Help me create "habitable" space

[Joe Black]

So I just bought my first house hack in the SF Bay Area. It's a single family house with an ADU. The main house has a finished basement that I am living in and so far so good as I'm paying approx $300/mo toward piti.

My issue: in the future, I may want to move out of this basement unit and rent it out (legally). I estimate that this would allow me to cash flow approx $1500/mo for this house (the basement unit is spacious and recently updated).

I haven't confirmed but I'm fairly certain that the basement isn't considered "habitable space" per city guildlines since it only has windows with proper egress in the kitchen area.

My question is, how should I go about having an evaluation done to determine what I would need to complete to have the space permitted for renting without drawing unwanted attention that could have city inspectors knocking out at my door doling out violations? Can a contractor be trusted to provide this evaluation?

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