Loft conversion - what did you use the rooms for? Kids or guest?

[sellotape12]

We're thinking of getting our loft done in a Victorian terrace. Yawn, I know.
What was your plan for room usage and why? Would you do anything differently in hindsight?
For instance, did you put the kids up there, or keep it as guest room, or something else? Finding it hard to imagine future needs when we only have one DC, age 3.
What we need is an office space and possibly a second child's room if we have baby 2. Options are

• use loft as guest room and office. Downside is our guests will mostly be aging parents, and it's another set of stairs for them.
• use loft as kids rooms, keep guest and office on first floor. Downside is kids are on a different floor to you (probs great when they're teens but what about night wake-ups when they're young?)
• Put master bedroom and office up there, keep kids and office on first floor (as above re rushing downstairs to soothe night wakes)
• something else?

Interested to hear from people who have teens too!

Hi, could you use the loft as office/guest bedroom but when it's an elderly guest coming to stay could you stay in the loft room and let them use your bedroom?

We had a three bed terrace and 2 kids. We converted the loft when kids were 10 and 12. Loft room became master bedroom for us, with en-suite and - as it turned out, cos Covid - office space for me. Not a separate office - desk in the bedroom. Would have been better as a separate office but I’d never envisaged being able to WFH so we’d not planned one.

So we are upstairs, kids are in 2 largest 1st floor rooms, and smallest 1st floor room is guest room / DH office / laundry drying.

When more guests come, kids bunk up in one room and vacate the other for guests too.

We liked being on same floor as them when they were little. Now we like being separate and each floor having its own bathroom and loo.

You can always change the room usage. You didn’t mention a bathroom - would you do that too? Its v g not to need to go downstairs to loo and shower, and to not share bathroom with teens!

We’ve had a loft conversion. Two rooms up there - kids bedrooms as they are similar sizes.

Our master bedroom and office are on the first floor (original rooms).

How big is the space? I'd always put 2 rooms in if possible- we have 2 (conversion was already done when we bought it) and its office and guest room. SIL has one large room as loft conversion which they use as a guest room and it's far too big.

Don't have kids, but if I did would feel weird being on the top floor in our bedroom with kids on a different floor.

Design it for flexible use.
You need if at all possible to be on same floor as DC when they are young, but later you can move the rooms around.

Guest suite and office for now, while the kids are young and the parents can still climb. Then move upstairs later on when the kids are older and parents are more frail. Keep the kids rooms as-is and turn your former bedroom into a multifunctional guest room that the kids can also use for gaming etc. A Murphy bed could be a good idea.

We have 2 DDs under 4. We have 1 big loft room plus shower room as guest bed and office space (also nice for my DPs to have their own bathroom space when they stay with us) so that our room and the DDs can be on the same floor. Probably when the DDs are tween / teen, we'll offer it to them to have their own space up there (either sharing, or by putting a dividing stud wall in to turn it into two smaller rooms) with the bathroom to be theirs, and we'll switch the guest room / office to be in their current bedroom.

Ours is still being furnished and decorated. We are redoing the downstairs now the loft is finished. In loft we have dh office, shower room, guest room and an extra TV room that will double as a guest space. First floor is our bedroom, a bedroom each for our 2 dc and my office.

My young kids are on a different floor to use (we’re in the loft), it works really well. I was anxious at first but soon loved the separation. When they wake in the night, they just come up to us. Kids get used to things quickly.

Do you actually need more space? With 1 or 2 kids (who could share for a while at least), wouldn’t it be best to enjoy what you have and do a loft conversion when the need arises? That way you can kit it out for what you need rather than try to guess and have it empty most of the time.

Thanks for all the responses, yes I guess it could be multifunctional. Perhaps there’s just no way of knowing what our needs will be in 10 years time. (We might even have moved!)
@SunnySideDeepDown we’re not desperate to do it but if we have the second kid, we will lose our guest room because it’s just a three bed at the moment. We’re also desperate for a space to work without a desk in the living room. It just looks so scruffy and cramped. The only reason for maybe doing it now is while we can just remotely still afford it. I fear that building and material costs are just going to skyrocket because of Trump.

Sounds like a combined bedroom and office space would be good - then you’ve got somewhere you can use for office space day to day, then if you have a second child that can be a guest room when needed, and office space most of the time. When kids are older you could move up there and have a first floor room as your office.

What about bathroom upstairs? Even just a loo and sink would be good.

I had a 4 bedroom house. I added 2 huge loft rooms plus a shower room in my loft extension with a proper flight of stairs too. I did it when they were late teens. Now they are adults and have both bought their own homes. I have 1 Foster child 18 in what we call the 'pent house suite'. Other foster DC is 16 and on same floor as us. 18 year old will be going to uni in September so won't be using it as much. When 16 year old is 18 he can move into pent house suite. Otherwise it's used when DD, SiL and 2 dgc stay at Xmas.

