The picture of his basement looks more like a crawl space to me.
I don't know much about basements because they're unheard of around here. But they seem to have more than their fair share of problems.
They’re a great place to put your random stuff, they do tend to collect junk.
Great to have easy access to your water heater or furnace/boiler.
Main problem in my area is water. Most people have some degree of dampness in their basement. Kind of rare to have a completely dry basement. Most are like our house, during a big snow melt or sometimes in the spring there is some dampness along a wall or in a corner. When I say dampness I mean like a quart or two of water max. This stuff is easily dealt with, use a dehumidifier or just monitor it to make sure it doesn’t get out of hand.
Water is pretty random. Some people have almost no problem others have constant and they could be neighbors.
Most new builds pipe and leave a bucket for a sump pump just in case. My parents place left the bucket, stone and covered it with a fiberglass things then put a light layer of concrete over that with “Sump” outline where the concrete can be broken if needed.
Other than water it’s the usual stuff you probably deal with. Cracked foundation, most are fine but some are not, leaking windows see my emergency post, radon but this is super easy to remedy.
Easy access to ducts, easy access to wiring owning a house without a basement sounds really strange to me.
Other small cost is the foot print for the cellar stairs. Two floor homes tend to put that hall under the stairs going to the second floor. Single floor ranches like mine tend to have some dead space in the middle of the house.
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