Uh-oh, you know what this means...

...the basement reno is back on the radar! We had a change of plans earlier this year and renovated the living room instead of our basement but now its full steam ahead. The basement renovation will be the largest renovation we've done in our house... about 500 sq ft of space. The basement is ugly dated usable now with a full bathroom, laundry room and large playroom for Chloe down there but it is definitely not a space for spending any quality time.

We've worked through various layout options and finally decided on a plan. HandyMan has refined these ideas and whipped up the architectural drawings above. There's the demolition plan, the architectural plan, the engineering plan, the flooring plan, the electrical plan, and the walls/trims/finishes plan. Click on the pics above to see all the nitty gritty details. This is where having an architect hubby comes in really handy. I'm amazed by those DIYers who can just start ripping things apart and start rebuilding room by room, making plans along the way. But I couldn't do that though - we're planners to a fault.

Maybe we're getting old & tired, but we have no desire to do all the work ourselves on this one. So we'll get some bids and depending on the price, pull things out of the scope. The plan is to price out our ultimate wish list (like heated floors and a cable outlet in the laundry room!) but in the end are ready to trade off and do a lot ourselves, like all the painting, tilework, installing plumbing fixtures, building & installing cabinetry, and all the trimwork.

Hopefully, we can transform this...
into this before the snow falls. Wishful thinking, maybe??
Oh, and anyone have a great Toronto contractor they can recommend??