Please help - loft being converted with v low head height

[cunningplan101]

I need your help as I am having a bit of a panic. Does anyone here have a loft conversion with a top head height of only 6 feet?

I'm in the process of having our loft converted. On the plans, it does make clear that the height at the apex will be 6 feet. I guess I had just never really taken on board what this meant. This morning I climbed up into the loft via the scaffolding and could see it for the first time with the new beams in and the builders indicated where the new floor height will be. I'm now rather in a panic that this room will be totally un-usable.

One thing that has been giving me confidence all this while is that I visited a property with a loft conversion on the same terrace as mine when it was up for sale. That conversion didn't have a dormer and somehow its ceiling didn't feel oppressively low. It felt like a decent height for a bedroom to me. And we will be having a dormer, so in theory our room will feel bigger. But that was quite some time ago. I'm now panicking that maybe their end of the terraced street somehow has higher loft heights than our end!!

Can anyone reassure me that you can have a usable loft bedroom with a ceiling height of 6 feet? Or do you think this is a v bad idea?

Is it 190 at the apex and then drops straight down so that it is getting lower and lower or is there a decent area where it is 190? Lowering ceilings is very very messy and long winded but would do the trick. I think in loft rooms people often expect it will be a bit lower and if the rest of the house is good height and spacious I think it could be ok unless you are both v tall! In this instance I would try and build in all storage effectively and paint it the same colour as the walls and use a low style bed and mirrors to maintain the feeling of space

We've just started a loft conversion in a Victorian 3 bed terrace and are having two bedroom ceilings lowered at a cost of 5k. I definitely second your getting a second opinion on the costing for that OP. Hope you can get it sorted

Cancelling isn't really an option at this stage as there's a hole in the outside roof, a hole in my ceiling and steels already inserted. If only I had realised all this earlier in the process... but somehow standing in the loft and seeing the new floor height and where the new ceiling height will be is what it took to bring it home. It's so frustrating, especially as I am usually pretty good at this kind of stuff! I spent ages poring over those plans, and yet never quite took on board this one major aspect.

When I called around the other loft companies today, they said lowering ceilings should cost less than this company is charging. But then this company will have to undo or alter a lot of the work they've already done. I can try to put an argument across that they should have advised me better, but then they can counter that they are only doing it according to plans that we approved.

I think we need to stick with the one company for the reasons above, because we already owe them so much cash, and because if we were to go with two companies then if anything (further) were to go wrong in future, each company could just blame the other and refuse to take any responsibility.

Most loft companies specify this at teh start the 2.2m apex thing Why did they go ahead with such a shortfall? They should have advised you it isn't your fault!

Can the builders do anything to squeeze out another couple of inches? (Know one of my brothers who converted did and our old neighbour.)

That's a really good idea about the caravan VivaLeBeaver I might try that this weekend!

Thanks Taranta that's very helpful. Could you give me any more info that I could use in my discussions with this company on Monday? The dimensions and how far they are lowering them? Do they include plastering the ceilings in that cost?

Plastering a ceiling for 2k?! That is outrageous! A plasterer's daily rate is about £200 in the north west. Let's be generous and say it would be £400 in London. It would take about half a day to plaster. Even with a builder's mark up, I wouldn't pay more than £500. Plaster is one of the cheapest materials to buy - so is plaster board

This is ridiculous! Call some plasterers and get some quotes and speak to these jokers about it.

If you want to proceed with using them, you need to be really firm and double check every single figure they give you.

Exactly noddy - our builder said he didn't want the job if he couldn't sort the perlin issue out with the structural engineer as it just wouldn't be a good job.

I would have expected anyone that would have taken the job on to get you to sign a massive disclaimer. Did they, or did the lead you to believe it would be ok-ish?

noddyholder thanks for your thoughts. It'll be 1.9m in a 1.5m x 2m area. The rest will slope down from 1.9m.

I think it's worthwhile getting a breakdown of that quote. 11.5k including VAT? assume it's 9.5k net, 2k for materials. Then at an average day rate of £200 (which is on the high side for labourers but more likely for London plasterers) then 38 days work.

Could you also halt the job and get a competitive quote from another builder to lower ceilings?

Also don't stress..I know how it feels when you hit a problem in a build. It will get resolved so just think through all the solutions to get the best outcome.

Thats not so bad!

