51sq ft "bedroom"

[floofycroissant]

Has anyone had a mortgage provider devalue a property based on bedroom size?

Considering buying a house advertised as a 4 bed. In reality it's a funny layout without a family bathroom - only has a tiny shower/loo room and downstairs loo.

The smallest bedroom is 1sq ft over the Housing Act definition of an uninhabitable room. And the house is +£20k over the highest selling equivalent house on the street (sold in Sept 2019)

I think we'd want to change back to a 3 bed so also cautious of paying a premium and then knocking off value.

I’d personally be cautious buying a house like that. There’s a house up for sale where we’ve been looking where they’ve split a large bedroom making it a 4 bed; the 4th bedroom is only 47sq ft. It honestly looks like a cupboard in the pictures. It’s been up for months now and it’s been reduced £30k in that time and it still hasn’t sold. It really is a 3 bed property and if I was to buy it I’d turn it back into that however it’s still about £10k-£15k too expensive (still in 4-bed territory).

Tbh, I’d regard it as a 3 bed. Possibly a good 3 bed if you could rearrange the mini room and the shower room into a bathroom and en-suite. It just isn’t a 4-bed IMO without a genuine bathroom or a bedroom that you’d struggle to get a single bed in.

Oh, I recently saw similar properties and they were advertised as 3 bedrooms + study.

Officially @FManc that's not a bedroom then. Annoyingly the one we're looking at can just be classified, if it wasn't I'd be telling them so and knocking them done a load.

I think it could be reduced, it's been on for a month already in quite a buoyant area/market. It is a nice house otherwise.

Agree @JoJoSM2 it'll be interesting to see how flexible the estate agent is.

It could be worth looking into how the council classify it for council tax purposes and if you want to pay £3 (I think) to land registry you could see what that reveals. Look it up on Zoopla to see how it's listed (think that will come from land registry) and if there are any previous sales to see how it was previously marketed.

These houses used to be described as 3 bed and a box room. The box room is office or storage only. It’s really a 3 bed. So I wouldn’t over pay and it will obviously cost you some money to have a decent bathroom put in. A shower room is useless in a standard family house. Ok for an en suite but that’s all.

Just checked and our first house had a bedroom that was 48sq feet. No one ever questioned it. Next door is currently for sale and has the same size.

My neighbour along the road was told this too, when he was going to sell his property. He ended up just renting it out instead. X

Well 6x8 is small but people do see it as a room for a cot. Not much space for a bed and clothes storage. I wouldn’t like a room that small for a teen. So it depends who is buying but possible buyers might be put off if their family is older. It’s ok for a guest room if a single bed fits in. But no good for couples!

Our house is similar. It’s Victorian and the big front bedroom has been split into a smallish double and a single. I think it’s fair to call it 3/4 bedrooms. The single could be used as a decent study but it comfortably fits a single bed in, and has storage, so works perfectly well as a child’s bedroom.

I’ve just looked at this via google: if you let a house out as a HMO, a bedroom should be 70 sq ft minimum. 6.51m2. Perhaps that’s what is being referred to? That doesn’t apply to private homes. Estate agents might have minimum size for their descriptions. What size can they reasonably describe as a bedroom?

I’d be more worried about the small bathroom which doesn’t really match up to a four bed house requirements. At £20k over recent comparable sales as well I’d be offering £20k less and doing something to create a bigger bathroom. Do you need four bedrooms? If so, this doesn’t sound right for you anyway.

Decided not to go for it after viewing, the layout felt awkward in general