Yes to all of these reasons. Homes without basements sell for less around here (they are usually over crawl spaces or on a slab with full foundation for the 36" frost line requirement). Basements house the utilities so they don't take up space upstairs. Game rooms, home theaters, work out spaces, extra bedrooms with egress windows, etc. - all cheaper to heat/cool And if you are lucky like me you have a lot that supports the ultimate - walk out basement with a southern exposure - essentially double the living space.

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Here is a tornado map of Illinois 1950-2010, and a closeup of my county. Have headed to the basement about five times over the last 20 years, once this last Spring, no direct tornado but heavy winds. One year one just missed our power substation but still knocked out enough lines to be without power for three days. Basements are cheap insurance.

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This would be my order of precedence:
1. Full Basement with walkout (hillside)
2. 9 foot ceiling, (only new homes would have this), but 8 foot is good, at least 7'6"
3. Poured Walls 1st, CMU (blocks) second
4. Perimeter Drainage and sump pump (even if you never had flooding)
5. Crawl Space over slab, but want the Crawl Space to be at least 4 foot with a vapor/barrier, insulation.

Two foot crawl spaces just suck. My dad built a bedroom addition with a two-foot crawl space and a very narrow access panel. I had to install insulation against the floor when I was 11 because he couldn't fit in it.

@punkin, good on you for bringing up an interesting topic that has sparked a lot of discussion! Some other good points brought up here about sheds/outbuildings. I have a large garage that is in the process of getting even larger. It will house my workshop, overflow pins, and get the cars parked inside for maybe the first time since we moved in (it was a three car garage then, I added a fourth, and still it is chocked full of storage, tractor, lawnmower, golf cars, pins, etc.) Two more bays being added on with a second story. I can do this where I am because even though we have zoning, I am in a small town and I really only have to watch setbacks from the property line. Many large towns/cities/counties regulate sheds and outbuildings and doing what I am doing would not be possible.

I still love my basement though and BTW it has always been dry, my biggest complaint is the oldest part of it has a low ceiling. I would love to lower the floor but that is a lot of work for not much gain, so I won't be doing that. I also have a small section over crawl space that I wished I had dug out when we added on but didn't. Also a dream to dig out (that has been done before by a couple of pinsiders). A lot more work than adding onto the garage, so maybe when I am fully retired but also not likely.

I wish we were taxed only on the land like you - all improvements are taxed and this really has to be taken into account with any additions you make. My garage is separate from the house by about 10 feet and this makes it an outbuilding, so it is taxed lower than if it was part of the house. Still, I will get hit with additional tax when the garage is done. Ironically, I could dig out the crawl space and add 400 sq. ft. of living and that would not be taxed much more at all.

Finally, on Radon, it is a problem in the house because it can build up and overtime cause lung cancer if you breath it. Outside, it does not get trapped so it isn't an issue (like background radiation that is all around us). If you don't have a basement then you might still need a system to evacuate it as it can come through the slab. Modern construction usually includes a barrier under the basement/slab so it isn't a problem. You can also seal cracks in your existing floor that might be all you would need to do. I had to put a Radon system in a house I sold because it was just barely above the recommended threshold (4 picocuries/liter). It is a hole in the floor, some piping to the roof with a motor than "sucks" it out from under the slab. Wasn't that expensive but sucked to have to do it in the first place.

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It is true the US is at the top in terms of average house size, but Australia, New Zealand and Canada are right there with us, not as much difference as you might think. One difference is basement space is often not counted in square footages (When we moved from the city we "downsized" from about 3,000 sq. ft above ground living in the city [279 square meters] to 2,600 sq. ft above ground [241 square meters] by getting rid of a formal living room and formal dining room, but our 1,500 square feet finished basement with full bath, sunroom and game area [139 square meters] is not included in the square footage calc.

Also, none of the garage is counted. I will say that average house size in the states peaked around 2015 and has started to come down, a result of higher building costs, higher land values/smaller lots, and actually personal preferences of the younger generation who don't want to be house "poor" or get as wrapped up in "things".

Fair enough - it was the picture from this post - windows on three sides in the basement, this is often called a sunroom and the kind you posted is often called a sunroom or conservatory.

I find it funny how opinionated we are about basements and switches and everything else we have grown up with. I find it even more funny that a lot of what we do are based on codes including tax codes which themselves are often arbitrary. 7oxford mentioned every room requires windows, even garages (guessing second means of egress for fire, or natural light). Bedrooms in the states require closets to be called a bedroom, and bedroom count affects housing value, etc. etc. - based on codes that may or may not be totally needed or address something that use to be a problem but no longer is.

When I remodeled in 2002 I paid a lot of attention to outlet placement and usage. In the great room I have the duplex outlets wired separately- one is switched by three way switches at each entrance to the room for the lamps. The other one is powered all the time for anything you want to plug in. And now, I use a lot of smart switches with Alexa so I can turn on all the lamps by voice.

What you spend most of your life doing:

1. In Bed 41.8% of the time - Buy a great mattress, make your bedroom a haven for sleep;
2. Work 16% of the time (50 year career) - If you work sitting down, get a great office chair, on your feet, a great floor pad;
3. In front of a screen (TV Computer Phone) 14.6% of the time - Hi resolution screens, right height, high refresh rates;
4. In the bathroom 2.5% (more if you combine with number 3 above like my wife ); Get a bidet, your bottom will thank you!

That comprises about 1.4% on average - your actual amount might be more (or less - that's what she said )

Sockets with grounds (earths) received patents as early as 1928 in America, but widespread use did not become the norm until code changes in the 1960s. After then, most houses included grounded sockets. prior to the 1960s, armored BX wiring and metal boxes could provide a path to earth without the need of a third conductor. However, there was also construction with Non-metalic (NM) wiring that did not have a ground. It wasn't till the late 1960s than modern NM wiring with same size ground was required. There was also the period of time in the 1970s where aluminum wiring was used but that is not allowed anymore in residential wiring #fires

As an aside, the current median age of housing stock varies in the US - older in New England (the original colonies area) but newer elsewhere. The Median here in Illinois and in California is 40-50 years. In growing states like Texas and Florida, it is much lower (20-30). So even though most US homes have had grounded sockets for a long time, the legacy of the two prong outlets meant that even as new construction was requiring them, manufacturers still made two prong plugs until mandated in 1969 to use three prong plugs for appliances. Worse, for years we used these "cheater plugs" in which you were suppose to use the tab to screw into the grounded metal box (but remember, not all boxes were grounded at the time), and nobody actually screwed them in anyway!

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A childhood right of passage, dared to lick a 9 volt.

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The squat toilet is pretty common in a large part of the world including the middle east/Asia. When I was in Afghanistan, most bases had porta potties for both western style and the squat toilet style - as it turned out Afghani contractors were breaking western style by squatting on the seat.

By the way, it is actually easier to do your business squat style as it straightens out the bowels. Standing, and to a lessor extent sitting, doesn't. The problem is we haven't had a lifetime practicing the balance needed

https://www.amazon.com/Squatty-Potty-Adjustable-2-0-White/dp/B06Y2JMP7B/ref=sr_1_2_sspa

$32 for the deluxe

https://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Close-Deodorization-Self-Cleaning-Adjustable-Nightlight/dp/B07DB6ZXKJ/ref=sr_1_24

$460 for biscuit (more for white!)

$500 to pooping heaven