Gobbolinothewitchscat No they never made a big deal out of the 1.9m height. Never said that it was unusually low. There was an issue about the staircase, where that had to be changed, which then meant we couldn't have an en suite bathroom up there - so we had discussions over that. And as part of that, the guy said it was going to feel like a single room more than a large double, and he did come around and kind of hold his hand up on the wall and show the slope - but that was to say we couldn't have an en suite, not to show that it was an especially low ceiling. The room is intended to be 4m x 3.5m, so I did find talk of it being a 'single room' odd, but moving the staircase didn't lower the ceiling, and to me, whether a room is 'single' or 'double' is about width and length of the room, not about head height?

And even if they considered that saying it would feel like a 'single room' was them telling me it had a low ceiling height, they definitely never volunteered any options to deal with a low head height, such as lowering ceilings below.

But I don't think I can switch companies now. And I think I need to make the second payment to them on Monday. So I'm hoping I can get them to really break down the costs of lowering the ceiling and somehow haggle them down. When I said the loft and rooms below were being finished to plasterboard, I meant plaster. So perhaps I could ask them to leave off the plastering of the loft above, to reduce by another £2k! And then get an independent plasterer in to do both.

Thanks newstart - trying best not to stress.

Oh noddy, do you think so? So would you just go ahead as is and not doing the ceiling lowering?

cunning - I've just mentioned this to our builder who just called.

He asked if you know any reliable independent builders - someone who has done good work for someone you know? If so, get them round and ask ther advice on this and your outrageous quotes. If you don't know, post on your local facebook site.

He also said, if it feels small now, it will feel even lower when its plaster boarded etc so factr that in.

I think I would tbh as I am living in a tiny fishermans cottage atm and its much lower than I am used to and tbh its fine and none of our friends or anyone have ever mentioned it!

Thanks. To be fair to my builders their quote may be high because a) I'm effectively making them change the course of work after they've already started and b) they've said this will be an absolute cost, with no chance for any further costs should anything unforeseen happen with lowering the ceiling. It also includes redoing all the wiring in the rooms in which the ceiling is being lowered.

I've told a family member about this option and she spoke to a builder where she lives in Kent and he has told her that lowering ceilings is a dangerous thing to do and could damage property etc etc so she is now dead set against us doing it. But from people on here, it seems like it isn't and is quite a common thing to do?

They may have done a lot of structural work that you can't see to get the steels in and so to remove them they would have to make that stable as the steels would then be below where they are now It is 6'4 - 6'5 high which whilst not period grandeur is still a useable space and would clever furnishing will be fine I think

with

Lowering ceilings is very common. I don't know anyone who's had a loft conversion in our area in a victorian or Edwardian property who hasn't had it done

Our builder has just finished s big project where he has turned a bungalow into a two story house after ripping all the interiors out. Presumably that's even more dangerous

Actially, we need pigletjohn on here. Hope he turns up

Can I ask what you have been charged in total for the loft room and what have you paid to date?

Floor space is irrelevant if the ceiling height doesn't make it possible for an adult to walk in the useable space. A dormer can make a difference - if it is a large dormer, what's in your plan?

If you measure 1.9m as the maximum height what will you do for lighting? A pendant light won't work and you will have to have ensure it's not a 'hot' light as it would be uncomfortable to walk past.

Electrics on a new ceiling is minor works..the cables effectively hang down once the ceiling is gone and then they are rerouted.

A good plasterer will plaster 1 ceiling in a day, they may have a labourer with them so should be around £350.

Hi cunning if you want to pm me your email I can send you our builders quote if you like, it's very detailed, and yes their costs do include plastering ready for decoration. We are lowering our ceilings by approx 10cm to give us a loft height of 205cm.

Noddy - yes I agree the quote will have to include them lowering and making safe the steels they've already inserted.

Unfortunately, it works out at just under 6'3, rather than 6'4 or 6'5. I think a ceiling of 6'5, even thought just two inches more, would be more liveable. I'm 1.72m tall, so the ceiling will be 18cm above my head. And it's 6'3 before any sort of floor covering goes down, so after a carpet and underlay it may be closer to 6'2.

The lighting is going to be spot-lighting, newstart, but good point about it being hot. Also, I think it'll be rather blinding! I will raise that with them. Although I'm not a big fan of ceiling lighting at the best of times, tbh. Still, not good to have lights that will burn you when on!

We had a loft conversion done 11 years ago on a 1950s semi in the Midlands.

Dh is 6' 2". The ceiling at its highest is about an inch taller than his head. The conversion cost approx 25-28k including fitted wardrobes (not full height), en suite bathroom, 2 dormer windows and plastering/decorating/flooring etc. it has added approx 10k to the value of our house, based on the selling price (a few weeks ago) and the price our neighbours sold for with no loft conversion.

I can truthfully and honestly say the ceiling height has never bothered Dh. And as a pp said, most of the time the room is used for sleeping or relaxing.