The trend for three storey new build houses 🏠 - but with very little living space?

[MCBfan]

I’ve noticed a lot of these springing up round here recently and I wondered what people’s thoughts were.

The houses have three storeys but are built on a very small footprint. You have just two rooms downstairs: a kitchen/diner and a small lounge. On the first floor, there are two bedrooms, and a bathroom. In the loft there are either two more en suite bedrooms or a large master bedroom, en suite with walk in wardrobe.

Clearly, these are designed as family homes but the living space downstairs is really small.

I’ve just seen one for sale where the owners have designated one of the first floor bedrooms as ‘the living room,’ and the small original downstairs living room as ‘a study.’ But it seems like it would be a pain having a living room on the first floor?

Just wondered what others thought of this trend! I’ll try to find a floor plan. The gardens tend to be very small too, as the houses aren’t very wide.

We viewed one when looking to buy our first home but the layout was even more odd - garage and kitchen on ground floor, then living/dining room and a bedroom and further bedrooms and a bathroom on the top floor. The living space seemed not too bad but all I could think was that once you had a baby the entire layout would be a nightmare (and the garden was tiny).
After we had our first baby I thought about that house a few times and was relieved we hadn't moved there!

That a) not all multi floor townhouses are the same and b) the level of snobbery from the OP's post is cringe?

It's not a trend. It's that land is expensive and it's much cheaper to build up than out.

I wouldn't want to live in one but it gives extra bedrooms etc at less of a cost than the equivalent on two floors. The original post just reeks of snobbery.

I suppose people just buy the best they can under the circumstances, and make it work.

I think there should be a law where each new home has to have a space for 2 cars and a space for bin storage ( we have 4 wheelie bins with our council). Plus a front garden. Not a parking space instead of one.

Well, we only have 2 floors, but we always use our kitchen-diner for eating so we spend a lot of time in there.

Where do they eat?

But she's specifically talking about small townhouses with very little living space... it's literally in the title. This isn't what you have.

Ours is a slightly different layout. 3 bedrooms, en suite and main bathroom on top floor.
First floor has open plan living room kitchen and dining area and separate office.
Ground floor has WC, utility room and huge integral garage. Going to have half the garage converted to create another space. Works well for our family at the moment.
Would never have got so much space for our budget at the time plus we got a load extras from the housebuilder.
Garden is small but we aren't in it very often so we don't mind.

You will need to have laws banning overnight onstreet parking though (which we have where I live). otherwise, people will covert the garage and/or build over the parking space and/or fill the garage full of junk and clutter, and then plop their cars all over the street (and sometimes, pavement) anyway.

We live in one and love it. We have extended slightly so we have room for a kitchen/ diner / sitting area on the ground floor which we use during the day and a bigger living room upstairs which we tend to use in the evening. Having two living areas has always been an advantage - the downstairs one was full of toys when the kids were smaller and the upstairs one was toy free (ish). Now there is a separate space when kids have friends over. Kids on a separate floor from us but it's never been a problem - it's a flight of stairs away not a separate wing of the house! The only downside is I climb a lot of stairs but hopefully it helps keep me fit!

We hate ours although the bedroom space is good. We never entertain. To seat the four of us to eat we have to move the table back and forth. I like to cook and it makes me miserable when I’m fighting for worktop space. The fridge is tiny and high up so food is always going off as we can’t see it. We are trying to sell and there are no shortage of buyers because they are the cheapest four bed houses you can buy, but we have lost our onward purchase three times now.

When we were looking for an onward property last year, we were sent info for lots of town houses, 3 bedrooms set over 3 floors

Benefit was they were slightly cheaper (relatively speaking!!) than the 3 bed semis in the area

Overall it just wasn't for us

For me the thought of hoovering 3 floors and going up & down all those bloody stairs put us off!!

We’ve got a new build town house, footprint isn’t that small so we have plenty of space. Living room on first floor…absolutely love the layout, it works for us.

Not a new build but we have our kitchen on ground and lounge on the first floor! We originally had to walk through garage to get into the house- as that was the other space on the ground floor. But converted it into a dining room / playroom and a corridor. Many other of the neighbours have done similar! Some converting it into the lounge and creating another bedroom on first floor.

I don't mind the layout, means we aren't on top of each other and we can all be on separate floors to have our own space which was useful during lockdown and when dp and dd (both ASC) need to unwind!

Also means you have to really want to go into the kitchen to get a snack etc.

