Get rid of the bath???

[YouknowIknowbest]

We live in a modest 3 bedroom house (me, DH, DS 17 and DD13).
For context, the house was a small starter home when DH and I moved in back in 2002 and the intention was always to move once we had a family. The financial crisis in 2007 hit us hard and we decided to stay and extend instead, which gave us an en-suite, a bigger master bedroom and a generous “box” room. We’ve toyed with moving over the years but in all honesty we’re all happy here and have no intention of moving unless we win big on the lottery so we can get a house with a pool 😂

So now we’re ready to re-decorate our main bathroom which is approximately 2m x 2.5m and DH and DS want the bath removing and replacing so it becomes a shower room as the queue for the en-suite shower is ridiculous every day.

I’d like to keep the bath, but feel it’s a selfish ask as no one else in the house uses it except me…and this is the clincher, I only use it on average 2/3 times a YEAR!

We’ve looked at L shaped baths and fancy showers over baths, but the boys would like to have this as a shower room for them and us girls keep the en-suite, so it’s a simple: Bath or Shower?

WWYD? Has anyone else got rid of their only bath and regretted it or was it the best thing you ever did?

Shower. Make sure the plumbing is there for a bath though. Prospective grandchildren can have a baby bath put in the shower, and low-step showers are much more suitable when you get older.

It needs to be suitable for what you want, not what some prospective buyers many years hence, who will probably have the bathroom redone, want!

And if you want a bath once or twice a year, go stay in a hotel and add to their water bill, not yours 😉

I currently have guys upstairs putting in a walk in shower to replace the bath in the family bathroom. Sightly different as there is a bath in the ensuite. A compromise could be that you use a bath replacement shower tray and keep a decent stock of spare tiles. Then as and when you come to sell if the estate agent thinks the absence of a bath is a big problem it would be a relatively straight forward job to put one in and you'd have the tiles to refinish. If you are clever with your shower design that could even be incorporated as an over bath shower at that point.

I would be fine with no bath though if you had pets or small children it wouldn't be practical.

How big is your existing bathroom? Could you post a plan? There are some great options these days for different styles of bath.

It's a lot of space being taken up in a small room by something you only use a couple of times a year.

Plenty of people on my estate live in houses with no bath and have pets and/or children so they manage.

Lots of European countries don't have baths and I assume many have pets and/or children,

We have 2 dogs and it's never been a problem

I wouldn't consider a house without a bath.

I only ever have baths because I hate showers, I do have a shower over the bath, DD enjoys one, but I only ever use it to wash my hair while in the bath, or leaning over t.

Keep the bath. You want it, why should everyone else get their way and not you? They say they won't use a shower over bath now, but I bet they will when they're late for work or knackered and want to go to bed.

Grandkids in the next 10 years seems unlikely though, surely? Even 27 would be pretty young, and especially if he'll be at home another five years...

I think it’s wrong to make everyone clamber over the bath or queue for the shower so you can have a bath every six months. For any grandkids you can use an inflatable bath, and arguing it’s for them in a decade if it ever happens is just looking for reasons to prioritise your needs over your families.

we kept ours, I didn’t want to, luckily enough thr main bathroom is big enough we could fit in a walk in shower also. The bath is an expensive ornament.

We were toying with the idea of getting rid of our bath and installing a shower. However after spending a fortnight in a hotel with only a shower in the room I have decided against it. Getting out of the shower was always so cold! Also I have long hair which was impossible not to get wet (without a ridiculous shower cap or weird physical contortions).
We are now going to have a shower over the bath to have the best of both worlds.

I wouldn’t even view a house without a bath same with holiday cottages and hotels no bath no booking

I realise this is a tangent from your post but I would personally want the en suite for me and DH and the family bathroom for the kids, couldn't be doing with the kids traipsing through my bedroom all the time, I like a bit of privacy!

Thus house has a huge walk in shower. I miss a bath. Every time I book a hotel room I request a bath, not got one yet, 😔

I’d get rid of the bath. But we do have an en-suite and a bathroom with bath and separate shower. No one ever uses the bloody bath. If we get round to redoing the bathroom, I’ll keep the bath and put an electric shower over, just in case of boiler failure.

In your case, I’d be looking to put a level access shower/wetroom to future proof if.

Ditch the bath. It is totally impractical and not required in the circumstances you describe.

We've just gotten rid of ours after a conversation with an estate agent and a tradesperson. it needed to be redone and we were agonising trying to fit a shower cubicle into a room with a shower over bath. None of us take baths. They took the view that the average bathroom is redone every 10 yrs, it's usually one of the first things to be redone on purchasing so is rarely a deterrent and unless you are planning to imminently sell you should do what works for the people that live there.

Plus you can get pop up baths to put in a shower basin for the fictional to be grandchildren 😀

I think if you are not bath people then its your house and you should have the shower of your dreams. HOWEVER, it doesn't sound like you actually want to lose the bath, which is a whole different situation. I don't think it's you being selfish, I think it's the rest of your family who are the selfish ones here. A nice bath-shower set up would be perfectly enough for them not to all have to queue for one shower room. They can still shower in a bath, but you can't bath in a shower.

"All 3 members of the family have said if there is a shower above the bath, they will still use the walk in shower in the en-suite, so my problem will still be the en-suite is over used and the main bathroom is empty 363 days of the year."

The problem here is definitely your family, not the bath. They need to stop being such princesses.

What have heights got to do with it? 6’4 husband uses our shower over the bath fine

It’s a no from me. When we got our bathroom re-done at the last house then my mum
went on and on and on about getting rid of the bath. We didn’t. A few years later we were selling it and got estate agents round, l asked about the bath and all said we did the right thing by keeping a bath

I'm 6'1. Showers over baths are great if I want to only wash from my shoulders down.

Bubble baths have saved me thousands of pounds in therapy.

I am the opposite. I won't stay in a hotel or a holiday cottage if they have a shower over a bath.

Well they aren’t going to say mate you should have ripped it out 😂

Me too. I've got an ankle problem that makes it difficult to step out of certain types of bath without something secure to hold onto, but you don't always know the arrangement when you book.

I’ve got broad shoulder and could have handled it! Plus it was a 3 bedroom family type house

I'd get rid of my bath in a heartbeat if I could afford it. Its such a waste of space. I've never seen the appeal of baths and would love a nice big walk in shower