> Much of the US South doesn’t have basements. Maryland is an outlier for climate (colder winters) and demographic (wealthier) reasons.
The Midwest, Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and most of the West have as cold or colder winters than Maryland. Indeed, it's largely only the Pacific coast and South/Southwest that don't have colder winters. Hard to call Maryland an outlier when like half the country lives in places that get that cold or colder!
Maryland and Kansas overlap in terms of temperature overall. Wichita Kansas is on average 5 degrees warmer in January than Frendsville MD, High 40f vs 36f vs low 25 vs 20. Kansas City in the northern bit of Kansas and only goes down to 39° / 21°.
So there’s not that much of the US that’s actually colder than MD.
The Midwest, Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and most of the West have as cold or colder winters than Maryland. Indeed, it's largely only the Pacific coast and South/Southwest that don't have colder winters. Hard to call Maryland an outlier when like half the country lives in places that get that cold or colder!