Love them, in the process of buying one atm! They are common where we were looking to buy and, having come from London originally, it reminds me of those 3/4 storey posh Mayfair houses but far cheaper.

the garden is tiny but that works for us as a park around the corner and we’ve learned from our rental property we cannot be successful guardians of a garden.

can see why they aren’t for everyone but another positive of the layout for me is three loos (we are a family of four) and the top floor is a large double bedroom with an en suite- something we certainly never expected to get for budget

We have some three storey properties on a local council estate that were probably 60/70's. These ones do have fair amount of room, though look fairly ugly from the outside.

We had some really stupid architects working in the NE at one point, especially for council estates. Concrete flat roofs are fairly common for example.

So many of the ones around us seem to have far more bathroom space than kitchen space and lack parking other than one, maybe two, allocated spaces.

I'm too old and creaky for that many stairs.

Works pretty well for me but probably not everyones cup of tea.

Had a Persimmon one. 3 full floors with a roof on top, none of that loft room business.

Downstairs was a big kitchen/diner and a small room i used as a utility. Middle floor was a small living room and a bedroom with an ensuite but used it as a play room. Top floor was 2 good sized bedrooms with a bathroom. I loved it.

Gardens are overrated.

I almost put an offer in one one when I was looking. I was dazzled by the gorgeous local stone it was built in, and the very modern interior. The location was ideal for me as well.
But slept on it and saw the light. Downstairs was a smallish kitchen, a loo under the stairs and a small, dark lounge, no bigger than what I already had.
The garden was pretty overlooked, very small, and half of it was on a hill.

Realised that ultimately living space was more important to me than bedroom size.
Ended up with a dormer-style semi with LOADS of downstairs space and smallish bedrooms. But that suited my living style so much better.

The only thing I slightly settled on was location. It's a nice, quiet area, but not the area I particularly thought I wanted.

well I'm looking for one actually, for the same reasons as others on here; small footprint but enough bedrooms, I've viewed a brand new townhouse IRL perfect but overpriced, viewed a 8yo town house online; perfect, viewed a slightly older one IRL quirky but perfect, townhouses often have parking round here at least which is great and I need a particular location so won't be moving further out for square footage. sell me a townhouse please 🙏🏽

Lots of food for thought, thank you. My friend is thinking of buying one; she has a six year old and a four year old and is planning for them to have the two bedrooms on the top floor. I think what some of you have said about not sleeping on a different floor to the children is a good point, I’ll mention it to her.

We looked at one when we were first buying.

It had one bedroom on top floor - could only stand up in in half of it - we did not like being a floor away from very young kids. The four bed had 4 doors all opening into same hallway - 3 bed was better laid out - no real hall a small box - galley kitchen off very small living room - would be hard to fit a dinning table in. I also didn't like like lack of storage or fact there was no path at door it was all parking.

We bought an extended 60s semi - much better layout.

Looked again when moving here - they had built in walls storage which made the rooms feel tiny - and again little family space. Again no path just parking at the front door.

We bought ex 60 extended council house with again a kitchen dinner so room for table as kids were older being on different floor wouldn't have been so bad but they were still in living spaces - so needed them bigger.

I wouldn't rule them out in future - just one I've seen so far haven't suited us and didn't feel well laid out.

@JusttheStart your flooplan is really nice; we have an estate near us that has the sort of flooplan the OP is talking about and the footprint is waaaaay smaller than yours, they're awful, they've crammed in as many houses as they could there. Stay and get stannah stair lifts!

We lived in a 3 storey house for 9 years and loved it.

Kitchen, wc garage on ground floor.
Main bedroom + ensuite plus lounge on first floor
Third floor had a main bathroom plus three further bedroom + another ensuite.

My 2 DS had bedrooms each with own bathrooms and fourth bedroom was an office.

It was a really large house and having the living room on the first floor was really quirky.

We've just downsized and are slightly missing the space at our o,d house but being mortgage free makes up for it.

Friends of mine have one, ground floor is integral garage, loo, and kitchen.

Middle floor is living room, bathroom, two bedrooms.

Top floor is three bedrooms with one en-suite.

There's no front garden, a driveway with just enough space for two cars side-by-side.

The staircase wasn't wide enough for furniture to fit through, they literally couldn't get their sofas into the middle floor living room. So now there's a section of staircase that's on a hinge!

They've lived there since the estate was built, it seemed quite nice when I first visited but over the years it's gone downhill. Now it just looks like one big car park.
The lack of front gardens and the tall houses makes the estate seem claustrophobic to me.