The first time we walked into this basement we were wowed by the high ceilings but that was it. The cork, mirrors and fuzzy wall paper had to go! Along with all the poorly constructed walls, ceiling and floors.
The entire basement was totally gutted, redesigned and rebuilt. We got permits for all the work we did and it was a great learning experience, the inspectors were very helpful. We relocated the bathroom from under the electrical panel and put the new furnace, water heater and softener all together into one utility closet. We moved the laundry room from the back of the basement to right by the stairs and outfitted it with a set of kitchen cupboard for extra storage. There was a crappy bedroom in the basement but we moved it the back of the basement and doubled the size of the window. It brings in so much more light.
The finished product almost doubled the finished living space in the house. It feels huge!