I've built a basement under the lot I'm currently building, but when I try to put stairs leading upward, it tells me 'Can't be built in a foundation.' Problem is, there is no foundation -- I haven't even used the foundation tool at all on this lot. The terrain is completely flat, except for one small corner leading to a hill off the lot. I've even removed all objects, walls, and floors from the place where I want to put the stairs, to no avail. I can put elevators down there, but neither straight nor spiral stairs can be placed.

Steps taken in attempts to fix this:

-Deleted all objects, stairs, walls in the area, then restarted the game
-Tried with and without moveobject and constrainfloorelevation cheats
-Lot is meant to be shared at some point, so there is no custom content placed at all, other than a few pattern / color changes
-Saved a copy of the building to the library, placed it on a different lot, same problem

Followed the steps on the 'what to do first' page:
-Deleted cache, load game, didn't work
-Remove custom content, deleted cache, load game, didn't work

I didn't try renaming / removing the user content, as this is a problem with this specific lot -- I loaded an empty lot, built a square house and a basement, and was able to place stairs there just fine. It's this one specific lot that won't work. All building is being done in buy/build mode selected from neighborhood view; there are no active sims in this neighborhood at all. It's strictly for building this one lot as a project.

Where I want to put the stairs: The stairs are meant to go on the light wood, with the orange wood being the landing.
The size of the basement: It's actually meant to be smaller, but I wanted plenty of room to make sure there are no walls interfering, and will resize it once I get this to work.

I think that covers everything. I've tried both google and the forum search, but the only thing I found anywhere with this same problem had no replies. Any help offered will be very much appreciated, so thanks in advance!

ETA: Forgot to mention, I've tried placing the stairs all over the area covered by the building originally, but it stays red, and won't let me place them. But if I go outside the original building, it'll let me put them in the grass, so it's not the entire lot that's bugged, just the part I built on. >.<

ETA2: The original building area

Thread moved. You might get responses if it is in the correct subforum.

All those images are shots of the ground level, right? What about the basement area?
Is it a manually-created basement or a WA basement?

If there was ever a building with a foundation on it on the lot, you will not be able to build stairs to basement inside where the old foundation was EVER, even if you sledgehammer the entire lot. I've just been through this with an EA build lot - one of the ones with the BV buff so I can't simply bulldoze it from Edit Town (that's yet ANOTHER bug where bulldozing the lot permanently removes the BV buff, also placing a pre-built house on a BV lot will destroy BV). Anyway I deleted the whole thing from the top down (starting with roofs) and it soon became clear that there was CFE madness going on on this utterly flat lot, I have no idea what the heck they did when building that (hideous) house but the whole lot is a dead loss. Anyway, Even after entirely deleting every build object, all furniture and clutter, and every living plant and tree, you can't place stairs to a basement inside the area where the old foundation was. Further more it still acts like every level of the former house is there, AND I kept finding CFE artefacts scattered around. The only thing to be done with it is delete the entire lot and place a new lot, losing the BV buff of course in the process (and probably won't be able to utilize the entire area as it was an odd non-standard size lot to start with)

Anyway.

I'm also confused by the pics you posted - I swear they look like they're all underground, except I see windows and doors and I've never had any luck putting doors in basement walls (built via the basement tool), and windows only if I butt the basement up against a swimming pool. I once tried putting a door there (just to see if the sims would try to use it and what would happen then) but it wouldn't let me, LOL!

Even if those pics were taken at night they don't look right if any of them are at ground level ....

Was this a brand spankin' new lot or has there ever been anything built on the lot, including anything you bulldozed from Edit Town?

I would try the "constrainfloorelevation false" build a room around where you want your staircase and flatten the roof of that room with some floortiles, all with the cheat on. Another thing I would try, I'm not sure if you have tried it, turn the staircase 90 degrees. Some have also success with holding down shift as they place the stairs.

You have tried placing it inside the basement of course?

My apologies for the misplaced location, and thanks for moving it for me!

This is a brand new lot, placed via the 'edit neighborhood' view; there never was any other construction on it other than what I'm building now. The screenshots are all taken at ground level, looking at the 'dirt'; they're a bit darkish because this is in Bridgeport, and everything gets that twilight look for me in that town.

The basement was made with the WA tool -- that's the blue area in the second screenshot, showing the size of it. I tried placing the stairs both in the basement going up and on ground level going down. Neither would cooperate, with or without constrainfloorelevation.

I tried futzing around with it before I went to bed last night in attempts to make it work. Other things done so far:

-Flatten whole lot with the 'force lot to road level' button

-Deleting everything on the stories above the area I want the staircase to be

-Built a column of 1x1 square walls, turned off constrain elevation, leveled every floor individually to make sure they're the 'default' height

-Rotated and wiggled the stairs around; can't place any stairs anywhere inside the building's basement or in certain areas outside the walls, neither spiraled or any orientation of modular

I'm trying to follow a specific floorplan as a project for a friend's specifications, so I do need the stairs to go in that space. Even if it'd let me put them elsewhere in the basement and still have it be inside the building's walls, I'd still have the same problem.

----------

Aaaand dang it. Had all that up there typed out, then decided to try something else before posting.

Deleted or moved everything on the story above where the stairs should go, then built a foundation there, then deleted said foundation to show the game that, yes, I promise, there really is no foundation on this lot so please let me place the stairs.

It worked >.< Stairs are fine now. Thank you guys for your time, and sorry I didn't try this first. Considering I had never even put a foundation on this lot, I didn't think to see if there might be a 'ghost' foundation somewhere, or something. Sigh.