Tell us what's happened to you recently (that's interesting)

Sounds nice! I especially like the finished basement. Basements are pretty rare here but so is any house under 250k… heck these days they seem to be pushing 300k easy.

Holy crap, I envy how much house you can get for your dollar, wherever you may be.

This is easily 800+ more square feet than almost any other house in this price range so far (mostly due to the finished basement, I expect). Though there have been a couple decently priced 1600-ish ones, but one’s below market price due to being held by a community land trust, and the other sold real fast. I strongly suspect it’s failed to sell so far because it has no garage and the layout is a bit weird. And if you have a car here, you really want a garage. I don’t own a car, though, and have no desire to.

It still seems like a heck of a deal so I’m paranoid something terrible is going to turn up in the inspection.

Woo! They accepted my offer!

Awesome, congratulations!!

I thought basements weren’t considered in the square footage of a house? They are a rarity here but I have always loved the idea of having one.

A regular, unfinished basement that’s just a utility space is not counted. And while basically every house here has a basement, they mostly aren’t finished. The house I am buying has had the basement modified so that it counts as living space, including a legal bedroom with egress window and a 3/4 bath. I am not 100% clear on what makes a basement “finished” but flooring, subdivided rooms, and so on probably feature.

Well congrats on getting the house. Hopefully nothing happens between now and the paperwork being signed.

My knowledge of basements is watching the shows on HGTV. :)

Two things to worry about with finished basements (which may be not be applicable to you at all) -

Radon
Flooding (via seepage)

Bodies in shallow graves
Sealed up wells
Red rooms

That which whispers to you in the night.

Lotion in baskets

-xtien

Tribal burial grounds
Pits that lead to hell.
Altars to Molag Bal

(Regarding radon, isn’t it standard for a radon test to be performed nowadays? Or is that not a nationwide thing?)

The basement at my parent’s B&B featured a cell-like room with a heavy metal door that locked on the outside in the basement.

Non euclidean geometry
pried up floorboards
nether gates
local squatter with keys to the basement
and, worst of all, HOA’s

It would be an extra $150. I am leaning against it but I will have to double check what I am risking.

It was extra for me on my last house, in Portland, OR which has lots of radon problems.

I guess whether or not you want a radon test depends on the area in which you live. In northern VA, it’s pretty standard.

Though from googling, it seems like the generic recommendation is to get it done. It would completely suck if you didn’t pay the $150 to do it and later on found radon issues. If you find problems now, the seller will have to pay to have it remedied. If you wait, you’ll be on the hook for it. I say pay for it!

That is a useful way of looking at it that I had not considered.

We recently sold our house and one of the conditions on the sale was a radon test. Our basement tested well above the recommended limits, so they asked us to mitigate. To put in an active mitigation system that vents the radon using the existing sump system cost us $750. It took the radon levels done to almost nothing.