On Nov 25, 6:06*pm, aemeijers wrote:
ransley wrote:
On Nov 25, 3:13 pm, (heimdm) wrote:
I live in a good size ranch house (40ft by 90ft). We bought the house on a
short sale so we got a really good price on it. However, despite all the
square footage there is no place to put a tv room or home theatre or a
game room. The crawlspace is about 3.5-4ft deep depending on the part you
are in. We are considering having it dug out. Right now we have block
walls, and I was thinking of when they dig it out have them replace the
blocks with pours walls. Is this possible?
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Anything is possible. but how do you compact it, and how are they
going to form and remove the outside form. I dug mine out and used
block, How deep is the wall foundation. Its no simple cheap job to do
it right. If you cant drive a bobcat down inside you get it hand dug.
You have to be extremely carefull keeping the house standing and level
as walls are removed, maybe leave the original support wall and build
a foundation and wall inside the present support, have fun figuring it
out.
1. If you have space on the lot, an addition of the back of the house,
above ground, will most likely be cheaper. Adding a basement after house
is built, is expensive space. (Gravity is annoying that way.) There are
a lot of dug-out basements around here, in 1930s-1950s houses. (Usually
a partial that had adjacent crawl dug out.) A stepped foundation is the
usual approach. To replace existing foundation a side at a time would
require jacks and cribbing to hold the house up while you work. Same
tech house movers use. You would essentially be moving the house to the
same spot, on a new foundation.
2. If you heart is set on the idea, get professional engineering site
survey, not Bubba the handyman. Lots of ways to screw up a project like
this. First step is to check water table in your neighborhood- you may
be on a crawl versus a basement for a reason.
3. Have you looked at redividing the existing 1st floor layout? 40x90 is
a pretty big house, and the only load-bearing interior walls are
probably the ones that run down the spine of the house, usually the
kitchen/living room divider and hallway walls. You can probably
fine-tune reality and move some of the others around pretty easily.
Staying within the existing footprint would be cheaper than a backyard
addition or a basement digout.
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aem sends...- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -
The water table is critical, and you cant know until spring or summer.
You dont want to be paying a fortune to pump, waterproof and
dehumidify, Thats the first thing I checked by digging way down below
where the floor would be. I was in charge and after what I experianced
keeping it level, I would not trust anyone to oversee the job, it was
twice a day measuring and adjusting jacks for me. If it goes out of
level, you have major new costs. Plus you must have a permit, or you
risk a non ocupancy citation of the building., It might cost as much
to move the house to a new foundation dug with power, as it is to hand
dig. Plus your house and heating system will be a filthy mess, even
covered. Its no small job.