Anyone here had a loft conversion? Anything you know now, that you wished you knew before starting it ?

[LovelyYellowLabrador]

Looking to get one done this year, but only at the beginning of the process
We can get a builder for the summer

Anyone out there I have

We have one. My only advice is to have it as light as possible. Lots of windows for natural light. And a walk in wardrobe if you can fit one in

Go on holiday when they break through from upstairs so you don’t have to see the mess 😂

Tl:dr get a great architect/designer.

We didnt do It ourselves but we looked at several house of similar style in three streets all were the same of 2 (lazy) uninspiring designs.
The one we bought was amazing and the design is incredible. It was def the tipping factor that sold us the house.

They took the extension right out and put the bedroom across the full length of the house so it used the full height of the gable and wasn't a claustrophobic 7ft high long box along the back of the house. Tonnes of space for proper wardrobes, no shower/bath weirdly crammed under an eave. No weird sloping "walk in wardrobe" you can barely stand in as the effective ceiling height is 5"5

We have:
A roomy and spacious master despite 4.5 double wardrobes, 2 sets of double drawers and a super king . Family sized bathroom as ensuite and a powder room /vanity room where I keep accessories and dressing table/make up.
I love it

If is is a loft conversion rather than a mansard be really clear where you can get head height and depending on which rooms you want see where you are allowed dormer windows or velux windows and then plan the space for what you want it for - sounds obvious but friend's husband got fed up of knocking his head because they had put dormer french windows ( looked beautiful ) in a loft extension and bed had to go under slopey roof . Also ensuite shower had to go under a sloping roof and same thing - Mansard roof - different - decent head height all round.

One other thing - match the stair case going up to it to the lower staircase - it makes it seem much more like the house rather than an add on

Am sure you have thought of both of these things.

All best

Get the highest ceiling height you can

Have a bathroom too but access off loft landing rather than en-suite

Have one big room

Have 2/3 Velux on front roof plane

Have bathroom in part of full width dormer at the back (with a window)

If you have the space, separate bathroom rather than en suite.

If you go for Velux windows, buy Velux branded blinds rather than cheaper alternatives. To save money, buy the blinds directly from the Velux website (dead easy - just pop in model number which will be stamped on window frame) and fit them yourselves to save money.

Definitely agree about head height and windows, you want to maximise the light. If you have dormers, put them over where you expect to get in/out of bed as you get a bit more height to stand up.

Also consider how many plug points and where they will be, make sure they are on the design.

The actual design of the loft conversion is often unchangeable early in the build, so make sure you are really happy with the plans early on.

Seriously consider how the roof would work in future if you wanted to install some kind of solar energy panels or tiling. Our dormers are on the sunny side, but we designed it in consultation with solar panel advice, and there is no problem to add the panels too when we have budget (which we do).

Heating wise, if you have a crap old boiler and plan to have central heating in the loft, think about capacity. You may need a new boiler and tank to sustain extra radiators.

Loft rooms are hot, hot, hot in the summer. And listening to rain on veluxes makes you think your are living in a tin hut. So consider if you want your main bedroom up there, some people I know built the room then cant bear to sleep in it. We built-in a small aircon unit as we want to be able to work up there all months of the year.

If you go with a dedicated attic conversion company it can be a lot more efficient but beware they may have a "template" solution and tell you things are impossible, that ARE possible, just harder work and not their usual design. Find someone willing to be creative.

We have a velum over the too of stairs to the loft - it really helps let the heat out of the house in the summer. The front bedroom which gets afternoon heat is significantly cooler since we had that put in.

Do consider if you need it to automatically open - I am tall and can only just reach to open it - I have to use a hanger to pull it back and close it!

My only advice is to install air conditioning. My daughter had a loft conversion and those rooms were boiling in the summer. You could feel the heat as you climbed the stairs.

Use every bit of space. In the eaves get drawers built in. Pocket doors. Think about radiator positioning - up right and out of the way. Cupboards floor to ceiling.

