When you are getting ready to upgrade your basement to make it an extra room to utilize in your house, make sure you take the time to figure out a game plan before diving right into it.
Here are a few suggestions and questions that you might want to think about before you start the upgrade to your basement:
Proper Use of Space
When you are upgrading or finishing your basement, think of what the room will actually be used for rather than what your knee-jerk reaction may be. Is it going to be a ‘man cave’? Is it going to be a play room for the kids? Is it going to be a room that you hardly will use? These are the questions you want to answer for yourself upfront. In fact, what may start out as a man cave could quickly turn into a play room, depending on where you are in the stage of your family life. So don’t do anything outrageous one way or another, unless you are sold on it being used for that one sole purpose. Design a layout and figure out what the best use of the space will be, and then start the project. If you begin the process before putting the time and effort into thinking about what the future holds for your basement, it may be a waste of your money if you have to end up re-doing it a second time in the near future.
 
What’s the Budget?
This is probably the biggest question throughout the entire process because you need to know what you are budgeting so that you can prepare the best way for your aspirations of upgrading the basement. Are you going to do a drywall ceiling or go the cheaper route of a drop ceiling? Are you going to utilize a floating floor or put the standard carpeting down? Are you going to install a large entertainment center with a TV hung from the wall with a surround system, or are TV stands and your old college furniture going to be the theme of the basement? Regardless of what you plan on doing with the upgrade, figure out realistically what you can spend and which areas you think you can spend more money on to spice it up more. You don’t have to get the best carpeting if you know that your kids are going to be running around, or if your pets are going to be sleeping and playing in that area. Then again if you are big movie buff, maybe you can spend the extra money on a larger TV so that the upgrade of the basement can be your escape area to watch the big game or the title bout. Get a budget, and make sure you stick to it.
Storage Space is Vital
Whether you plan to use the basement as an entertainment area or as just an extra room, storage space in it is vital no matter what the final decision may be. It is smart and essential that you utilize the extra space in the basement by adding a closet with shelving so that you can hide some of the extra kids toys or clothing that you don’t want lying around the house all year round. You don’t want to go overboard and start put shelving in every inch of the closet, and you don’t want to start putting shelving in the entertainment space as it will be begin to look sloppy and cluttered very quickly. If you find yourself having too much storage, rather than trying to make room and wasting the extra storage space, get rid of the items that you know you won’t need. Use the storage space for important things in your house, like holiday decorations or cherished family items.
Flow With the Rest of the House
When you are upgrading your house, make sure that you make it similar to the rest of your house. By this I mean that if you just built a brand new home, you don’t want to go cheap on the upgrade of the basement so that it sticks out like a sore thumb. Conversely, if your house it a starter home and it is 50 years old, you don’t want to make it elaborate so that it is so much better than the rest of the house. You won’t make a return investment if you sell yourself by going overboard on upgrading the basement. Make it fit with the rest of the house. Make it comfortable for people so that it looks like it belongs to the rest of the house. Don’t separate it by making it too good or too low-scale.