Does anyone live in a small or average size home?

[scootlandyard]

With their family?

Just wondered as I was looking through past threads regarding home size as we are moving soon and slightly downsizing. I was shocked at the general consensus around house size! Eg posters saying anything less 2000sq ft would be a ‘struggle’ for a family of 4 (I’ve viewed a show home of this size and it was bloody massive), posters saying they are in a detached four-bed with large kitchen/diner,separate lounge, study, playroom but will ‘have to move and upsize’ because it will be ‘too cramped’ when their second child arrives.

I also recall a thread not too along where OP attached a floor-plan of her house and pondered whether it was would be large enough should she have a third child. It was a four bedroom inc en-suite, large living room and decent size kitchen-diner. There were posters insisting it was far too small even for her current family size and she would need to move by the time her kids were teens.

I feel like 90% of mnetters must live in huge houses.

Anyone else in a standard 3/4 bed semi with children/teens and somehow managing to survive? 😅

Me! And my 2 teen/YAs

We live in a traditional Victorian 2 bed terrace. 2 rooms and a kitchen downstairs. 2 bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs.

The smaller of the 2 downstairs rooms was a playroom until DC were about 13 and 15. They never really used it anymore at that point and didn't want to share a bedroom any more. So we turned it into a bedroom for DS2.

Sure the house is small and we are constantly decluttering. But it's perfectly possible to live in a small house.

Lol I dream of being in a semi detached! Family of 5 here, two kids are teens and one is an adult, in a 3 bed mid terrace with loft conversion, (so yes it's a 4 bed but smaller than a standard 4 bed house)

We feel lucky as we live in the south east so to own a 4 bed property round here isn't easy. One of our bedrooms is a box room and really not big enough but it is what it is.

I love my house. Until I go to friends massive houses and then I feel a bit envious. But there are other things in life than big houses and I'm blessed in many ways ☺️

Somehow I have managed to survive living in a Victorian/Edwardian terrace like millions of other families.
I am single, have one son and foster.

We have no utility/boot/cloakrooms, no garage, no off street parking. Horror of horrors we have one tiny bathroom...... downstairs......
When my son hit his teens I invested in a big shed, insulated it and put in a power supply so he could hang out with his mates out of my way. Before I started to foster I did a mini loft conversion which now houses all the junk that used to live in the 'Room of Doom' ie the spare room.

Not exactly spacious but plenty big enough for 2 adults and 2 children/teens.

Next door seem a bit squished to me but they have 3 children and although they have an upstairs bathroom, that is at the expense of a proper 3rd bedroom

I grew up in a small 2 bed terrace. 2 adults and 2 children. We extended when I was 16. And practically doubled the size. My house is even smaller than that one was. But there is only me.

@scootlandyard

you also need to keep in mind that many post about the life they want, not the one they have.

Apparently my house is just shy of 1,300sqft, and it feels plenty for us! Three bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs, lounge/diner, kitchen and separate reception room (which I use as a home office).

It's only me, DH and DD though, so would feel more cramped if we had another child as the 3rd smaller bedroom is used by DH as his office.

I do daydream of doing a wraparound extension with the second floor extension over the garage (to create a 4th master bedroom and ensuite) but we don't need it. Especially not for the £100k it would probably cost us to do it!

Family of two in a small, terraced, two up - two down. Approximately 600 square foot. Tiny garden. It’s small but it works for us! Unfortunately most of DD’s friends live in massive, beautiful houses, and she is starting to be aware of the difference, which is a shame.

Until three years ago we lived in a tiny three bed terrace with three kids - our house now while not massive is much larger, much more room to spread our crap out.

It's always on the threads about kids sharing rooms that you get people wringing their hands over the teens having their own room and their own 'study area' like most of them aren't doing it sitting on their beds while their desks are stacked with junk!

You can make a home of any size work if you have to. Of course cultures very different from here in the UK do it in ways we definitely wouldn't, but there's thousands of videos on YouTube of families making it work in tiny little flats. Not saying it doesn't make it harder, it bloody does, but keeping up with the Jones's has a lot to answer for!

When we had 3 kids at home we lived in a semi with kitchen and family room ( diner and living area, lounge, 4 bedrooms ( smallest was 8ft square) and just one bathroom ….we had no downstairs toilet or utility area

3 bed semi here, 1 bathroom, 4 adults here, plus DS GF, gets very interesting all of us trying to get ready, usually ok as us 4 only shower quick, but the gf showers for around 20 minutes, at least she uses the lounge to do her make up as that takes over an hour. We live on a corner so cannot extend, DS 28 has the 8’ x 6’ tiny bedroom with gf when she stays both in a single bed.

