>Growing up in Wisconsin everyone had basements and they were used all the time (Wisconsin has tornadoes just like NC). Here in North Carolina, because of the water level, most basements flood during heavy rains anyway but pretty much all of them will flood during a hurricane!

We have no hurricanes back home, but I wanted to have a basement just in case (it was later a shelter for a few Roma families from the 'hood). Knowing the underground water level usually rises once the streets are paved in a newly built area, I've made it of watertight concrete, and it held fine. Then I installed the heating, with a big boiler in the basement, and according to technical rules, had to have a sufficiently big drainage space - which I made in a form of a hole below the door. And that's where the next water came from - the hole wasn't waterproof.