Black out helix window blinds as mentioned before.

If you can get approval get a window balcony.
www.roofingsuperstore.co.uk/product/velux-gdl-mk19-sd0l001-cabrio-balcony-system-for-slates-78cm-x-252cm.html?gclid=Cj0KCQiAip-PBhDVARIsAPP2xc0GfY15YpFDhN8PEtt0dvAHUbC_bjYlwSXypCB0n3rrjFCML8G2HQQaAljpEALw_wcB

In the summer it’s HOT so make sure you have lots of ways to keep air flowing!

Make sure it’s properly designed and building regulations are correct, we decided not to do a loft conversion because the space lost with stairs on the ground floor reduced the benefit of the extra room.

Ours is massive as to pp point we got builders in and worked with them on the design, only trouble is it looks like someone dropped a shed on top of the house from the back but I don't mind too much about that.

One thing I would suggest is think quite hard about any attic storage space you'll be losing. How much space do you need for suitcases, Christmas decorations and the boxes and boxes of stuff you don't need but can't seem to throw out. We have a small Hatch in the eves but it's not enough, if we did it again I'd lose a couple of feet in bedroom space to allow more storage.

Oh one more thing. You cupboard under stairs built under the stairs to loft room as you would traditionally have downstairs. That minimises lost space.

Make use of all the space you can - not necessarily as room space, but as practical/usable storage.

Be prepared for dust to be everywhere in the house (particularly if there is a chimney stack to take down)

Be aware you might need to make changes through the house - eg we had to have new doors hung, that met fire standards, on the “route” to an exit, ie journey from loft room to front door.

@knittingaddict is right - those top floor under the roof rooms can get v hot but depending on budget you can buy a portable air-conditioning unit for the hot weather - but then - see storage - if you want to tidy it away during the rest of the year.

It takes longer than they say it will. 8 weeks instead of 4 in my case.

Fire doors are really expensive.

Yy to expensive fire doors. We too didn't realise that you might have to change 5 or 6 other doors to meet fire regs. We only had to install one in the end but I can't recall how we go round it.

Also consider the turning space on the stairs. We really struggled to get a small sofa up there and the king sized mattress. Suspect if we move out we'll have to remove the julliet balcony and hoist them down.

Our loft conversion has just finished, so here are a few things fresh in my mind - some may be useful, some not!

• It will more than likely take longer than they day. Loft company told us 6-7 weeks. All in its probably taken closer to 10 weeks all in, various delays some caused by Covid, some could have been avoided.

-It will be noisy and stressful to have people in and out every day. Underestimated this, I'm very noise intolerant and like my peace and alone time

• Wish we had put a window in the stairwell leading up to the loft, it's dark. We are going to remedy this ourselves later on.

-There's alot of dust! -Consider storage as pp's have mentioned. We expected more under the eaves, but generally happy with our little door leading to the area. -A walk in wardrobe area was the best decision we made. It's given us less bedroom I suppose but I love it so much. We fitted it out really cheaply with a rail, shelf and matching IKEA drawers- it looks very smart! -The views are great, and the light is awesome. Bit cold up here so far...hoping summer time we will have a breeze.

That's all for now

It takes a lot longer than they say it will.

If your conversion has a flat roof at the back it will allow for a flat roof "window". We put one over the stairwell which flooded the stairs and the 1st floor hallway with light which was great. We didn't specify a velux window which was bad as discovered later we could have had all kinds of electronic opening and blinds solutions for hot weather.

Definitely consider air con. U.K. is just getting hotter and hotter and retrofitting will be a pain.

Air conditioning is a must

Definitely install air con. Loft rooms are unbearable in summer. Look at installing a skylight above the shower cubicle if you have one

Imagine the amount of dirt and dust that will seep into the rest of the house when the works start. Then double it. One day I came home from work and burst into tears. I could not believe the coating over every surface.