3 storey house with a dog and child

[Greentiles67]

Hi

After a year of house hunting something has finally come up in our village that ticks many boxes. My only doubt is that the garden is accessed from the ground floor but the kitchen/diner and living room are on level 1.

With a dog and a child, I'm wondering if we will not find the layout practical?? Anyone live with this layout?

The price will not leave us with much to make alterations. Floor plan attached.

Apart from this, the house is lovely. We have until Monday to decide.

If it's all you can afford in the area you need then I'm sure you can make it work but personally I'd never touch this townhouse layout. I think most of the time, with the outside access being on a different level to the living area, it would feel like a flat. And I wouldn't want to spend time on the ground floor as it would feel like car port area.

The type of family this works for, I think, is if someone offers a business from the ground floor room (beautician, childminder etc). Then having the separate floor is helpful so clients don't see the main home.

My living room is on the middle floor, kitchen is on the ground with dining and living space plus study/4th bed and works for us but it's bigger overall and no under 18's. Was an issue with the elderly dog because he wouldn't climb the stairs for the last 2 years

There's no way on earth I'd buy that house, and I don't have a dog. I have two children. That kind of layout just doesn't work. Keep looking.

With just the 6 year old and dog I think this is fine. If you're TTC then I wouldn't be considering it.

I grew up in a house exactly like this.

My parents bought it because it offered the most space for the least money, they needed 4 bedrooms and money was tight.

We were three kids, my brother had the downstairs bedroom, and the layout of that house was we all had to go through it to get to the garden. No one really minded,

We didn't have any pets.

Ultimately, it was a good house to grow up in - it was in a great catchment area that they would not have been able to afford a typical 4 bed in, but definitely unconventional. None of us siblings would choose to buy similar for our own families - we all wanted a 'normal' house.

When my parents became elderly and downsized, jt did take a while to sell, but it did eventually.

We lived in this exact layout of a property and it used to drive me nuts!

Anything outside in the summer I’d be constantly up and down the stairs, bbq - carrying all the food downstairs, eating outside….. kids playing outside - I longed for a kitchen that opened up into the garden so I could sit inside with a brew and watch them playing outside.

The top floor got stifling hot in the summer, especially the smallest room - warm air rises and we constantly had to open our loft hatch for the air to escape. It was sooooo warm.

The pros of it were that we had a teenage step son - he loved living downstairs and could have people over without disturbing us and waking us up etc. that worked well.

A few of our neighbours changed the layout, they moved the kitchen to the ground floor ( as the ultity room has water etc already) and the fourth bedroom up where the kitchen was.

Some took the garage out completely. Or made it into a false garage so a small space at the front then a large kitchen living room at the back.

had we have stayed in our house we would have done one of the above.

I know live in a property where the kitchen looks onto the garden and after 11 years of not even after a year the novelty hasn’t worn off!

if you love the village is doable as you can change the layout

We also had dogs for a while living in it, they didn’t really mind the stairs!

Our house is similar to this but our kitchen is downstairs and the bedroom is on the middle floor with the lounge.

We have a puppy and found if we're downstairs he often asks to go outside usually just to play so being upstairs away from the door can be a positive. The only time it was a bit of a pain was when our dog was very young as he sleeps in a crate in our room so I'd rush downstairs in the morning to get him out in the garden. That was prob only for the first few months until her was toilet trained.

Our DC was older when we moved in and the house works well for us, we liked spreading out with a floor each during lockdown, meant we weren't all on top of each other while doing work/ school work.

Also a plus, the square footage of the house! Our townhouse was large square footage wise that our now detached house….. as it’s over a few floors it feels spacious too

Yup it’s great to have a separate snug for teenagers & young adults to have their own space. Especially when you consider many don’t leave home until later these days due to house prices. Myself & friends have children well into their 20s living at home & then it’s a blessing to have separate living spaces.

The layout is not ideal with your child at their current age or younger children though.

It would be a hard no for me with a 4 and 6 yr old and the amount of socialising we do in the summer, as you’d have to traipse everything up and downstairs if you were having a bbq and now way of sitting and having easy access to everything in the kitchen when you have friends round in the summer!

We have a similar layout, 4 stories, 2 small children. We love it. It’s ideal having the children on the same floor as us, a lot of houses we looked at had the master bedroom on the floor above. Also having guests sleeping a couple of floors away is ideal. I was gonna say only downside is not having a bathroom on the main living floor when potty training as you’ll end up with a potty in your living room for a bit but just saw your dc is 6 so you’ll be fine!

The area has gotten so expensive and this is in our budget, probably because it doesn't tick a growing families boxes.

Sounds like my area to a T

I'm in the same position - I'm expecting that I'll go with a home which doesn't tick all the boxes - likely a new build with less maintenance stress (divorced single parent) and less buying stress (huge demand in my area and bidding wars and gazumping - I want to reserve and know it's mine)

3 kids so the twins will have to share long term

And I'll have to sacrifice a utility and side entrance door

We have loads of these types of houses on the estate I live in. I would avoid and keep looking. It's such a pain in the arse to live with.

I lived in a house with a very similar layout for eight years, and it annoyed me every day for eight years. In the end it just meant that our garden was completely underused. The whole bottom floor of the house became a bit of a dumping ground. It was really difficult to make it homely.

We moved nine years ago to a standard two-floored home, and I am grateful for it every day. Everything is so much easier now.

If you do decide to go for it, you will need to be absolutely scrupulous about what the room on the bottom floor is going to be used for, so it doesn't just turn into a useless space.

We stayed in a holiday home with an upside down layout and it wouldn’t be for me long term.

The thing I really missed was being able to open the doors from a living space and be in the garden. I like the natural flow from indoors to out, and to sit with the doors open looking out.

We have a dog too, and at home he wanders in and out safely while we’re in the lounge or conservatory. In the holiday home, he only went out to pee on request!

Lots like this in our area and I've discounted them all - I want to be able to be in the kitchen and have kids playing outside at the same time without a flight of stairs between us. Also utility on the ground floor means you'll be up and down two flights of stairs for every laundry load!

Ugh I'd hate that.

We have a very similar layout. I don’t have a dog but have cats and a baby. The layout doesn’t bother us - yes it’s a lot of stairs, and you can’t walk straight out into garden, but you get used to it.

We get so much more space with this house than more conventional houses at the same price point, so for us it was worth the compromise. And the ground floor doesn’t feel like a basement or the house feel like a flat generally

I think it would be amazing.
And if it's the best you can afford after a year , I'd make it work . I'd had 4 children though.
Once they became teenager they lived in their rooms, so lovely to have been able to spread out.
The shopping thing needs thinking about (get dh to do it), but I'd figure something.

I wouldn't do it personally. I have lived with a similar layout and hated it. In the summer I like to throw doors open and just have free-flow access to my outside space for the kids and the dog. Having to make a special trip downstairs to go in the garden from the living space is so annoying. You'll quickly get irritated with it, especially with the dog needing the toilet.

Think of things like BBQs - carrying all the stuff downstairs and into the garden urgh.
And like a PP said, two flights of stairs for every load of washing urgh.
And taking all the bags of shopping up the stairs into the kitchen - you'll hate yourself for it 😂
Don't do it, OP!!

Friends of ours had this exact layout with young kids and it was awful. The downstairs room was a toy cupboard - set up as a playroom but never used. Very impractical for eating in the garden. Complete waste of space!