Where should I put a desk? Remote working

[incognitopurple]

I work from home an average of 2 out of 5 days a week. Sometimes only the once. We have a 2 bed home. I can’t keep working from the sofa, it is no good for my back and I am not as productive.

I am toying with the idea of a home office. I see my options as follows:

1. Make the whole spare room an office.
   *I am unsure about this as we’d like it primarily as a guest bedroom (and if we are lucky enough a nursery in the next couple of years). Although, the room could have dual use, it is certainly large enough. I’d get immediate and fairly frequent use out of it as an office, now, rather than friends visiting every few months for one night or planning for future family growth that hasn’t happened yet!

2. Sell the bulky armchair that nobody really uses and set up desk corner in the sitting room. *NB the sitting room is a small size. WiFi speed is excellent as near the router.

3. Upgrade dining table to something more substantial and work from there, considering I only work from home less than half the week and it is extremely light and bright in our kitchen. And close to the kettle for unlimited coffee!

What do your homeworking set ups look like and what would you suggest given the above options?

Use the spare room. Could you fit a fold up bed of some sort in? Life’s too short to work at the kitchen table when there’s a free bedroom upstairs.

Spare room definitely most sensible as otherwise you’re hardly using that room. Spare room/study hybrid is pretty normal these days!

Having said that, if that room is not very nice to be in during the day eg it’s cold or dark then maybe the kitchen is a better option. I found it depressing working in a cold dingy spare room/study and would bring my laptop down to the kitchen whenever possible.

I think in your situation I'd either use the spare room (with a sofa bed in case of guests maybe?) or the dining table. Depends how portable your work is. Presumably quite portable if you're currently using the sofa?

We converted our spare room into a home office with his and hers desks. We also bought a gorgeous sofa bed that is legitimately more comfortable than our own bed, so there's still somewhere for guests. Nice to lounge on it on breaks as well, staying out of the rest of the house to keep "work" and "home" very separate.

@VeridicalVagabond could I ask for details of the sofa bed please? Ours is not comfortable and I’d like to upgrade.

@incognitopurple - spare room, definitely!

I am using our spare room which isn’t as bright or warm as the kitchen is when the sun shines though. But it has room for a desk and I’m going to decorate it really nicely and have a shelf with plants and candles etc so I feel like I want to be in it. I also have a lamp which can change from white to yellow light which is nice so you can’t change the overall vibe. And best of all once I’m done working I close the door to the room and forget all about work!

I use the spare room. I'd rather there wasn't a bed in there tbh.

I’m considering same at the moment except I don’t have a spare room. I can’t use my living room as I have kids and they will be in and out so I think that leaves me with a corner of my bedroom.
In your situation I’d opt for a corner of the spare room.

We got it from Willow and Hall, it's called Appley and it's quite customisable, four different sizes and loads of fabric and pillow options! It's on the firmer side but very comfy, with none of the usual squeaking or rickety feeling that some sofa beds can have - very solid. If DH is snoring I'll sometimes sneak in there and it's lovely to sleep on!

I would probably use the spare room. My spare room is already my peloton/gym/wardrobe/storage room and I need to be wired to the router. Which is why my WFH is in the living room
Set up in this patio door area so it's out the way

If you can afford it, do 1 and 2.

Use the spare room and a sofa bed. In my current house I'm lucky enough to have an office space downstairs but in the old house the spare room was a dual office and spare bedroom. It worked well.

Spare room.

a door you can close is very valuable.

if it needs to become a nursery then you can reevaluate at that point.

Spare room with a good sofa bed. That's what we did when I first WFH years ago in a 2 bedroom house. It's nice having a sofa in your office.

I work from home and came to the conclusion that it was pointless having a spare room that only got slept in a few weeks of the year, when I could get use out of it much more frequently.

I got rid of the bed, and replaced it with a lovely sofa bed. I got a small desk that can double as a dressing table when guests stay. It has drawers so I have a place to easily store my laptop and papers when I'm not working.

We are going to wall mount a TV in the room too, which will be nice for guests sleeping in there, and also means we can use it as a second living room in the evening.

I think I would go to the office every day rather than work at home if I didn’t have the space for it.

get a folding table like the one below. I have this and i can take it apart in about 30 seconds at the end of the work day and keep it under a bed until i need it again. No need then to have a desk taking up space all the tine

Coavas Folding Computer Desk Office Work Desk No-Assembly Student Study Foldable Laptop PC Gaming Desk for Small Spaces Home Bedroom Corner Wooden Kids Writing Desk Simple Style (Walnut,100x50x72cm) amzn.eu/d/h9oQ79C

I think one of the beauty’s of WFH is you can work anywhere in your house with a laptop. Even though I have a designated study I often work in the kitchen or elsewhere in the house. Study is exclusively used in th school holidays

I'd definitely use your spare room and put a sofabed in there for guests. If you can set yourself up with a designated work area, monitor etc, it makes WFH so much better.

I use the spare room. I have a folding table so when we have guests I fold it away. It's our smallest room and when my table is up there's absolutely no floor space at all. But it's cosy! DH also wfh on a laptop on the kitchen table but I prefer my set-up.

I work from the spare room but now 7 months pregnant and having to make plans where I’ll move to once the baby is born. It’s worked well until now though.

We have two WFH spaces, a study plus a corner desk in the spare room.

That doesn’t take up a huge amount of space. We still have drawers & a double bed in that room & it’s our smallest room.

Spare room. We turned our spare room into an office. I WFH 5 days a week and needed the dedicated space where I wouldn't be disturbed by DH on his days off (has week days off) or the kids during holidays etc.

We don't have guests 😂

I also like having a dedicated space to make the transition between home and work easier. I like shutting the spare room door on a Fridau and nor having to go in there again until Monday morning.

It’s really nice having a dedicated space where you can leave things but when you close the door, it’s done and you aren’t reminded of work every time you look up from the TV or stacking the dishwasher. So spare bedroom would be getting my vote. But right by the kettle does sound nice!

Another vote for the spare room.
I have an ethernet cable running from the router to my laptop which is better than wifi.