In Ontario, all new homes built after 1975 had to have basement foundation wall insulation with an R12 rating just two feet down from the sill plate. This was designed to prevent condensation from forming on the top half of the foundation wall that was exposed above ground level. This code provision is a standard component of all Canadian and United States building codes today. For older homes built before 1975, there was typically no basement insulation. Recently, the …

Growing up in the west end of Toronto, our three-storey attached Victorian row house had beautiful stained glass windows, spacious rooms and a third floor bedroom large enough to house four children. The basement, however, housed the mountain of coal dumped through the basement window, quarterly, which fed our furnace – that was it! In the early 1950s, people just accepted the fact that basements were dark, dank, wet and only about 6 feet high. Today it’s a different …

As a homeowner, you are not legally permitted to perform your own renovation work, with the exception of the electrical, but it is strongly recommended amateurs not do this as disastrous results can occur.