Splitting a large bathroom to make third bedroom

Ekim · 17 Sep 2020 at 16:33

I currently live in a two bedroom victorian terrace and have been here for around four years. We love the house, but are getting to the point where we really need a third bedroom.

We had thought originally we might convert the loft to get a third bedroom, but the costs involved are putting us off as I think we'd probably be looking to move out in the next five years even if we converted the loft. The loft would probably cost around £36k to do and I think would gain us around £20k in value on the property.

At the moment at the back of the house we have a large family bathroom (2.5m x 3.4m). A number of other properties in the area use this space to make a (very) small bedroom/cot room and small bathroom. I've had a very ballpark quote of £8k - £10k to do the work.

I have a floor plan of the house here with a rough suggested new floorplan for the bathroom and sample images:

I think we'd be able to fit a small bath (1500x700) in the new bathroom. Just wanted to get some thoughts and opinions. The other option is splitting the other bedroom in half, but we aren't keen on a bathroom we couldn't put a window in to.

Semple · 17 Sep 2020 at 17:09

That would make an extremely cramped bathroom, and result in a very small bedroom.

Whenever anyone asks about these things, i always flip the question on its head and say if you were buying this house (as a 3-bed) would the size of the bathroom and 3rd room put you off. Would it seem value for money.

If you're already contemplating moving in 5 years, is it worth putting that 10-15k towards a bigger house and jumping ship earlier than 5 years?

ash_scotland88 · 17 Sep 2020 at 17:38

doesn't like large enough to be comfortably habitable or within building regs

happy_2008 · 17 Sep 2020 at 23:11

Does that mean you would have to walk through the bedroom to get to the bathroom?

eviled · 17 Sep 2020 at 23:53

Terrible idea

HangTime · 18 Sep 2020 at 01:01

Semple said:
if you were buying this house (as a 3-bed) would the size of the bathroom and 3rd room put you off. Would it seem value for money.

This is the issue, you are already talking about moving out and could be putting off buyers by doing this. I know the eyes will be lighting up with £££££££££ at the prospect of selling a 3-bed house instead of a 2-bed house, but the reality is you will be inviting different sorts of buyers. People wanting a 3 bed house may think yours when converted is poor by comparison to others with better sized rooms (e.g. a similar house with a loft conversion). Whereas people wanting a 2-bed house might think it's a decent house in its current state. Adding a tiny bedroom and making your bathroom tiny in the process might be good for your lifestyle but it could be counter-productive when it comes to selling the place.

tom_nieto · 18 Sep 2020 at 01:46

eviled said:
Terrible idea

Yup.

I don’t think you’ve got enough room to do it without it looking like a dodgy student let.

A loft conversion is a lot of work, but you might trade the pain of going through it for a larger asking price on your property and a quicker sale.

Rroff · 18 Sep 2020 at 01:54

Obviously practical realities are another matter but it sounds like you'd be better off putting the money and hassle towards bringing forward moving to a more suitable property.

alexakasloth · 18 Sep 2020 at 07:57

We considered it here because several houses on rightmove in the local area show the outrigger bathroom being split into a bathroom (usually shower room) and small bedroom.Our next door neighbours have it as a bedroom for their 1 year old currently with a cot and it works well enough.
I've drawn 3 variations of the layout (3080 x 2620mm) but it's not practical with a bath, the closest way I found would result in a bedroom that would fit a single bed with ~700mm down the side.
Instead we're going to put a stud wall in with a smaller bathroom behind it (but big enough to be functional with a 1500mm rolltop) and have the space in between for storage or a desk area.

Ekim · 18 Sep 2020 at 09:03

Thanks for the replies. Definitely got me thinking. Other houses in the area have done it, which got us to thinking about doing it. You can see an example of it done here:

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-72848205.html

I might explore the option of doing a more simple loft conversion (no dormer) and see how much that is as an alternative.

happy_2008 · 18 Sep 2020 at 09:29

Would your bathroom have a window fitted as well? I personally would steer clear from this option

Ekim · 18 Sep 2020 at 09:31

happy_2008 said:
Would your bathroom have a window fitted as well? I personally would steer clear from this option

Yeah, would have a window fitted for sure, that is the reason we are considering putting if there vs splitting the middle bedroom and having a windowless bedroom.

ash_scotland88 · 18 Sep 2020 at 11:43

Ekim said:
Thanks for the replies. Definitely got me thinking. Other houses in the area have done it, which got us to thinking about doing it. You can see an example of it done here:

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-72848205.html

I might explore the option of doing a more simple loft conversion (no dormer) and see how much that is as an alternative.

