Suggestions for improving a cramped living room in a new house.

[EzWin2]

We’ve had an offer accepted on a house but the only thing I’d like to change is the living room, it feels a bit cramped and difficult to place furniture.
I thought about knocking down the wall to the hallway but that would mean front door opens straight into the lounge. The wall between kitchen and lounge is load bearing and not sure if that’s worth the effort involved and cost.
We also don’t need the large downstairs shower and would be happy to just keep the w/c.
What are peoples suggestions?

If possible I would swap the main rooms so the larger room is the living room. The current living room looks plenty big enough for a kitchen

Block the doorway between the kitchen and living room. Extend the hallway up into where the shower is, create a doorway to the kitchen on the left of the new hallway.

The cloakroom becomes a narrow room on the right. Toilet stays as is, sink opposite, sliding door in the middle.

You could also move the living room doorway somewhere else on the same wall, if it's better for furniture placement.

This. A solid wall and no doorway makes the living room work better for furniture

any chance in editing the floor plan for a visual? Thank you

I would keep the layout and build some clever storage in the front room , with minimum furniture. It'll make a cosy snug.

Keep the downstairs shower room. They are very handy for pet washing or if someone in the house suddenly can’t manage the stairs.

Could it be that when you viewed it the owners had their furniture oddly placed which felt odd to you because those are decent sized rooms.

All of this. Being able to access the kitchen from the hall will give you back a lounge, otherwise it's just a corridor to the back of the house. You may find that, once the dividing wall is blocked up, there might be a space for a small sofa on that wall in the kitchen/diner. That way, you keep a separated, quiet lounge away from the cooking and eating area but also have some casual seating in the bigger room.

If you can't see how you live in the space, it's not the right house for you. Keep looking.

I hate having to walk through a living room to get to the kitchen, so assuming the house is otherwise perfect, I'd probably do as @MyLottie suggested.

Unless you specifically need a downstairs shower, that would be acceptable collateral damage imo (we previously installed a ground floor shower room in a large rural house with two other bathrooms, intending to use it for our muddy dogs - I think we used it once in three years).

Usually, I'm up for swapping rooms over - we did it at our last house which was a originally 'walk through living room to get to kitchen' layout. It was the only affordable period house with large (0.5 acre) garden, so was worth the hassle/costs involved.

We've also done this at our current 200 year old cottage where we didn't want our cosy snug overlooking the road, but were happy for the kitchen to do so. It's a fairly unique property so again we were prepared to do the work.

However, in your case @EzWin2 I don't think swapping rooms is the best solution. Perhaps as @Tortephant says, this isn't the the right house?

I would open up between the living room and the kitchen with glass doors so it all feels airier and you have the option of privacy and quiet if needed.

I would not take out the hall walls. Two reasons, people hate opening up straight into the living room so it will impact your resale value even if you like it. Load bearing means it will cost a fair bit too. Final thing is if the hallway is open/gone and you want to convert the loft, or already have you will have to install a sprinkler system due to fire regs.

Re the shower. As suggested, I would cut straight through and take the dog leg counter out as well. Not have a weird L into the kitchen. I would build a cupboard into the corner beside the sink. You could use it as either a washer/drying machine storeroom as you obviously have drainage there. Or a coat/boot store. If you are at a stage where you have small children you could also leave it open and just have hooks for wet coats and then you can shove the pram in there so it doesn't block the hallway. They are a total pain in a terraced house but kids grow out of them.

Could you move the wall between the kitchen and living room back a big - so it is level with the counter. That would add some space to the living room.

Then I'd remove the shower. Put a door there into the back of the living room and right next to the door into the kitchen. Block up the door into the living room close to the entrance.