Why a bedroom down there needs its own way out
Lots of Des Moines basements get finished into family rooms and bedrooms. A family room down there is one thing. A room where someone sleeps is another, because a fire at night can cut off the stairs. A bedroom needs a second way out that a person can use on their own, and in a basement that means a window big enough to climb through, with a well outside big enough to climb out of.
It matters when you sell, too. A basement room without one often cannot be counted as a bedroom, however nice the room is.
Why the old basement windows will not work
Most older Des Moines basements have small windows set high in the wall, right up under the floor joists. They were put there to let in some light and air, and they do that. But they are too small to climb through and too high to reach easily, and most of them sit in shallow wells or none at all.
Mid century houses often have the same kind of short windows in block walls. Even newer houses with bigger basement windows may not have one that opens wide enough, or a well you could climb out of. So almost every basement bedroom project starts with a new, bigger opening.
What the job involves
In general terms, an egress window goes in like this. The details change with the wall, the house and what the city requires.
- Pick the spot. That depends on the room layout inside and what is outside, like a driveway, a deck, steps, the air conditioner or the gas meter.
- Get buried lines marked. Call 811 before any digging so gas, power and other utility lines are found.
- Dig outside along the foundation, deep enough for the new well and the bottom of the opening.
- Cut the bigger opening in the foundation wall and finish the edges of the cut.
- Set the window and seal it into the wall so water stays out.
- Put in the well outside, with a way to climb out and a way for water to drain at the bottom.
- Fill and grade the ground around the well so water runs away from it.
Cutting into the foundation wall
This is the part that changes most from house to house. A poured concrete wall gets cut with a saw made for concrete, and it makes a lot of dust and noise. A block wall has hollow cores that need to be filled and closed off at the edges of the new opening. An old stone or brick wall is a job of its own, since those walls are rough stone or soft brick held with lime mortar, and cutting into them takes care.
A wider opening also takes away part of the wall that was carrying the house above it. Some openings need support across the top so the wall above stays put. Ask the city what it wants to see, and know that some walls need a structural engineer to look first.
If you are finishing the basement, put the egress window in before the framing and drywall. Cutting concrete in a finished room means dust everywhere and walls torn back open.
Questions to ask the City of Des Moines
The city sets the size of the opening, the height of the sill off the floor, the size of the well, and when a well needs a ladder or steps. Those rules are the city's to answer, and they can change, so ask before anything gets cut. If your house is outside the Des Moines city limits, ask your own city the same things.
Bring these up when you call or stop in.
- If a permit is needed for a new egress window, and who pulls it
- How big the opening needs to be, and how high the sill can sit off the floor
- What the well needs to be, and when it needs a ladder or steps
- If a cover can go over the well, and how it has to open
- If finishing the basement needs its own permit
- Which inspections there are, and at what point in the job
- Anything else the room needs to count as a bedroom, like smoke alarms
The well outside the window
The well is the part people forget about until it fills with water. It is a hole dug next to your house, right in the clay, with a big window at the bottom. Built wrong, it collects rain and snowmelt and sends it straight at the new window.
A good well sits a little above the ground around it, so surface water runs off instead of in. The bottom has a way for water to drain away instead of pooling against the glass. The ground around it slopes away from the house. And no downspout should empty anywhere near it.
Des Moines winters fill wells with snow, too. A cover keeps snow, leaves and rain out, but on an egress well it has to open easily from below so it never blocks the way out. Ask the city what kind of cover is allowed.
Keeping water out of the new opening
An egress window puts a big hole in a wall that used to be solid, low down where the wet clay sits. The seal between the window and the cut wall matters, and so does where the well meets the foundation. Gaps there show up in the first heavy spring rain.
If your basement already takes water, deal with that before you finish it. A new bedroom with carpet and drywall is the worst place to find out where your water comes in. Joe Gomez of JC Cement looks at where water is getting in and what the wall is made of, and tells you what he would do before anything gets dug or cut.
Where JC Cement comes in
JC Cement puts in egress windows in Des Moines, from the bigger opening in the wall to the well outside. The egress windows page has more on how Joe handles that job, and the window wells page covers the well side of it.
To get started, call or text Joe at (515) 777-5018. Send a photo of the wall inside where you want the window, a photo of the outside of the house on that side, and what part of Des Moines you are in.