finishing basement walls

Where to Start when Finishing Basement Walls

Some people are fortunate to buy a home with a finished basement, but many of us are faced with finishing our basements if we want to use them as additional living space. Contractors leave basements unfinished for a reason: finishing a basement adds a lot of expense to the cost of building the home. You'll find that out when you go to try and do it yourself. To start out, you need to take a look at your basement walls. What kind of condition are they in? Are they still the same old poured concrete or cement blocks of your foundation, or have some attempts been made at finishing basement walls? Are the walls in need of repair? What exactly is it going to take to finish your basement walls?

The first thing you need to do is make sure that your walls don't have any water seeping through them. Although waterproofing is an added expense, it's well worth taking care of prior to finishing basement walls. Otherwise the water problem could end up damaging your newly-finished walls, rotting wood and dry wall, and causing you to take down what you so painstakingly put up to take care of the problem at a later date. Basement waterproofing can be accomplished a number of ways. The best method is by adding a waterproof barrier from the outside of your home which will stop the problem at its source. However, this is also the most expensive way to keep water from coming into your basement. Most people paint their inside walls with a waterproofing paint, such as Drylok, which is effective although it still allows water to seep into your foundation from the outside.

Next you need to decide how you want the walls finished. A lot of that will depend on how the space is going to be used. If you're planning a laundry room, it will probably just suffice to put a coat of paint over the walls to brighten up the area. If you want to turn a room into more formal living space, however, you will most likely want to either panel the walls or put up sheet rock and drywall them. For exterior walls, it's a good idea to add insulation prior to finishing basement walls to keep these new living spaces more comfortable during the winter months.