Basement Dig Out - Anyone done it?

[awisnia]

Guiding a friend in his home build options - I've always been a fan of basements over garages.

He needs about 18 - 24 more inches of height to do a basement sim.

I've suggested cutting the slab and dropping the floor in the needed area.

Pretty easy digging in the area - or so says the guy who built the house.

Anyone ever done this?

How was your experience??

Photos?

TIA

[Dax]

There have been a couple of people on this site that have done it. Search for the topic and you should be able to find them.

[awisnia]

Tried first - couldn't seem to get anything searching "Basement dig" etc

[JackedUpSwing]

Several people on this forum have done this. If no-one replies, just search through this forum a bit.

[soupy]

check this out. probably cost them big bucks but this is extreme

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0DFLlaGNsk

[awisnia]

damn that's nice!

[soupy]

that would be my dream basement. I no longer have one though as NC does not typically use them and no longer in Massachusetts

[TheJones]

The digging maybe easy, but bucketing out all that dirt will not be :-)

Good luck!!

[bubbtubbs]

From my understanding, you can't just dig and pour. Everything has to be underpinned and reinforced to prevent the soil settling and affecting the foundation footings, and that's not even taking into account redoing the drainage tiles to the sump pit if they're affected.

In Canada it's about $80/sqft

[John6577]

Sounds like a complete nightmare to do. Better off (likely cheaper as well) building a separate building with high ceilings and use as a multipurpose building. Not sure where you live and how much land you have but those steel butler style buildings are not too expensive to construct.