Which option?

[Muuuuuuuum]

There are 2 major projects I'd like to do to our house, but reckon financially it's going to be an either / or situation. So if you were me would you:

1. Rebuild lean-to galley kitchen to full width of adjoining breakfast room to make large, open plan kitchen diner? Also possibly knock through to adjoining reception (which is slightly raised) to make giant, split-level L-shaped living kitchen diner.

Or

1. Convert attic to add additional bedroom and bathroom. Don't need bedroom but do need bathroom (about to have 3 teenage daughters and fear will never get in to bathroom!). Roof does need some work and feels silly to spend £ now fixing it, if going to convert soon, especially as will take money out of project budget.

I think I'd rather have the kitchen diner, but might feel very differently in a few years when queuing for the shower!

How many bedroooms and bathrooms do you have now and how many people live there and what age are they?

Do you have a dining room now?

I would try to do both in the longer term but probably start with the attic if your DC are older.

If you don't need the bedroom, ie they all have one each, do the kitchen diner, teens aren't there long and the bathroom will be used for a limited period each day.

I think both would be lovely but sounds like you would get more benefit from kitchen changes. It would for me also depend if you need a new kitchen now or I might wait.

I would look at how much value each would add to. Is there nowhere else to put another bathroom in or a cloakroom? We just had 1 bathroom at old house and was fine but only 4 of us and 1 bathroom avoiding boy which balances out the teenage girl. If you only have 1 bathroom now and kitchen doesn't need replacing would prioritise adding another bathroom or cloakroom somewhere but maybe not whole attic conversion. Would also get quote for roof as sometimes you can underestimate these things, we have a thatched roof though. 😂

Thanks for thoughts.

We are 5 (me, DH and 3dd), with 5 beds and 1 bath (plus downstairs loo).

We have 4 reception rooms at moment - currently a lounge, office/study, playroom and breakfast room. Playroom would be knocked into kitchen diner if we went that route.

If I could do both, I'd get round all problems that doing one or other brings but, while no real idea on costs, am expecting them to be £££.

Only other option for getting another bath would be chopping current one in 2, to make small ensuite for main bedroom. Might be do-able but would leave 2 v small bathrooms, rather than current ok size one.

Can you turn the play room or office, or part of those rooms, into a shower room? Won't cost much.

Hmm, playroom maybe. It's sort of under the bathroom and next to the downstairs loo so should be fairly straightforward.

Another idea for the mix!

When we knocked a wall out and made it a kitchen diner it was around £12,000 but that was 10 years ago, negotiating good discounts - there are a lot of costs like electrics, new lighting, new flooring, new kitchen, repainting, replastering, tiling - we knocked down wall ourselves and repainted ourselves. Ours is solid oak flooring and worktops, shaker units, Range cooker, spotlights and very happy we did it. I think that project makes sense but would get quotes for everything before embarking.

We are looking at bathrooms now and redoing an existing one looks around £10k for everything though depends on size and quality of finish. £7k may be possible for a small one if careful.

I wouldn't split a big family bathroom in two. I think the kitchen plan makes sense as you shouldn't need a playroom now but a shower somewhere would be good - there's some really fancy ones now. Is there anyway the downstairs cloakroom could be extended to add in a shower - you would probably have to redo whole lot but would make sense to have it together. We also didn't have a breakfast room, dining section was enough. I wouldn't have a shower room next to a kitchen but downstairs is good. I quite like them next to garden so no mud coming through house but depends on house layout.

You could maybe put a shower - some really lovely large ones now - in the playroom by the downstairs cloakroom but separate. That could still be by a kitchen diner. There used to be a rule that there needed to be two doors between a kitchen and a toilet but looks like they've gone. For some work you may need building regs approval.

A friend of mine has a shower room next to her downstairs loo. There is literally nothing else there, simply a shower. As such, it's relatively cheap and easy to install, and you jist need r9 section a bit of the room off. Or even extend your downstairs loo.

Thr other thing you could do and I'm not sure of rhe size of your bedroom, but install your own en suite. And leave the girls to argue over the main bathroom.