Loft Conversion creating fourth floor

[GnomeDePlume]

Would we be mad to do this?

We have a modern (2006) 3 storey town house and I am wondering about whether to extend our house up into the loft.

Currently we have:

Ground floor with kitchen/reception rooms/utility room/toilet
First floor with master bedroom and office
Second floor with 2 bedrooms, snug (same size as office so small single)

So I am thinking that an extra floor would give us space for an extra two rooms plus shower room.

Not too worried about adding value more the utility of it. All DCs are adult but 1 DC likely to be here for years to come. Married DC lives in another city so they come to stay for a week or more several times a year.

Does anyone have any thoughts please?

Without seeing your house it is impossible to tell but all the modern townhouses I have seen don't have a real loft as this is where the top floor is located.
Do you mean extending the height of the roof?
Are you detached?

Thank you for answering! We do have a full loft so 3 storeys plus a loft. We are end of terrace. We wouldn't be looking to raise the roof.

We are fortunate in having a well designed modern house with plenty of storage. There is room to put a staircase up to a loft room without losing a room on the second floor.

I don't know if putting a fourth storey on the house would create building regs complications.

My thinking with having extra room is creating more guest space. This comes from my own and DH's parents moving into bungalows and us not being able to stay without sleeping in conservatories or on sofas which was uncomfortable and inconvenient.

Dependent on layout, you may also need a sprinkler system. This would need to cover all areas bar bathrooms smaller than 5m2 and cupboards smaller than 2m2, u less these have electrics in them - these would need coverage.
The system then could need a Pump and Tank due to poor water supply.

@Sheetonthebed thank you. Is this a building regs requirement? I had read about possibly needing a sprinkler system.

Yes, if you have floor plans of you house you could send them into a company and get a quotation/advice. They'd also need a plan of the fourth floor - this can be hand drawn with some estimated dimensions on. Feel free to DM me them and I could get an estimate for you to include in your budget.

As already said, converting a loft adds a complication in terms of complying with the regs due to the height of the upper floors. It takes you into the requirement of full sprinkler protection or adding another escape.

Thank you. I'll be honest, sprinkler systems make me nervous. We already refer to our smoke detection system as The Cooking Detector. The idea that it could then decide to flood the house because someone made toast fills me with horror!

That is deluge system which is often shown on TV, a sprinkler system activates the smoke alarm (it is just used as a sounder) a sprinkler will only be activated if there is enough heat - and the closest sprinkler to the heat source. Additional sprinklers will go off if needed.

I don't think I explained that very well. A deluge system is where all sprinklers activate. In a domestic sprinkler system only the sprinkler(s) closest to the heat source will activate.

You wouldn't need sprinkler systems just wired smoke alarms in each room but not bathrooms.
We've had ours done recently for our daughters.You will need plans drawing up by an architect and a good building control company.
It can be constructed under permitted development. For more space it's definitely worth doing.

A sprinkler system could be needed dependent on layout. Just because you didn't need one does not mean another house would not need one.

That's a relief! I had visions of opening the front door to have a tidal wave of water come out at me with DS riding the wave, munching on toast and chocolate spread.

We would, of course, incorporate any building regs requirements. DH would do the cosmetic fitting out and the electrical work (he is a 'competent person' for this). We would get a builder in for the actual conversion work.

It is more the 'is it worth it' question.

I like our house and dont want to move. In estate agent terms we have 5 bedrooms now (3 doubles & 2 small singles). However, how we use the house day to day is that we have 2 double bedrooms, a sewing room, an office and a snug.

DD2 and her husband live a couple of hours away so when they come to us they stay for a few nights. When this happens the sewing room gets converted back to a bedroom. At some point there may be grandchildren to accommodate. I like the idea of having comfortable guest space plus also comfortable space for DS (potentially armed forces so may need somewhere to live in between times for a number of years).

Would a four storey house become impractical? DH and I are in our mid 50s. Would we end up with the opposite of bungalow knees (stairclimbers thighs?).

It depends a bit on how old you are and your financial position. People coming up to retirement downsize both for economic and mobility reasons and a 4 storey house will not end up being practical after a certain age. Secondly on economic grounds - would it affect your council tax rating, and can you afford the extra bills for energy given current fuel inflation? Will it be practical once all your DC have left to have a large empty house to maintain and keep up when you only use all the additional rooms a couple of times a year?

