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Home Decorating

May I see pictures of your basement playroom/family room?

11 years ago

We are in the beginning stages of possibly moving.

We are recent empty-nesters, but the most likely buyers of our home would be a family with younger school aged children.

DD2, who has babysat for most of the families on the block, thinks that moms want a nice basement play area so that the main level stays neater. So we will be doing some minor fix-ups with this in mind. Our home is older, and has stone foundation walls with paneling. Current floor is bare concrete.

I would love to see pictures of your finished spaces (very casual is fine!), and what is the opinion of the group regarding painting the concrete and adding a nice large area rug, vs tile or carpeting on the basement floor? Our current idea is to have this not necessarily be a "finished" basement, but more of a "play space". Would also like to hear opinions on that. We would obviously like to keep costs low, but appeal to the largest pool of buyers.

Thanks in advance.

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Comments (7)

ohgoodness
11 years ago
Here's a picture of my old house with a nice playroom basement. My new house has a similar one too and was certainly a feature we wanted when we were house shopping but I had this picture handy. I would absolutely recommend carpet over anything else. I think most moms prefer their babies to crawl and play on carpet. We used an olefin Berber which seems to be very popular in my area. The walls of my basement were finished in Sheetrock, but if you already have paneling, I would recommend painting it a light color to brighten up. I think those two things would make a big impression.
localeater
11 years ago
I am sorry I do not have a picture to post, but I have to disagree about the carpet. To many young mothers carpet is synonymous with germs, dirt, mites, and bed bugs. I think the preference would be for something that looks clean and easy to clean, it can be warmed up with area rugs. Also if you want your kids to be able to ride big wheels and trikes in the house carpeting is no fun. Think floating wood, ceramic tile, luxury vinyl...
A play space needs to be warm, and bright, it should not damp at all.
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it's temporary for a few years (and I guess I'm trying to be open to the fact that we may not do further renovations as fast as we think we will) , so we want to be able to enjoy it. It used to be a garage years ago so the concrete is very cold. I don't see painting the concrete as a great solution. I think we would all avoid the room, rather than use it. I was wondering really if the novalis, which is $1 a foot, would not work since the floor is a little rough. I looked at it again last night and the concrete is in better shape than I had thought. thanks anyway. .
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Your title says playroom. Your pictures show a bar area? It does matter. Is this a playroom for children? I understand wanting it to look nice, but I personally would go for the least expensive option for a child's playroom with a plan to replace it in the future. Does your flooring store carry carpet remnants? In our previous home we found a very large, dark blue remnant that was used for the children's playroom. The cost was minimal and it didn't bother us too much when it had to be replaced a few years later. The room did have 3 windows as it was a walkout basement so the dark blue worked for us.
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Across the whole back wall I would build a deep shelf with an open bottom at table height. For now it will be good for parking ride on toys under and setting larger playsets like Little People, Barbie, and Hot Wheels. You can add a couple of baskets to catch miscellaneous small toys. I like to group them by people/animals, cars, etc. Later, it will serve as the perfect place to stand and build with Lego, and finally when they are Middle/High School age you can create a study area there. Under the window you can place a bookshelf, and use a sofa floating in the room facing the toy shelf to divide the play area from your work space.
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PAX can definitely be imposing and overwhelming—if you went this direction, you may want to consider the 14” depth instead of the 23” depth. That might be a more practical depth for toys and games anyway. Ease of operation of the doors might depend on whether the doors are sliding vs hinged, material and style, etc. I’m sure some are heavy and difficult, although mine (hinged) are not. I actually wish mine were harder for my 11 month old to open, but sadly he has this obsession with opening and shutting doors and won’t leave my Pax alone. Someday he’s going to pinch his fingers. At my last house (which also had Pax) we didn’t have much space for doors so we mounted thin curtain rods along the top of the units and hung simple linen curtains on rings. It worked and looked better than I had expected and would be easy for kids to operate.
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roarah
11 years ago
We did a very inexpensive play area in part of our basement. It has pergo "wood" floors and a drop ceiling and although very low end it has been a perfect solution for clutter in my small home and it is a hit with the kids:). I painted the unfinished stairs white and added an $80 runnuer. Whole project cost less than 1000 dolars:). Pardon the mess:)
patty_cakes
11 years ago
Here's a few worth pondering.....

Here is a link that might be useful: play areas
ellendi
11 years ago
Ours is carpeted with industrial carpeting. We have two sofas and a tv. The kids used it for sleep overs, Girl Scout meetings etc.
I think whatever you choose, it will look clean because it will be new. I think that the fact that this space is done and functional will be a big plus.
Good advise from your daughter!
noellabelle
11 years ago
mine is not nice enough to take pics of, but we have a carpet remnant over those foam puzzle kid floor pad thingies. It has a tv with bookcases to make one wall, toy boxes and random seating, and an easel. But the thing that makes my kids think it's the "best basement ever" is that we have an ikea teardrop swing and hand rings hanging from the joists....visiting kids love to play down there.

If we ever finish it, I would want to use vinyl hardwood looking floors,I think. I would also probably switch to a tank less water heater.
juliekcmo
Original Author
11 years ago
Thanks for all the pictures and advice.

My DH thinks that painting the floor is a good way to go, but I think it needs to be nicer. Sounds like most of you agree that the floor needs to be nice enough to feel comfortable with kids sitting on it to play.

I think since we might be not putting much furniture down there to show, that clean painted walls, new light fixtures and carpet would be the easiest to do and have the largest appeal.

Our ceiling is finished plaster, and has radiator pipes hanging on it, so it is not a new house with high ceilings and that type of setup. The ceiling and pipes are all sprayed off-white.

Thanks for the preliminary help. I am currently working on emptying it out (we're getting a dumpster in 2 weeks). I will post some pictures when I get it emptied out.

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