Does anyone know anything about removing a crawlspace?
Answers:
You may luck out and find that they put full foundations around the whole house, including the crawl space. That was the case at my house.
You can dig out the dirt yourself but it's very time consuming and then you have to figure out what you're going to do with all that dirt. And that's assuming your dirt isn't hard as concrete.
If you don't dig out the crawlspace, you should make sure it's insulated and has a watervapor barrier on the dirt. That will make your basement less humid and musty and will help with heating bills.
Other answers:
Possible, probably.. expensive, no doubt. You would not be able to recover the entire space anyhow. You would need to leave a foot or two adjacent to the exterior wall's footers. You would have to probably hand dig the crawl space putting columns in at appropriate places to hold up the house as you dug. I had to dig out a very small area to put a water heater and it was NO fun. I can't imagine doing 1/2 a house.!!
Possible, probably.. expensive, no doubt. You would not be able to recover the entire space anyhow. You would need to leave a foot or two adjacent to the exterior wall's footers. You would have to probably hand dig the crawl space putting columns in at appropriate places to hold up the house as you dug. I had to dig out a very small area to put a water heater and it was NO fun. I can't imagine doing 1/2 a house.!!