Dgflorida wrote: ↑Tue Jan 22, 2019 8:51 am
Basements are interesting value added features unavailable along the coast for the most part, Jackielou. The way house size is treated may vary depending on real estate markets and taxing authorities. This house includes an enclosed garage which therefore makes it 1300 ft. Attics are also not really useful in most houses here because they get so hot. I believe you can store stuff in attics in the north extending the house area indirectly. Is that considered or is my assumption incorrect?
In NC, TN, and OK, only available 'living' space is counted as square footage. Like the place we're in now? One floor at a little over 2000 sq ft, the 3-car garage is unheated and while the 'footprint' of the house is considered for tax purposes (of course,
) only the heated/ac'd living area is listed as the official square footage for real estate purposes. I have friends on the coasts, their 1st and 2nd floor liveable footage is their official footage - their basements, even those that are finished & look so good they could be rented out as apartments, aren't counted in "square feet" for the house - they're just listed as bonus space; neither is the attic room one built complete with dormer window, heat/air, closet, etc. Here, by law, that's officially a bedroom and gets added on to official sq ft.
Semi related ~ He built that room without permits and without the city/county/state's knowledge. He'll never move, so it'll be his kid's legal tangle later on.
I understand the garage thing, after all who wants to live out there? But those basements (we don't have those, 95% of OK houses are on concrete slabs), those, to me, are square footage. Once it heated/cooled and looks like your living room, it's "house" as far as I can tell
.