Raising ceiling height

Bargie

Hi,

We are currently trying to sell our house - been 7 months, we've had loads of viewings, 2 offers (which both fell through) and are getting fed up. The feedback is our very low ceiling in the dining room and kitchen so we are looking at whether it is possible or cost effective to do this. If I outline the room it would be great if people think it is something that can be done so I can then get quotes from a builder (don't want to get one out if there's no chance or crazy $ to sort).

Basically it's a 3 storey house. About 150 years old and made of stone. The lower floor has the kitchen and dining room in. It is essentially a basement with one wall underground but the back wall is level with the garden and has windows and a door (it's built into a hill). Hope that makes sense? Currently the ceiling is only 6ft2". So we'd like to some height, ideally up to 7ft but even a couple of inches might help.

Is it feasible to dig out the floor and is that going to cost a lot of money?

Or I have heard it might be possible to change the joists in the lounge floor(so ceiling of kitchen/dining room) to shallower ones which would give us another 5 inches or so. But we recently spent over £1000 on real wood flooring in the lounge so don't really want to have to rip it up.

Any ideas on whether raising the ceiling is a possibility? Or do we have to keep hoping some smaller people will come and view it?!

Thanks if you can help/advise

System

you could only dig down if you had suitable foundations/ground conditions to do so, which would beg the question, why wasn't it done during the first construction?
the next problem would be the expense, i'd say you were talking some serious money as you would effectively have to dig out and remove everything by hand, which is either costing you a lot of time, or lots of money to pay someone else - then you would have to look at what plumbing you have in the kitchen, is it all running to a public sewer and would lowering it mean you have to pump waste upwards...

does the kitchen have a full plaster ceiling in it? one option would be to remove the plaster and expose the floor joists above which might give the illusion of more space...

bryanb

AndrewBs wrote: »

Are ceiling heights important? Most people would agree that they are very important, for a variety of reasons.
Generally, most marketing campaigns for houses for sale will highlight tall ceilings and for good reason: quite simply, the rooms are more spacious and feel better. Tall ceiling heights are nearly always found in old period or high-quality contempary homes. :T

That was a useful post.

Bargie

Thanks it is plastered so that might be one solution to look at - thank you.

We think it was originally some kind of scullery or something down there and I guess people weren't as tall then as they are now, but agree I would be wary of digging too deep and I guess we would then have a step up into the garden/patio too so probably a no no.