Hi Everybody, I've done alot of reading here and I've already decided on a course of action but thought I should post them here to get other's opinions (especially some of the resident gurus here).

In my previous house, the basement was completed using simple 1/2" dryall, no insulation, lots of pot lights, and laminate flooring. When I was down there, I swear that all sounds coming in were amplified. The duct sounded like kids were doing summersault inside. When walking up/down the 2nd floor stair, it sounded like they were jumping up and down or in a hurry. Couple of time, I ran upstair thinking my kid was falling down the stair. When people were talking on the main floor, you can actually hear their conversation. And I could not stand the clicking sounds when walking on the laminate flooring.

So for my new house, my goals is to reduce/muffle these noises (not completely block as that would probably be impossible unless I won the lottery). After doing some extensive reading, this is my plan:

1. Double the ceiling with 1/2" drywall and Green Glue
2. Build backer boxes for all recessed lights and fixture

In your opinion, do you think this would be sufficient to achieve a good result in noise reduction? I didn't want to add insulation to ceiling because basement is really warm in the winter and cool in the summer. I like the idea of heat actually going up to the rest of the house.

If you are going to this extent and having the house built, I would look at a few other things as well.

1. A nine foot ceiling. Makes it easier to put up an 8 foot ceiling and isolate all the duct work and pipes, etc. between floors instead of inside soffits.

2. R19 in the ceiling joists. It is RARE to get any insulation between floors from the builder.

3. Isolate the supporting wall of the stairs by building a second wall in front of the supporting wall that is NOT attatched to the stairs in any way.

4. Insulate and DD +GG under the stairs.

5. Double check the placement of the HVAC vents. They should go on the OUTSIDE walls. IF the main trunk is on the inside wall, have them run insulated flex duct over to the outside walls.

You'll get some raised eyebrows, but with exception of the nine foot foundation, none of this should add significantly to the cost of the house. And the nine foot pour should only be a relatively small incremental cost to that of the entire house.

Sorry, I did not mean building a new house. I meant I will be finishing up the basement in my new home.

OK, so it's probably too late to get a 9' pour. Is the basement unfinished? If so , you can probably do all of the other things.