy but traditional feel.
“We did everything we could to make a seamless transition from the upper to lower levels — to make the basement a part of the main house,” says Bruozis.
Opening views to the basement by adding fancy staircases also helps merge upper and lower levels in all of these homes.
“The opposite of the old hidden-away-behind-the-basement-door mentality,” says architect Turley.
Turley encourages clients to dream beyond mundane uses for basements.
“What’s really life enhancing that you don’t have yet in your house? The basement can get you there,” he says. “It’s like the icing on the cake.”
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80%
In the Northeast and Midwest, about 80% of new homes have full or partial basements.
20%
In the South and West, less than 20% of new homes have full or partial basements.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau
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Top 5 basement features
1. Family entertainment areas
2. Bathrooms
3. Bars/kitchenettes
4. Bedrooms/guest rooms/play rooms
5. Steam rooms or full spas
Source: Synergy Builders Inc., West Chicago; Turley Architects, Evanston
