It is my opinion that you shouldn’t buy a house with a basement. 
More seriously, I love mine. I don’t lose any first floor space to laundry, pipes (they’ll freeze in a crawlspace), or furnace (which I also cannot hear). Also the expansion and contraction of the soil UNDER my house by frost, which really is a thing here for a few months of the year, is mooted. Frost heaves are real. Frost really does bring large rocks to the surface, and if that rock is under one of your footings, or come up under the wall of your house, your house will lose. Big time.
When I moved to NorCal I was sort of confused… nobody had one. But they didn’t need them, in fact they’re a bad idea in places that flood or have high groundwater tables. A good idea in other places.
