How would you reconfigure this small bungalow?

[Nibblets]

We're looking to buy this small bungalow but think it could be re-jigged to make better use of the space and orientation. The front faces north; back garden south. Kitchen is isolated at front of house. Both bedrooms are at the rear; you cannot access conservatory or garden without walking through a bedroom. Logic says to swap front to back and open back into family room and kitchen. Maybe extend garage forwards? Make conservatory a real extension? It's quite tightly situated on both sides. Final thoughts - the roof space is ripe for a loft extension in the front half. Where to put the stairs, though?

What a dreadful design. Lounge could be Bed 1 with en suite. Kitchen Bed 2. Bedrooms knocked through to make one big room and garage incorporated into the main building. Either knock down conservatory or build an extension and use rear of the bungalow for lounge, kitchen and dining room with bifolds on to the garden.

Stairs from bathroom or en suite?

My first thought is that two bathrooms in a small two bed property is excessive.

I'd look to turn the current kitchen and living room into bedrooms. Make the conservatory a proper extension and reconfigure the current bedrooms and conservatory into kitchen and living space. Use the space where the ensuite shower room is for stairs up to a loft conversion.

In a bungalow it's good to have proper separation of bedrooms and living space.

If you're set on the location it'd be worth getting an architect to redesign the space. You might also consider completely rebuilding to get what you want in line with current building regs, high spec insulation, etc to minimise running costs.

That’s a lot of work, unless you are getting it very cheaply. I don’t see what’s so terrible about the layout, except that the conservatory has been stuck on the back without access, but that’s because maybe there wasn’t really room for a conservatory. Could you put a return on one side to access from the living room?

You can put the stairs where the separate loo is, then you can have another loo upstairs. I have done this. It works well as the loo is in the hall, where stairs are naturally.

moving the kitchen could only be done reasonably into bed two, because all the water is on that side of the house.

Kitchen into bed 1 (adjacent to the existing en-suite) and open plan both bedrooms and conservatory to make kitchen/dining/living space. Depending on how large you want your bedrooms lounge could be one or two beds with the existing en-suite turned round to suit. The windows on that side don't look very big so feasibility to make a second room in that space may depend on that. Second room would be a single anyway - may suit if you have young children. Existing dining room as bedroom.

If you want to go upstairs I would tend to take out the cupboard and go up there and using part of the existing lounge. You then wouldn't have space for another bed in the lounge space but you'd presumably have beds upstairs. Could also consider using existing en-suite as a utility room.

If turning existing en-suite into utility, you could add a new ensuite for the newly created bedroom, behind the stairs that have replaced the cupboard and using that small window.
Could also consider knocking the toilet into the bathroom and using the space gained go put in a replacement/additional cupboard.

All sound very do-able - and along the lines we thought would work best. I like a pick and mix of the suggestions - now thinking of making current lounge into a snug/office at front, with smaller bedroom and en suite behind. Add a velux window in roof of that bedroom. Kitchen would become another bedroom. The current bedrooms and conservatory become open plan kitchen/dining/living area. The current interior is dated and needs refurb - so new kitchen needed, whatever happens. Might as well go at the back, where there's water and drains.

Hi @Nibblets we've just done some building work and what you're proposing sounds very expensive and time consuming and stressful! Moving kitchens, knocking walls, putting in stairs, etc - I'd budget quite a lot of time and money for this, and wouldn't want to live in it while you're getting it done. Just sharing as I'd drastically underestimated how much of a faff it all was!

Convert the kitchen into bedroom 1

Close up the lounge door by fliping the heater tank room to that side of the cupboard

Close up the current front door

Push the big bathroom over to replace the hall & W/C

Convert the bathroom space to the front entrance and stairs up to the loft
Add a porch link to the new front door and the garage so that the garage can be a converted into an independent room.

Jack and Jill the new bathroom as bedroom 1s and the "public" one

Flip the ensuite into the lounge and convert to a utility
Install the kitchen where the ensuite was.

Add a new ensuite to the lounge side

Convert the lounge to bedroom 2

Remove the wall between the 2 old bedrooms for an open plan kitchen diner

That sounds interesting; I like the idea of creating a porch for the front door/garage area - a roomy one with space for loads of coats, boots, shoe rack etc - even bikes.