Approximate cost to build a basement?

[countryboy9799]

Anyone out there have any idea's on what it would cost to build an unfinished basement to put a house on? Sq. ft. would be in the 2000 ft. range.

[fishinchicks]

Depends somewhat if you are going with a poured wall or a block wall. We are using block right now. Our builder explained it to us this way - you have to have your foundation four blocks high, anyway, so the only added cost is the next seven block, and the additional dirt work. We are using a couple of guys out of Granite Falls to do our block work. We are doing a major remodel, and went with the block to match our old foundation. Not a dollar figure, but it may help you figure out.

[JohnMickish]

A guy I work with is building a new house with about a 2000 square foot footprint. For his basement (poured walls), large three stall garage (30X35) and apron, sidewalk and poured front steps his bill is going to be right at $22,000. That might sound like alot but it's only about 5% of the house cost which is pretty cheap.

[countryboy9799]

Is this price for a basement with 8' ceilings? Or would it be for a split level home? Thanks for the help

[bottomdweller]

Our basement which is a ranch style home roughly 1600sq ft and with poured walls ran 14000

That also included a foundation for the garage which was 24x30

That was three years ago

[countryboy9799]

That sounds affordable, I have been hearing 30k and more and thought that seemed very high for an unfinished basement.

[JohnMickish]

Right now is a great time to shop around. Sure, its' the busy time for concrete guys but the housing market is very slow, so if you shop around and find a slow shop they should be happy to do the work at a decent price. I think 30K is a bit steep but you didn't say if the ground is rocky, 10'walls, drain tile system??? All that stuff factors in.

[countryboy9799]

No rocks so it should be easy to dig. I would like to go 10' walls but I am not figuring on that for a price right now. I did get a couple of rough estimates for an 8' wall for about 20k. Thanks.

[fisherdog19]

You should be in that 20-25K range, just make sure you find someone with a good reputation. Have you thought about using the poly foam insulated concrete forms?

[countryboy9799]

Can you explain the purpose for those please. I am new to this and trying to learn.

[rattlereel]

ICF's are the foam forms that are used when you are done pouring your wall. You leave them on for insulating your basement.

I work for a concrete company in Fargo. We won't use them and the first reason is cost; we can pour a concrete wall and put 2 inches of foam on the exterior of the wall for less money than we would spend on ICF's. The second reason is you can't see what is under an ICF form after it is poured. Everyone makes mistakes if we have a window that dosen't get filled in we can fix it at that point. Also if we have a rock popout we can address that when we strip our forms off. The third reason is when you try to water proof your basement, the water proof is on the outside of the foam and is vunerable to damage when it is back filled.

ICF's are a great product when used in the right application but it's my opinion that basements are not the right situation for these.