I have one large room and shower room.

its my bedroom and the office is tucked at the end.

i love having my own floor and being slightly separated from my children. Also works well with the office being up there slightly away from day to daY noise.

mine were 5/9 when we had it done and no issues being separate floor.

We’ve just finished ours - adding 2 bedrooms and shower room (not en suite) to our Victorian terrace.

For now will use them as office and guest room, and we will stay on the first floor with the 2 DCs (7 and 4). This has the advantage of a self contained space for guests/peace and quiet to work in.

Later on either DH and I can move up there or the kids can. We deliberately didn’t have an en suite to preserve that flexibility. We are lucky though that we have 3 very generously sized bedrooms on the first floor (no box room).

We've just finished our loft conversion, turned a 2 bed one bath into a 3 bed 2 bath. We had the option of 2 smaller rooms but decided on one big room as we could split later if needed. Upstairs will be used for office/guest room for time being, intention is to move master or kids room upstairs eventually. It's great having the extra space with options depending on what happens over the years.

@StartsAgain thanks. Yes, that’s what the loft conversion company has recommended, i.e to keep the bathroom separate to the 2 new beds, so that you don’t have to walk through someone else’s bedroom to use it (as would be the case with an en suite).
That said, if we eventually move up there, I don’t suppose it will matter if it’s our ensuite.

@sellotape12 having an en-suite means the bedroom can be slightly bigger as you won’t need to have a landing outside the bathroom door, though you also lose usable wall space for furniture (because of the extra door).

For us the flexibility of having the separate room was worth the slight reduction in bedroom space because (a) in the current configuration (guest rm + office) I can use the loft bathroom if working in the office without going into the guest’s bedroom and (b) if we ever move the 2 kids up there they can both share the bathroom.

If we ever move up there it will still feel like an en suite as it’s right next door to the bedroom. I’m not a fan of en suites anyway unless they’re palatial as don’t like the idea of pooing in a cupboard in your bedroom but I know not everyone agrees! It could be converted to an en suite fairly easily if we ever sold.

master bedroom plus en suite. We have a 2 bed terrace and 2 kids so no office!

Hi OP, we were in a Victorian terrace and had our loft done. We had it under planning rather than permitted development which meant we got the largest possible space built. This gave us:

• large main bedroom (which we used as our bedroom)
• shower room
• smaller single bedroom (which we made into a dressing room but could be a bedroom or office)

It was a brand new expensive lovely space that we got to design entirely to our spec and taste. So we very much wanted to use it for ourselves.

Much like yourself we only have one child (and can’t have anymore) and ailing parents. So would be no use as a guest room and I didn’t fancy giving a 2yr old the biggest and best space in the house. We had no issues being on a different floor to our 2yr old but in general they’re a very good sleeper. Down the line if they have night wakes and start trying to come into our room, well… I don’t want
them to! So hopefully the floor of separation helps that and if we need to go down to be near them then there’s a double bed in their room or a guest room next door.

We're planning a similar loft conversion, but considering the controversial step of not putting a bathroom/shower room/ensuite up there. It's not a big space and it would be so nice to have a bedroom (ours) that spans the full length of the house, with windows front and back.

We've already got a full bathroom on the first floor and a loo on the ground floor - surely that's enough for four people?

@SEL0ndon off topic but have you got a baby monitor or something? (Or maybe this in the past so not relevant anymore?)

My kids are older (7 and 4) but still need us regularly in the night for things like toilet accidents, illness, nightmares. They are great sleepers too but these things happen to all kids. I would guess that if we hadn’t heard them they’d have tried to get to us eventually, but on quite a few occasions we’ve heard faint whimpers (definitely not audible from another floor) and then found them sitting in bed surrounded by vomit, or standing in the bathroom in a pool of wee having not quite made it to the loo - I think would be a bit much to expect them to climb a flight of stairs to alert us in these situations, or at least would have taken a lot longer before they’d have got help.

But if you have a monitor then I guess would solve this problem.

Master bedroom and ensuite because it gives us peace and quiet and loads of space.

Ahh @StartsAgain this is a very good point. Emotionally I’m not that bothered about being on the same floor because quite like having my own space but realistically, as soon as DC whimpers, I’m in like a flash. There’s something so primal about how quickly I wake up and want to rush to help!

It does depend on the size when you draw up the plans, but I love having a bathroom on the same floor as the bedroom. It would be like having to go down to a ground floor bathroom for the loo / shower if I slept on the first floor otherwise- obviously it’s doable and people do it, but it’s much nicer not to.

ours was a terrace conversion and the bathroom fitted in v nicely and easily and the room is still double ended window wise. Have you got plans drawn up?

I would hate to have to go down a flight of stairs to go to the toilet during the night. I would think of future buyers what might put them off.