When I was growing up, our basement was multipurpose. It had a laundry room, an office, a play area for my brothers and I, and a mini water treatment plant for our well. As we grew up, the space changed—the office desk became an impromptu tornado shelter, the play area turned into a workout space, and everything else morphed into storage. Basically, it was (and still is) a space with no defined purpose. But that’s not what people are looking for in homes these days.