Downsizing with kids, how to manage bedrooms? Or is it a bad idea?!

[XebraFish]

Thinking of downsizing to drastically reduce our mortgage. Have 3 young DC and would be going from 4 bedrooms to 3 upstairs - 1 double and 2 singles. There is a second reception room downstairs that could be used as a bedroom. However at the moment I think the kids are all too young for one of them to be on their own downstairs overnight and they wouldn't like it anyway.
Would you:

1. Me and DH have the double bedroom, make 2 of the kids share a single and then give the other single to one DC. The singles are big enough for bunk beds but would be a squeeze. In the future one of the kids can take the room downstairs.
2. Let all 3 kids have a room upstairs each and me and DH take the bedroom downstairs
3. Let the two kids who are sharing have the double room for more space, and me and DH take a single (!). It is 7ft wide by 12 foot long so can fit a double bed but you can only get in one side, and we could only fit one small wardrobe.
4. Keep looking for a "proper" 4 bed house

The issue with option 4 is that a lot of the houses in the area we are looking have at least one of the bedrooms downstairs anyway; plus a proper 4 bed is significantly more expensive and so won't make the drastic cut to the mortgage we are looking for. The house ticks every single other box for us, the bedroom issue is the only compromise. Thanks

Plenty of DC share.

When mine were sharing who have a near 7 year gap the younger one was really just sleeping in it.

I live in a 3 bed- 1 double plus 2 singles. My ds26 and 21 are still at home. Neither bedroom is big enough for a wardrobe as they both have gaming pc's. So they use a cupboard on the landing for their clothes. It's not ideal. But needs must. We have a roof over our heads and that's the main thing!

This is exactly what I was going to advise.

Kids only need a bedroom to sleep.

you might find when they’re older they still prefer to have the “playroom” turned into a teen space with desks and sofas etc.

I wouldn't have the 8 and 2 year old sharing, I would either have the 2 and 5 year old share or the 5 and 8 year old. My first instinct was to have our bedroom downstairs but I would perhaps still worry about the 2 year old coming downstairs on her own in the night (I suppose we could just have a baby monitor instead and a stairgate on the door but then if she's sharing with the 5 year old it means she would also wake us up if she needed the loo in the night which she is currently quite happy doing on her own).

At the age your children are now, I would want to be on the same floor as them for sleeping. I'd still strongly recommend that you take the double bedroom. In all of your very lovely thoughts and worry for your kids growing up, don't forget the 2 adults who need a space of their own too. Never underestimate what a decent private space can do for your sanity. Being squashed into a room that means one of you cannot get out of their own side of the bed isn't any kind of sanctuary. 2 small children (2 & 5) I feel will not be deprived for the handful of years that they share a room. That size room should give enough space for a bunkbed with a wardrobe or large chest of drawers, and enough space to move around, along with a playroom downstairs. It's also helpful, at that age, to have a clear difference between their daytime play space, and nighttime sleeping areas, which this would give you and them.

Option 1. The two youngest share a single room until the eldest is old enough to sleep downstairs.

I have 4 all same sex in a 4 bed with two reception rooms. All four have a bedroom each and we have what used to be a living room that's our bedroom now for DH and I ( over a year now), our current living room was our dining room. Kitchen big enough for a large kitchen table to feed 6. It has worked out fine without moving house. One tiny reception room but who cares? DC aged 19 to 9 get a room each🤷‍♀️

Hope you work things out OP. We are MF so we made sure we reconfigured our home so we don't need to buy a bigger place.

I would stay in your existing house a couple more years.

Get all the children into the schools you want them to go to (catchment area) then move further out to a cheaper house.

The house you are currently considering doesn't seem perfect. I like old houses but in your case, if you feel you have to move now, think a newer house with 4 upstairs bedrooms would be more suitable, or at least a 3 bed with 2 double bedrooms.

Wow that change in your outgoings is massive yes you defo have to move.

Go for option 1.
In a couple years you can move your eldest downstairs (or you come downstairs) but for now use the downstairs room for all their toys and you could also have a wardrobe in there to take the overspill so that the smaller rooms upstairs are just for sleeping and essentials.
You will make it work.

Go for it.
X

This is the size of my only bedroom! Bulky, antique king size bed means I have to go sideways to get between the end of the bed and the wall. As you suggest, the other half of the room's available for storage. I'm still figuring that out because, for some reason I can't remember, I didn't want an L-shaped wardrobe. There would be space for one with sliding doors, then a little table and chair in front of it.

Is there a large airing cupboard type space on the landing. We have one very small bedroom and that person uses the airing cupboard as their wardrobe!

This would be a slight relocation for us anyway so kids would be moving to new schools.

We really love old houses; our current house is more modern but have always previously had old houses and I much prefer them. However I wouldn't be averse to a newer house if the layout and price worked for us and that's the tricky thing - if we want every single box ticked then it becomes much more expensive.

No there isn't - if the kids are in the small bedrooms I think they'll be big enough to fit everything. If me and DH take a small room then I think we might have to get an ottoman bed and also potentially look into adding fitted storage to maximise space

In your shoes id downsize....

I would put the 5 and 8 yr old together - at this age both "sleep properly"

2 Yr old gets teeniest room for now...

You can get bunk beds or custom beds and storage so thry have their own sections (think Stacey Solomon sort your life out)
Id be willing to spend a grand or two nailing the layout

Then once oldest goes to secondary they swap
Oldest gets own room
Middle gets "a top bunk"
Youngest gets to share with big sibling
Or oldest moves into playroom and everyone has their own room

From what the OP said upthread, she doesn’t think the middle one is going to like this. I imagine she’d like it even less if she was the only one to never get her own room.
Have you decided how you’re going to sell it to her, OP?

I might do it so that if they do share for a while, she gets to pick which room she has when they do all eventually go into a room each.

But my intention long term would still always be for all kids to eventually have their own room, by utilising the downstairs 2nd reception as a bedroom for someone whether that be me and DH, DC1 or DC2. So pps who have mentioned the problem of 'teenagers never having their own space' or similar, this wouldn't be the case. If the kids were already older then the solution would be obvious. It's just what to do with them in the short term while we're not comfortable with one of them sleeping downstairs alone that is the issue.

Personally I think you try it out and if it’s not great, you shuffle around and move yourselves downstairs. It’s not long before the toddler will be much better at stairs and much less likely to need you in the middle of the night.

If it were me it would be option 2. And in fact... it is me and we we have living room by day bedroom by night set up, kids upstairs room each.

they can have their toys in their room. If they bring some down have a basket downstairs and bring them back up at bedtime.

Except this is a thing that will almost never happen with an 8, 5 and 2 year old in a house! I think you could just about do this with baby toys - if you're disciplined about it. I remember I had a wicker basket, as we had nowhere to store their toys except their bedroom. The basket got moved into the living room in the day and was meant to go back in the DC bedroom at night, but half the time it stayed where it was in the lounge and had a blanket thrown over the top so you couldn't see the toys in it! We moved to a larger house by the time they were 3 though, and had a playroom. I wouldn't have carried the kind of toys a 2 year old loves up and down stairs. For starters, mine loved their workbench and toy kitchen. I wasn't shifting them, and those were the things that they'd happily play with for extended periods, and didn't need direct supervision. But kudos if your DC love only small, light toys that are easily moveable.

Children do not need a room each, it's a luxury. And to configure your house so that the adults have to sleep on a sofa bed every night while the children have a room each! I'm speechless. Parents share a room and children share a room if you don't have the space for the children to have a room each.

My similarly aged children do return all their toys to their rooms from the living room, but perhaps only so that their sibling doesn't get hold of them