I have no idea how many square feet it is, but my house is a very boring 3-bed terrace with one bathroom. There are four of us and another bathroom would be amazing. We're in a tricky location with a lot of equity that I don't want to waste moving locally, so we're fixed until the DC finish compulsory education.

We are lucky to own and live in a top heavy 4 bed house but my poor neighbours across the road who have a housing association as their landlord are families in one bedroom flats and due to the ridiculous swapping system they are trapped.

Not everyone has space or choices.

I live in a two up two down new build.

It's only teen dd and I though, it feels fine 🤷‍♀️

I always think the more house you have the more cleaning you have to do 😉

That thread you're referring to was an 800sqft 3 bedroom new build, not 4 bed.

We have just downsized from a huge 3 bed terraced property as I was sick of the cost of running it! We filled the space but to be honest it was never cozy and never felt like home even though we lived there for over 10 years!
We moved to......another 3 bed terraced house😆 this one is almost identical in layout but the rooms themselves are much much smaller and I love it, feels like home already 😊
The bedrooms are still 3 doubles so my teens have enough room to hide from us so at the moment I am only seeing negatives with large properties, I definitely don't like to rattle around in space I don't need.
The house we have moved to is still slightly bigger than average I would say (just thinking about the homes friends and family live in) so I don't believe for a second that everyone is living in palatial pads🤣

My house is tiny. I can heat it with a woodburner and 4 logs in 1 hour and I can clean it up to bottom in 2 hours. DC spend their time in the snug/kitchen diner, their rooms are a single bed plus a 1foot space around them. It is very good for us all, we can afford it too :)

We have a 2.5 bed 1930's terrace. The smallest room is tiny that's why I've only allocated it 0.5 😄 it's a proper box room. One small bathroom for us all. No hallway.

It's the smallest house of all our friends and family. I bloody love it, it's so affordable.

We've lived here 21 years and brought up 2 kids here. One of my friends once said "to be honest Singing, this isn't a family home is it? Even our tiny holiday cottage was bigger than this." I just laughed.

Tiny 3 bed here (third bedroom currently a home office). Open the door straight up the stairs, no passage way.. living room is pretty small, downstairs bathroom off the kitchen..

We do have an en-suite in our bedroom. Marriage garden so space to extend.

Tbh we rushed into buying our house, bought it for £95,000 twelve years ago and we were so excited we could afford to buy! Then we got married a year later, then a year after that I had our first son and a year later had no 2 and then I was part time..,

It was great for 2 of us and tbh fine with 2 small children but now they are getting bigger we would love more space but thinking ahead to university I just don't think we'll bother to move. Might extend in the next ten years so we have more space to host at Christmas etc when our children are older.

2-bed terrace here! Makes me laugh how people on here say they'd "never cope"!

We live in a typical 1920’s semi, the third bedroom is small and used as an office and it has one bathroom. We have a big conservatory on the back and quite a big garden. Quite a few neighbours have big ground floor extensions.

We did look for a bigger house about 15 years ago but the only one we liked came back with a terrible survey. I must admit it gave us the financial flexibility to have many lovely holidays staying in a smaller house and we are retiring early because of this as well. I’m unsure as to square footage and am wondering what it is now. One of my brothers who moved to the States many years ago to study and stayed there has a house with 7 bathrooms, it’s absolutely huge. His guest basement is bigger than all my rooms put together. It has 3 big double bedrooms , a huge bathroom, kitchen and then a family sitting room then an enormous room with an indoor tennis table, karaoke machine and gaming set up. His walk in wardrobe is bigger than my sitting room and his gym is above his triple garage. I am but the poor relation :)

3 bed flat here, family of 4. 72sqm (775sqft). It's ok. I think in a flat you gain a little bit because of just having one hallway, but obviously lose through no loft space or outdoor storage space.

We do fine for bedroom size but lack enough communal space imo. Would love a bigger living room or a separate dining area. Pine over space for a dishwasher. And mostly am fed up that we're constantly having to get rid of things due to lack of storage space - no room for sentimentality or keeping stuff for hypothetical grandchildren.

Anyway, it comes with small mortgage and saw us through tough times. We'll have to move eventually due to stairs not making it old age friendly but when the teens start to move away it'll suddenly feel very spacious.

So you answered your question. Millions of families live in regular 3 bed semis.

2 adults and a toddler in a one-bed flat here.

Slightly missing the point but how does anybody even know what their 'square footage' is? I haven't a clue...

I meant mumsnetters specifically