If you can extend a house to create more usable space then it is probably worth putting in the current market. This is especially true if you can create another bedroom, and even more so if you can create another bedroom whilst simultaneously making more living space to keep the house in balance.
So when our client came to us and asked if we could devise a way of creating a bedroom for the expected baby, we looked at how we could do this. However, we were not about to forget that the downstairs living space should be increased as well. The obvious way to increase the living space on the ground floor was to convert some or all of the garage; this is what actually happened. As I have blogged before, in my view garage conversions should be carried out, only if you have an overriding reason to convert. What I mean by this is that if you can create more usable space by extending then it must be better to do than converting a garage. When you lose garage space you probably lose storage space rather than a parking space, so you would need to find alternative storage space unless, of course, you can dump the contents, and even if you can what about the next inhabitant. Garages do have a value and this should be considered when looking at the economics or converting the garage.
In the case of this house, extending was not an option because the garden was so small, but they would desperately need extra living areas not only to keep the house in balance but also because babies take up an inordinate amount of living space. So we created a new kitchen and a utility room, again really useful when you have babies or young children because it becomes the laundry room effectively.
So the scheme was to convert the roof space over the garage and partly convert the garage leaving enough to act as a garden store. The bedroom produced was enhanced by the creation of a dormer window. Even a small dormer window can make a big difference to a small bedroom as it increases the area that you can stand in, and of course, it is a connection with the outside.
The main area of difficulty with projects like this is that we have to be able to make the floor plan work so that you do not have to pass through one room to get to another. We were able to achieve this.
The extended house has enabled the family to live there for longer, and will easily recoup the cost of development when it is time to sell. Of course some of the increased value would have happened anyway, with house price inflation, but they have had the benefit of the additional space in the meantime and they can move when they want instead of being forced into it at quite possibly, an unsuitable time.
When you are buying a small house it is worth asking if the house was designed so that it can be extended. It is government policy to encourage extendable homes and often architects are asked to consider this by developers. But not in the case of this house- but we did it anyway because that’s what we do at Building Tectonics.
Written by Tony Keller – Building Tectonics Ltd.