The Pros and Cons of Adding a Bathroom to Your Basement

When you first moved into your house, chances are, if there’s one thing that you wished it had more of, it was bathrooms. Yet, once you discovered there was a basement and you talked the possibilities over with your real estate agent, you probably thought to yourself “No problem. I’ll simply have one built—later.”

But before you hire a contract to make that kind of addition to your home, we wanted to make sure that you thought the process all the way through. That’s why we wanted to take out a moment to offer you some of the pros and cons that come with adding a bathroom to your basement below. That way, should you choose to do it, you won’t have any regrets once it’s done.

Pro: It will add value to your house. If there’s a definite “plus” that comes with adding a bathroom to your basement, it’s the fact that having more than one bathroom in a place can add to its property value. This is good to know should you decide to put your home on the market at some point.

Con: It tends to be a pretty costly effort. Being that you’ll need to install water pipes into your basement, you should be prepared for a basement bathroom to be a somewhat pricey home renovation; especially due to the fact that basements are made out of cement and so jackhammering will be required in order to put in the necessary plumbing.

Pro: It is convenient to have. All of us have had moments when we’ve been in a rush to get somewhere but we’ve had to wait for someone else to get out of the bathroom. Well, by having another one in the basement, that means that it’s more convenient for everyone. Plus, should you decide to convert the basement into a guest room or a place for your in-laws to stay, they won’t have to worry about running up and down the stairs. They can maintain their own privacy right in the same space.

Con: It will probably require some other additions. Typically, basements are used to store items or it’s the place where we go to wash and dry our clothes. In other words, being that we don’t tend to spend a lot of time down there, we usually don’t think to equip it with the kind of things that it needs if we were going to actually hang out in that space. But, if you’re going to add a bathroom, there’s a pretty good chance that you also need to add some heat. Plus, you might want to consider having an energy auditor come over so that you can ask for a home performance evaluation. This will help you to see if there are any cracks in the walls or if there are any other ways that you might be losing energy. When it comes to this particular “con” the bottom line is this: Be ready for the fact that you probably won’t be spending money just on the bathroom alone. Therefore, make sure that as you’re making your budget, you’re taking heat, flooring and decor into consideration as well. And if you can’t afford to do all of these things to upgrade the basement, you might want to wait a little while before you add a bathroom to it.