Disaster Bathroom…Help Needed!
OK, so it’s not that bad. It’s “Blah”. I could easily make it “Look” awesome enough. The problem is that the tub placement is upsetting my living room plan and I JUST CAN’T GET PASSED IT!
That tub…right…there!
It just needs to be 8″ closer to the toilet! There’s room. I realize that would just make this already small bathroom even smaller but what is that weird extra space on the right of the toilet doing for anyone? Really? (It does make a nice place for the new “Flip Top” trash can that Brody can’t get into! (But I’d just put a trash can under the sink if I need to.)
So I’m considering moving the tub over or getting rid of it altogether and just having this be a pretty powder room. The bedroom that this bath “services” will never, not once, be used for Showering as long as we live here.
My question is:
What would you want if you were to walk into my house, if it were on the market?
Would you want two small bedrooms, each with their own bathroom?
Or, would you be OK with an office and one small bedroom with it’s own bath and then another bedroom with a bathroom upstairs (in addition to the master “wing” with bedroom, closet and bathroom AND the guest bedroom and bathroom downstairs)? So, it would still be 4 and 1/2 bathrooms in the house. (I’d just make the half bath upstairs a full bath and the full bath HERE a powder room.)
So, that’s three questions. Help me decide because I’m at an impasse here. I HATE this bathroom and would love to get rid of the tub altogether but I don’t want to shoot myself in the foot when it comes time to sell.
What would you do with this baby?
EDIT: I had to scratch this floorplan out for all those asking for clarification. Sorry it’s so hard to read…I was in a hurry!
Nothing is to scale but you can see where everything is on the main floor. The basement has a GIANT Guest bedroom and bathroom so our guests would NEVER use this TINY spare bedroom. There is a 1600 sq/ft open room upstairs that currently has a half bath. I want to make that a full bath with walk in shower and put in bunk beds so that upstairs would technically be a “bedroom”.
The only way I can see anyone actually wanting to use both of these small rooms as bedrooms is if they had two small children and then they wouldn’t really care if they had to use the en suite bathroom in the one bedroom. Right? Anyone with teenage kids would probably have the teens upstairs in the “Groovy Teen Hangout” room (that isn’t groovy yet but all in due time…)
My vote is for the powder room. Every house should have one that guests can use. And with the bedroom being converted to an office a powder room just makes more sense. I would make the office a dedicated office/study space with some built in bookcases and maybe a nice window seat. We are looking at converting a one car garage into my hubby’s man cave with a storage room in back for a freezer/extra fridge and other “stuff”. Just a thought!
It’s really too bad that you couldn’t change things around to create one Jack & Jill bathroom that both bedrooms could share, especially since both bedrooms and both bathrooms are so small. Then both bedrooms would still have access to a full bath and it wouldn’t seem like as much of a loss if the tub was completely taken out of the second bath. But I do get it that it would be a real pain to do that with your existing floor plan.
That said, I think I agree with the others who said they would change out the tub for a really nice tiled walk in shower (the kind without a door or curtain), move it closer to the toilet to give you the space you want in the living room and close off the door to the bedroom.
I think that with the cost of long term care skyrocketing and the average age of the population in general rising, there are going to be more and more extended families sharing living space. As others have noted, having even one bathroom with a handicap accessible shower could be a huge plus to future buyers.
Those bedrooms need a Jack and Jill! It’s the logical solution. I’m going to have a plumber come in and check it out. Love the ideas. Thanks so much!
My hubby is a plumber, and one of his first projects once we move at the end of May will be to add another 3/4 or full bath in the basement where my work space / craft room will be. 🙂 It’s SO nice having a plumber (and painters!) in the family!
Ok, another thought. If the walk in closet is big enough, could you switch the guest room closet with the bath room? I mean if the other bath is so close, it might be easy to move the plumbing??? Then just move the fixtures ….I know easier said than done, been there, but just a thought.
I think I need to call in a plumber to see about that. Maybe an option.
If you were going to make the office a true office, with built-ins (something unchangeable by the future owners), then I would say make the bathroom a powder room. However if you keep the office an ambiguous undefined space I would say leave the tub.
I’ve been recently looking at buying a house, and if I had decided that the “small bedroom 2” room in question was going to be my new guest bedroom I would be annoyed that they wouldn’t have their own shower/tub and would have to share with the “small bedroom 1”. My thought is if you define the space, then there wont be a problem when future buyers are looking.
Hope this helps. I just found your site and your projects are totally amazing.
Good points Katie. Thanks for your input.
And Welcome! 😀
Ditta above: easy, powder room with a single door, done. For me, I’d much rather buy a house with a functional living space plan than with an excessive number of bathrooms.
Yeah, yeah, yeah! (It might be because I think this will be the easiest but I think most people are voting for the powder room) 😀