Adding a 2nd bathroom into a 4 bedroom house

Out,_Vile_Jelly

How long are you likely to live in this house? If it's your family home for the next 15-20 years then I would use the space however suits your circumstances and preferences best, not calculated against some mythical future profit.

phoebe1989seb

Hoploz wrote: »

Downstairs showers by the way, seem to be popular with dog owners, I discovered when looking at large country houses! They bring the dog in muddy and go straight in to the shower I'm told!

That was us at our last house Georgian country house of a fairly decent size (2500 sq ft) with ground floor shower room that we kitted out specifically for our dogs - although with somewhat better quality sanitaryware than they appreciated, lol!

We did have a ground floor bedroom (built as an annex by a PO, we used it as an additional living room) so it made sense to retain it although we had a further two bathrooms - well one was actually a shower room - on the first floor.

When we purchased the house, apart from the annex bathroom which at that point had a 1980s pampas suite......nice , it had a very tiny first floor bathroom serving five bedrooms spread across the two upper floors. We took the decision to turn one bedroom into a large bathroom and converted the original tiny bathroom into a shower room as we felt future buyers would expect more bathrooms in a property of that size/number of bedrooms. In addition there was space on the second floor to create a bathroom specifically serving the two bedrooms up there. Had we not sold when we did that would have been our next job!

Currently we have a situation similar to the OP - a four bed Victorian three-storey house with one (12' x 8') bathroom and a small downstairs toilet - but our issue is compounded by the fact that two bedrooms are on the second floor with no obvious space up there to fit in a shower room unless we shave a bit off a small double bedroom, ruining its original proportions. We considered again losing a bedroom but in this house it didn't seem to make sense.

When we sell next year buyers will expect two bathrooms, so a decision will have to be reached

Typhoon2000

Do you need two bathrooms or just a bigger one. If it's the latter you could turn one of the bedrooms into bathroom and bathroom into a single room.

Henry_rees

amateur_house wrote: »

We have this problem, a 4 bedroom house with a tiny 5.5ft square bathroom. It was a shower room when we bought it, but we managed to fit a bath in by rehanging the bathroom door to open outwards. I would like an additional bathroom, but given the layout of the house the only way would be to add an ensuite to one of the bedrooms.

I was planning to rehang the door as well did it make a big difference?

zagubov

We've a decent bathroom upstairs but when we looked at our house we looked into the toilet under the stairs we realised the it had a hidden shower, which stole an unusable corner of the kitchen so you wouldn't notice it (loads of kitchens have a corner you can't use properly).

amateur_house

Henry_rees wrote: »

I was planning to rehang the door as well did it make a big difference?

Yes because it meant the sink could go on the wall opposite the bath - so bath is on right hand wall and sink on the left. If the door opened inwards there wouldn't have been room for the sink.

Niv

caronoel wrote: »

No need for a second bath in a 4 bed. Why are you against a downstairs shower room? That would be a far more efficient use of space

What is the total internal area of your property? Can we see a floor plan?

@Caronoel quite simply because the OP wants to have a bath and does not fit in the current one.

TBagpuss

I think to some extent it is down to personal taste. Round here, a lot of older properties have downstairs bathrooms. I really hate them so when I was househunting it meant I would not even view. My expereincewas that even though they are quite common in this area, they did seem to be slightly cheaper than similar propetis where the bathroom was upstairs, which suggests to me that a lot of people don't like them.

I agree that looking at comparables in your area (e.g. 4 bed with ownstairs bathroom vs 3 bed with updatis bathroom) will gie you the best uidea of the current market conditions in your area,.

The other issue os of couse what you want in your hom. If you're planning to stay there for the medium to long term then work out what will best meet your and your family's needs and do that.

nkkingston

I think for me it would depend on the bath. If upstairs was swapped to a compact, modern bath and shower unit, downstairs you could have a fancy clawfoot tub in a dolled up wet room - make taking a bath in it as much as a use of your leisure time as curling up on the sofa to watch a film or eating a fancy dinner at the dining room table is. Divide up the space so the room is just a bathroom, too - add a wall so there's a downstairs loo in a separate room.

If you want to be more practical about it, though, I'd probably go with Hoploz's solution and try and recess a larger bath into the upstairs room to maximise your use of that space, and put a shower room and loo downstairs.

ST1991

Not sure if this has been brought up, but can you extend the bathroom to make it larger, instead of adding an extra one?

E.G make one of the bedrooms slightly smaller and the bathroom slightly bigger (depending on the floorplan/layout, of course).

This way you still have 4 bedrooms (or 3 and a box room?) and a good sized bathroom.