Have I mentioned that we're looking into having our basement finished? We recently got a quote from The Remodeling Guys, who have remodeled three homes on our street (to varying degrees). The quote was higher than we want to pay, but is half of the first quote we got and seems pretty reasonable. Also, the owner needs two web sites done and so we've agreed to do a partial trade, which will save us a couple thousand dollars. Yesterday we had a plumber we've worked with before come look at the basement and talk to us about it. He quoted us to do just the bathroom down there. Unfortunately he's busy until May and I'm not sure that using him would save us money, but I think we're both more comfortable with him than we are with the unknown plumber that The Remodeling Guys will use. I need to follow up with TRG to find out more. The really exciting part of this, aside from having 50% more finished square feet in our house, is that Benjamin has tentatively agreed to get a pug puppy once the basement is finished and the yard is fenced. I am thrilled! My hope is that we can have it all done in time for my birthday on the 4th of July. Nothing like a new puppy as a birthday present. The next big step is to figure out the financing. We need to price home equity loans and lines of credit from various banks and for various amounts. It's scary to take on more debt but my credit card and car loan debt is almost completely paid off so our only debt is for the house and student loans.