To ask if you wished you grew up in a bigger house? Or did it not matter?

[Apricotmuffino]

Having a bit of a moment 😁

So we've spent more money on our 3 bed house than we had initially planned, it was a complete doer upper and initially we had planned to live in it for 5-7 years. Well time has gone fast, we are coming up to 6 years now, the house is much better, and I- think- were happy here but it's quite small and were thinking of expanding our family further very soon (3 to 4) and although it's a 3 bed house the 3rd room is miniscule so 2 children would likely have to share rooms. We have a small garden but big enough for children to play, great location with a nearby park and close to a train station.

The thing is, to upsize would cost a considerable amount more, prices seem to have rocketed and even a house 100k more than this would wouldn't actually get us much more in the same area. We could afford it but we wouldn't have the same disposable money, and would likely need to save hard for a few years.

I like having disposable money but I also feel guilty having 2 children in a house that's small. For reference it's about 1100sqft (I am not sure if this includes the garage).

It got me thinking about childhood, I grew up in a smaller size house (900sqft) and I can't remember ever feeling miserable living there (I had the boxroom), we were lucky that my parents had enough money to take us on an annual holiday usually in Europe)

I dont know, pondering on what would give my family a better quality of life, a bigger house or more disposable money for holidays, toys etc

Interesting to hear from others if you dont mind sharing your thoughts whilst looking back on your living accommodation growing up!

Can't see either of our salaries jumping anytime soon but perhaps in 5 years or so?

They don't need to share though, there's enough bedrooms for the current child and possible future child!

I would have liked to have more space to escape to. It was definitely better when we moved to a bigger house when we were teenagers. But, I loved sharing a room with my sister. There were niggles and we fought, but the night time chats are something I miss dearly.

If your two bedrooms are very unequal sizes @Apricotmuffinoit may be worth speaking with a builder to see if there can be adjustments made so that the two rooms are
of a more equal size. A friend of mine did this with their bedrooms so that her two boys could have more equal rooms. No need now but it may be an option for the future.

We live in a house that sounds similar to yours, and have two young children. At the moment my youngest (two) has the box room. It fits her cot bed, a chest of drawers, a small IKEA storage unit and that’s it. But it’s absolutely fine. When she’s old enough for a single bed I think we’ll get a cabin bed / raised sleeper to give more usable room.

However, not too long ago we also got our garage converted into a spare room / home office. So, I’m thinking that once our youngest outgrows the box room, she could take over our eldest’s bedroom and eldest could have the downstairs bedroom, which I can imagine a teenager loving (private space / more grown up). So that’s an option for you maybe?

2 children 😊

I grew up in a huge house and prefer it that way. Not necesarrily very big, but private rooms for everyone.

It depends on a person, but I'm a private and introverted one, and it would have been torture to share a room with my sibling. I look at it like this: if you share a room in your own home, that means that there's NOWHERE in the whole world just yours, just for you, private. Where you can relax completely, decompress, be yourself. You always surrounded by people at all times. Even in sleep. That's a nightmare for me. Many people don't feel this way at all.

So it depends on a child.

Thanks for this, we do have a garage attached to the kitchen, its well used and full of stuff, but I suppose it could be an option!

Would you make your home office into a bedroom, is that what you mean?

Do you mind me asking where you store your 'garage' stuff? We have tools, a washing machine, cleaning stuff, hoover, paint brushes etc in there!

I grew up in a 3 bed semi (2 good sized bedrooms and a box room). It felt plenty big enough. My parents eventually extended it to add another bedroom and playroom. The rooms weren’t used much and always felt different to the main house.

We’re now a family of 3 in a 2 bed terrace. We’re not having any more kids or buying a bigger house because we want to feel financially secure, have plenty of disposable income, and pay the house off in 10 years.

I’ve got friends whose kids share a room. It used to be fairly normal but is increasingly unusual. Some of the kids share because they prefer it! Same sex and small age gap, though.

We were happy enough in our small terrace house but honestly even happier in a slightly bigger semi detached. Things like having two separate living space, once kids are older makes life a lot easier. As does both kids having their own rooms. And space to comfortably WFH.
I’d choose a bit bigger house than holidays / luxuries if it was an option. But don’t forget about stamp duty when you’re doing your sums.

I did grow up in a big house. Very big. We looked like the ‘perfect’ family. But it was anything but a happy house. Very abusive childhood. The size of the house doesn’t determine children’s happiness, it’s the quality of the people in the house

We live in a very old 3 bed that needs a lot of work - bought it as a project and whilst totally liveable just dated and we don’t have a lot of spare cash as I was made redundant and new job is less money.
I worry about my kids (we moved here for location) 2 boys share and daughter has her own room
she never wants to invites friends over I think she’s embarrassed but I genuinely can’t afford to do much to it really
I hope in time she realised I’ve done this for my kids so they can go to a good school but it breaks my heart when she says so n so has an en-suite and her house is lovely it makes me feel awful 😞

The small room is always the shorter straw that someone has to accept.
Growing up, I did wish we had a bigger house, but there were 4 of us, -kids.
I now recognise that we were all ND, and it was constant chaos.
One of my siblings screamed and screamed, the other would steal and lie, the other was just weird.. and we didn't have any privacy really. We all shared rooms.
I think a bedroom each is a fairly good shout, but more than that doesn't seem particularly necessary.
One necity I do like in a home is a room used for play. It's the worst room in the house, constantly being decorated and having furniture replaced, but I do have a living room that's fairly nice and comfortable because of that room we use for play

I grew up in a fairly small house, although my parents extended it and afterwards I had my own bedroom. Two of my brothers shared so might have a different view! I loved it. There wasn’t a lot of communal space. Just a lounge and no dining room, but it didn’t really affect us. Our grandparents lived nearby and had a lovely house though and I must admit, I hoped for a house like theirs when I grew up!