It looks like the doors/drawers would bang into the end of the bed. As a buyer I wouldn't want that as a third bedroom.

If it gives an idea here is what Scotland wants as space for a bedroom, this is for new builds or extensions, possibly even for reconfiguarements of rooms inside. I think estate agents have a minimum legal room size to classify a bedroom too.

cheesyboy · 18 Sep 2020 at 11:55

I don't think it's a terrible idea, tbh, having looked at that other house. If it gives you better usage, and can be done for a reasonable cost, then have at it.

As for potential buyers, it depends how small the room is. The minimum for a bedroom is, IIRC, 50 square feet.

A lot of people might see it as more of an office/study space, others would see it as a potential baby room, before they upsize.

A very small extra room, with a compact bathroom, would have been preferable to me when we were buying our first house (a victorian terrace - ours had the attic conversion, but no other extension)

Semple · 18 Sep 2020 at 12:17

cheesyboy said:
I don't think it's a terrible idea, tbh, having looked at that other house. If it gives you better usage, and can be done for a reasonable cost, then have at it.

As for potential buyers, it depends how small the room is. The minimum for a bedroom is, IIRC, 50 square feet.

A lot of people might see it as more of an office/study space, others would see it as a potential baby room, before they upsize.

A very small extra room, with a compact bathroom, would have been preferable to me when we were buying our first house (a victorian terrace - ours had the attic conversion, but no other extension)

I think this is kind of the point i was making with my earlier reply. If you were buying the house, it would need to be significantly cheaper than a 3-bed house where the 3rd bedroom is of a reasonable size. This is almost a 2.5 bedroom house. Which is fine if a prospective buyer was intending to use the 3rd room as a home office, you don't really need much more than being able to put a desk in there.

The size of the room might be ok for a very young child, but i would have expected as they get older, their clothes start getting bigger and taking up more room. Plus storage of toys etc, all of a sudden the small room becomes very small.

My point being that you're limiting your target audience by quite some margin.

Edit: Also regarding your point about the minimum for a bedroom is 50 sq feet (4.645 sqm), looking at the other house linked the 3rd room is only 4.454sqm (just under 48 sq feet).

the_r_sole · 18 Sep 2020 at 12:45

can you get anything like a useful room in there? It's never going to be a bedroom as in, you're not going to get a full sized bed in with space to do anything else, so you'll end up with an awful bathroom and a useless bedroom - not an option I'd consider tbh

pingwing · 18 Sep 2020 at 14:03

Live in the same style of house in Bedford, plenty of people have done alternative solutions to your original plan as that'll be a bit too tight to be worth the effort.

Have you considered either splitting the master bedroom (assuming you have two windows a the front) so the side nearest to the stair case accommodates a bathroom and you retain 3 more or less equal sized double rooms? Or taking out the wall between master and second bedroom and reducing both by half a metre to make a bathroom between the two (with a light tunnel thing from the room)?

Up here the £36K to do the loft would add more than £36K to the house value now (let alone looking ahead 5 years) and to be honest if you can get that one done then you end up with a very liveable space

happy_2008 · 18 Sep 2020 at 14:25

I would probably save the 10k and move to another property at a later date.

eviled · 18 Sep 2020 at 21:09

36k for a loft conversion?!? Mine wasn't even half that and include an entire reroof and a gain of 64 sqm - 2 bedrooms, a mezzanine and a full bathroom

Zefan · 18 Sep 2020 at 21:48

eviled said:
36k for a loft conversion?!? Mine wasn't even half that and include an entire reroof and a gain of 64 sqm - 2 bedrooms, a mezzanine and a full bathroom

Yes, that quite does seem like silly money to me for the size you're talking about OP.

The bathroom idea is completely non-workable in my opinion, the only thing aside from a loft conversion (which you should do, you have the stairwell already carved out), would be to split bedroom 1 right down the middle, keeping the existing door to it and shrinking bedroom 2 to allow a door in to the new bedroom 3.