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Nyororin (Offline)
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10-18-2010, 05:13 AM

It is my understanding that it has a lot to do with zoning laws and the limits of the amount of space allowed to be built on a property. We looked into building a house and I was wanting to build a basement - if only for the extra storage.

I don`t know how these limits work in other countries, but I`ll give my run down on it. In Japan, property has a set number for what you`re allowed to build. A pretty normal one is 60/200 for residential.
This means that you are allowed to cover 60% of the land with a building, and that the building can only have 200% the space of the land. So as a basic example... If the land is, say, 100 square meters - you must leave 40 of those open, and the building you put on it can only have 200 square meters of space.

The basement is counted in the total space of the building - but an attic/loft area is generally not. The difference is that the basement has to be a planned living area while the attic/loft/etc is an area that is almost necessary in most housing designs.

So if you had a basement under the foot of your entire house, either more than half the building would be underground (in the case of it being built on a normal 2 story footprint), or you would have a narrow 2+ story house that would need to be extremely small to make up for the lost space being used underground.

I wouldn`t want to have the size of my house cut to make a basement - and most people think the same way. Basements are usually limited to commercial structures that require very deep foundations to begin with, and that have a different zoning figure - 90/500+. When you do spot them in newer residential properties, it is usually a single underground room being used as a soundproof home theatre or for some loud hobby (houses built by families with a member into serious drumming/etc tend to like them).


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