Cost of removing load bearing wall?

gazfocus

We are in the process of buying a house. The garage has been converted into living space, however, at present, you have to go through the living room, dining room and kitchen to get to the converted garage.

So... we want to do one of two things:

1. Remove the wall that runs along the stairs between the stairs and the downstairs 'bedroom' (converted garage). This will probably involve replacing the staircase as I'm guessing the wall supports the stairs as well. If we were to do this option, we may look at relocating the stairs and making the living room wider but that's another story.

2. Knock through the wall, leaving enough of the wall to support the stairs but opening up enough space to create the larger hallway.

I am assuming the wall is load bearing so will need to be replaced with an RSJ.

The wall is approx 4m long.

Can anyone give me some guidance to how much both options are likely to cost?

Rough layout from Estate Agents below.

Rodney_Trotter

Door under the stairs or from the entrance hall?

I can't see what your idea will achieve other than a lot of work.

StuC75

What about just making a 'door opening' rather than actually removing the whole wall that you imply, that way just needs a lintel across.. - That way when come in the front door have option to turn left, upstairs or turn right?

How accessible is the side door, that way could access via the kitchen..

paddyrg

How about squaring off the bay window across the current entranceway and knocking a fresh door into the bedroom?

Try asking builders if they have any suggestions, they do a lot more conversions than me (as you can tell) so may have other ideas

gazfocus

Thanks all for your thoughts..

Rodney_Trotter wrote: »

Door under the stairs or from the entrance hall?

I can't see what your idea will achieve other than a lot of work.

We want to open up the hallway. I like a big hallway .

StuC75 wrote: »

What about just making a 'door opening' rather than actually removing the whole wall that you imply, that way just needs a lintel across.. - That way when come in the front door have option to turn left, upstairs or turn right?

How accessible is the side door, that way could access via the kitchen..

If we were to cut out a section of the wall, it would be sort of from the front door to the bottom of the stairs, so would we still get away with just a lintel across? That way, we wouldn't have to touch the stairs either.

The problem with the kitchen, is that is currently has a door on all 4 walls so we're trying to look at where we can block doors up because at the moment there's nowhere to put a decent stretch of worktop.

paddyrg wrote: »

How about squaring off the bay window across the current entranceway and knocking a fresh door into the bedroom?

Try asking builders if they have any suggestions, they do a lot more conversions than me (as you can tell) so may have other ideas

I'd not thought about this, but I don't want to alter the look of the house if I can help it. I actually like the bay window which was one of the reasons I like the house, however, I'm not saying it's not a possibility.

It's a good idea to ask builders but it's difficult doing this when we're not in the house yet

Rodney_Trotter

Open the hallway up into where?

I'd speak to the estate agents in your area. Opening the front door into a reception room will devalue a property would it not?

gazfocus

Rodney_Trotter wrote: »

Open the hallway up into where?

I'd speak to the estate agents in your area. Opening the front door into a reception room will devalue a property would it not?

I'm not talking about opening the front door into a reception room.

The plan is to make the hallway wider to give access to the downstairs toilet, kitchen, etc, then build a stud wall with a door into the front of the converted garage ('bedroom') which will become a study/family room/etc.

With the downstairs toilet and the boiler cupboard being in the converted garage, makes the rest of that room (apart from the front) unusable as a 'room' anyway.

So...very roughly, something like this:

Rodney_Trotter

So you don't need to remove 4m of wall then. What's that bedroom going to be then about 8x6 feet, you'd be hard pushed to call it anymore than a study, it's certainly not a family room.

gazfocus

Rodney_Trotter wrote: »

So you don't need to remove 4m of wall then. What's that bedroom going to be then about 8x6 feet, you'd be hard pushed to call it anymore than a study, it's certainly not a family room.

As you will see, there is two options in my original post. Option one is to remove the entire wall and option two is to remove part of it up to the stairs!

The internal space of the room will be approx 10x8 feet. It will be used as a study and is about the average size of a study going by other properties we've viewed.

Rodney_Trotter

I don't see what removing the whole wall will give you.

gazfocus

Rodney_Trotter wrote: »

I don't see what removing the whole wall will give you.

Well that's why I'm asking on here

I wasn't sure if it would be better to have an open staircase with spindles rather than a solid wall.

Though, no-one has actually answered my question