And finally you might want to check with estate agents about future value. Sometimes oversized houses end up aesthetically unbalanced with the bedroom space outweighing the amount of garden and reception space for that number of a cup ants that might make it less attractive for sale.

Sounds lovely OP. Would you be worried about energy bill increase?

This is not true, unless it has been justified via fire engineering. If 2 floors are over 4.5m, it triggers an additional requirement.

DPIL & DM downsized to bungalows which made visiting very difficult when we were a family of 5. We are not currently planning to downsize, in fact we extended on the ground floor! This has given us a good sized kitchen, sitting room and dining room. We don't have a large garden though it is big for a townhouse as it is the width of the house plus a double garage.

But I take the point about being oversized for the size of plot.

Not sure about utilities. The radiators on the current top floor are generally switched off because it gets quite warm. I am currently using the top floor sewing room which has a hard floor with no shoes on and the window open. (Midlands for weather reference).

The cost and effort to convert your loft will depend on how the existing roof is built. Roof design changed in the 1960s with most roofs being built since then with W-shaped trusses. That would all need to be rebuilt to open the space up along with new floor joists to retain the roof integrity.

Can you stand without bending at the highest point in your loft?

Ask a builder to have a look.

Could you price up cost of conversion v cost of putting guests up in a hotel for a certain number of nights a year? You've got some room for guests already.

My DM bought a house that had enough room for me and DB to visit simultaneously - think she had visions of big family Christmases?

Wasn't room once we had four children between us. And it was really impractical as miles from the nearest hotel. And we both preferred doing Christmas in our own homes for our children than carting them off somewhere else.

I think you need to consider if it's worth it. We found it such an effort once we had kids to go anywhere much of the time it was easier for grandparents to visit us. Now my kids are older they're not so keen on staying places where there isn't anything to do. So we're still the ones being visited.

The house would be unbalanced loads of 7 bedrooms and 3bathrooms
but limited reception space

This was my reason for always wanting a four bedroom house I didn’t need the bedrooms but I couldn’t get the downstairs space that I needed in a three bed. I just can’t imagine a scenario where you would want a seven bedroom without massive amounts of downstairs space.

I had envisaged that either the top floor would be DS's or it would be guest space. Either way it would be a bedroom plus either a sitting area or a children's bedroom. Second floor would be sewing room plus bedroom and snug. First floor would be master bedroom plus office. So in our usage it would be 3/4 bedrooms.

Anyway, talked further with DH. His concern is that it would be unused most of the time.

Thank you everyone for your thoughts.

We have 5 stories, including a lower groundfloor where currently our kitchen and dining room is, and a loft room, which we use as a cinema/gaming room, and I also have my desk there to work, when kids are at school. It's a very old house, so the loft has always been there, as a basic room with a narrow staircase to house the servants. No idea whether it would comply with modern regs, but the previous owners installed a large external fire escape staircase off the 2nd floor, and the gable windows off the 3rd floor lead us onto the flat parapet gutter area between our and the neighbouring house, where we have roll up fire ladders to get down. If it was a bedroom, I would retrofit a mains linked sprinkler system to feel safe, though. Anyway, it's a long way up! Walking up from the kitchen to the loft to call the kids or bring them snacks is a serious workout. And don't get me started of how it feels logging up Henry from his basement cupboard 🥵 If you do convert the loft, I would make sure someone fit uses it and hoovers and cleans after themselves, and maybe get a mini fridge so they don't have to run up and down all the time 😉

We have 5 stories, including a lower groundfloor where currently our kitchen and dining room is, and a loft room, which we use as a cinema/gaming room, and I also have my desk there to work, when kids are at school. It's a very old house, so the loft has always been there, as a basic room with a narrow staircase to house the servants. No idea whether it would comply with modern regs, but the previous owners installed a large external fire escape staircase off the 2nd floor, and the gable windows off the 3rd floor lead us onto the flat parapet gutter area between our and the neighbouring house, where we have roll up fire ladders to get down. If it was a bedroom, I would retrofit a mains linked sprinkler system to feel safe, though. Anyway, it's a long way up! Walking up from the kitchen to the loft to call the kids or bring them snacks is a serious workout. And don't get me started of how it feels logging up Henry from his basement cupboard 🥵 If you do convert the loft, I would make sure someone fit uses it and hoovers and cleans after themselves, and maybe get a mini fridge so they don't have to run up and down all the time