Basement Renovation Project {Pt 01 before}

As I've mentioned in a few various posts these past few weeks, that I've been planning a major renovation of the basement in our house. This is where my room is, and has been for the past 5+ years, and along with my new job I've decided that I want to heavily upgrade and make my living area much better! I really like it down here cause its cool and dark year round {my PC running 24/7 provides a good amount of heat when needed}, there are sliding glass doors to our back yard which makes it perfect for my dogs and overall its quiet...I really like it down here!

As I work to renovate my living space, I'll be posting many images of my progress {yes I'm doing this entirely myself, more fun that way and its far too expensive to have someone professional do it anyway...} and to get this started, here are several before images.

Do keep in mind that its normally not this trashed and messy, but for the past few weeks I've been going through everything, moving it around, deciding what to keep and what to throw out {which has been tons and tons of stuff...mostly other family members things they don't want}

Anyway, here are the {before} images: {Oh and I'll try to take images at the same location & angles so its easier to follow the progress!}


The door to the furnace room will be moved to this wall, next to the steps!




The wooden wall/gate I built years ago when I first adopted Khalus, and was used at first to teach her rules. Now its always open and yeah it's going to be removed entirely!


Yeah, I need to move my other PC before that shelf gives way...LOL










The short piece of wall from the modem hangin on the wall to the roll of cable, is being moved back...more space woohoo!


There was a door there, but I just removed it and its being moved to a new wall!




Inside the furnace room, where I'll be moving a wall back 2.5ft!









I'm installing an entirely new floor too, which is going to be 60% carpet & 40& Laminate Wood Here is the wood I just bought the other day. {$0.69sf, a total of 230sf} I'll be going to get a roll of carpet padding today, and the 400sf of carpet tomorrow:

Well that should keep you busy for a while;)
That pc chair looks the most uncomfortable I've ever seen, but I guess it just must be that looks are deceptive? lol

Good luck with the Renovations.

Well, my thoughts of I'll just remove the door & frame to get started turned into several hours of gutting the wall and moving it back...LOL Keep in mind it may appear to not be straight, because its prolly not. I only just moved it back and I havn't yet measured it all out properly where it will sit or re-secure it.

I need to get some rest now as I have quite a bit to do today. Here are the images of my progress thus far. {Oh and now I understand why the wall was not run how I now have it ~ whomever built this wall wanted to hide the support pole. I kinda like it...}:

Gutted wall, before moving it!











Gutted wall, after moving it!














Already it feels like I have a lot more room down here!

Mai, that there bed is rather messy, sir.

yer it is, but its oh so warm and comfy, specially when ya have two 80lb labs sleeping right next to ya. And most days I wake up, and one of them has moved and are sleeping on their back next to me. {they do sleep in their beds, which are in my bed every night...lol}

And pretty much spent the better part of today working on the basement again. Once I get a project started I like to get in and get it done, though I'm extremely tired now as I've been at it for about 9hrs, but I'm done with the first part now.

Here are the finished photos, and while its not perfect, I think I did a pretty damn good job:






Well, not quite finished. Still have to repair/add too the hanging ceiling...







The new location of the furnace room door, I really like it being over here...and more hanging ceiling to repair!

i need to do some roofing. want to come help me?

also nice work, i see your a handyman when it comes to projects and tools

Thanks and yes, I'm quite the handyman. Instead of saying or thinking I can't do something, I'm more like yeah I can do that, even if I never have. Then I watch how-to videos on youtube, and look things up. And as I get a project started it all just starts to click and make sense how things are designed and how they should be build to make them function properly.

I'm definitely not a professional or do things as good as they could be, but I'd like to think for knowing next to nothing going into these projects, they turn out pretty dern good!


Roofing huh!? Well I was a roofer for a few months once, but after nearly falling off a few times I kinda gave up that line of work. Not scared to get up on a roof, but its some really hard work, and ya prolly live too far...hehe

It's looking good.

And another full day of building the infrastructure of a new wall, that will finally give me the privacy of my own room. This was an unbelievable amount of work, mainly because I couldn't build the wall on the floor as one would normally do, then stand it up. Too much in the way, plus the hanging ceiling.

After adding the main support beam to the ceiling, and then each support 2x4 I was able to lay that down and nail the base board into them, then stand it up with a bit of difficulty since they were loose with nothing holding them on top. I got it though and made sure every 2x4 was perfectly level, then drilled the holes in the concrete to drive in dual 3" nails to hold the base in place ~ trust me its not going anywhere!

Oh and the door opening is not the standard 28"-32" that you would normally find in homes. I decided to go with a 36" door!

Anyway, enjoy:







2x4s are loose after just getting it stood up!


There is another beam 3" from the top of this door opening I added later...












Tomorrow, if I'm not too sore after all this work the past 2 days, I'm going to get the sheathing for the walls and get that up. {instead of drywall for a wooden look} The prehung-door will unfortunately have to wait for now as that costs $69, but all good.

I'll be starting a new thread for the next update as there are quite a few images in this one making it take a bit to load.