We moved to Pittsburgh PA a few years ago from board flat Ohio where there are almost no houses with garages below the house. We didn't look at one house where the garage wasn't below a part of the house, that concerned me a bit but didn't have much of a choice. I have 4 fire extinguishers in my deep 2 car garage just for a piece of mind. As Sieg said a fire resistant ceiling is a great idea, it is actually a code around here for garages. I usually don't do anything in the garage without having the doors open for ventilation. My plan for priming my car when the time comes is to use a couple of big fans to push air out of the garage. I also got an electric heater instead of my kerosene one for the winter time. Hope this helps and happy house hunting.