Yes - at the moment the old garage is a (large) home office with a sofa bed in for when family come to stay. My thinking is that when the time comes that our youngest needs a bigger room, we’ll make the home office into the eldest’s bedroom. Then youngest would have the other double bedroom upstairs and husband would have the box room as a small home office.

We did think long and hard before converting the garage, as, like you, we had a LOT of stuff in it and worried about the lack of storage space. We got rid of a lot of stuff we didn’t need, then got a larger shed plus a large storage cupboard thing for the garden for all the usual garage stuff (DIY stuff, bikes etc). Luckily we already had a small utility space in the area between the kitchen and garage, so didn’t have to worry about re-housing a washing machine. Although it’s occasionally annoying not having the garage space, that’s far outweighed by having another large room in our downstairs.

I'm intrigued that you've only got 2.5 bedrooms with 1100 sqft? We've got a bit under that, but 3.5 bedrooms (all on the first floor, which is the same size as the ground floor). Is your ground floor much bigger? Or are the bigger bedrooms upstairs really big, in which case, could you shift a wall upstairs to make the bedrooms more equal?

I grew up in a traditional semi, 2 beds and a box room. At first I shared the second largest bedroom with my sister who was 18 mths older than me and my younger brother slept in the box room. When baby number 4 came along she moved into the box room when she outgrew the cot which was in my parents room - on bunk beds with not much room for any furniture.

My younger siblings did not get on ( aged 8 and 2 when began sharing) and after many physical fights, my little sister was moved into my bedroom. So I ended up sharing a room with my two sisters, bunk beds and a single bed somehow squeezed in! I was around 16 at the time, my younger sister was 4 or 5 and my older sister 18. Luckily she was heading off to university a few months later so during term time there was just two of us in the room but during the long holidays, my returning sister had the top bunk, my baby sister the bottom while I kept my single bed.

I always wonder if this was the reason why my older sister started getting holiday jobs in London rather than in our home town, so she rarely came back for long visits.

When I was a kid we shared one small bathroom between 7 of us. Three of us shared a bedroom. None of us had any privacy until we left home. Nowhere to study. I hated it. I never went back.

Now ds and I have plenty of space, ds has his own large room. Plus we have a spare room and a study.

We have only just moved this year so kids had been sharing until then as we were in a 2 bed. They are girls 10 and 5. They never complained and it worked but I am so relieved they now have their own rooms. The eldest is getting to an age where she definitely needs her own space. It is also so much easier if one is ill, for example the youngest can suffer with bad coughs at night so at least now the eldest does not get woken up.
I do look back and wonder how we coped for so long as we were all pretty much on top of each other. I do really appreciate the space now.

I’ve read about couples who swapped their living room sofa for a double sofa bed and turned the living room into their bedroom at night, completely freeing up what would be their bedroom for a child or children.
Not suggesting you do that btw but just shows you can make things work if you need to.

I grew up in a very big house. The house looked (and still looks) really nice. But it was cold, very dated, not well maintained and had seen better days. It was what I was used to, and didn’t know any better. I was happy. As a teenager I has some school friends visit and stay over (from boarding school), and I was very conscious of what they had versus our family. We never went on holidays abroad either, except to relatives in England.

However, even at in my early teens I knew times things were difficult. Looking back we didn’t have much money, my mum had passed away, DF had big decisions to make, but as kids we were somehow happy in those uncertain times.

I wish we had one more bedroom where I grew up. There were 6 of us in a three bed house and I had one brother and two sisters. I shared a room with my sisters and my brother had his own room and my parents had the other room. Their bedroom was really small though, barely room for a double bed and some built in wardrobes. We also only had one bathroom which had the only loo in the house, so that could be challenging at times.
But, the house was close to town and the local park and we had a really good sized garden. As a child you just accept how things are tbh.
You could hold off doing anything until you know what the next baby will be, and whether sharing a room will be possible or if you'll need to start looking for another home in a year or so.

We have 6 year old and 4 year old opposite sex siblings sharing a room. They're best of friends, don't mind sharing at all (in fact, want to continue sharing) - however just lately, the way each of them gets to sleep is so different/incompatible that it's really making bedtime very difficult for us that they are in one room. And I think it will only get more difficult the older they get. I'd not avoid it to the point of not having a second child but if possible I would prioritise extending / rearranging or moving to allow each child their own room, however small. That said, you've got a few years yet.

I grew up in a huge 5/6 bed house, didn't have a particularly happy childhood. DH was raised in a small terraced cottage. IMO, I would say it's not the house but the family inside it.

it mattered, I wish I had my own bed let alone my own room.

although it's a 3 bed house the 3rd room is miniscule so 2 children would likely have to share rooms.

I doubt that. I bet previous families living in houses like yours have had a child in that box room!