First home purchase. Need design/remodel/layout tips.
#1
03-30-17, 12:33 PM
First home purchase. Need design/remodel/layout tips.
Looking at a potential house for 1st purchase. See pics here: house layout help - Album on Imgur . My issue is when it comes to resale the kitchen is tiny. Also there is a step down 22'x9' room that is essentially dead space. Raising up this floor would be too expensive for us. My question is based on the pictures 1) do you have any ideas for how to make the kitchen bigger and 2) how to make use of that 22'x9' room. Any other suggestions about how to reconfigure the house layout would be appreciated too. Thanks.
#2
03-30-17, 12:39 PM
Welcome to the forums!
It looks like the 9'x22' room used to be a porch that was closed in to make it part of the living area. Some locales get pretty picky on that so it would be wise to check if permits were pulled [county/city would have a record] Not much you can do short of knocking down walls to make the kitchen bigger. It doesn't cost anything to make good use of the space you have with eliminating clutter being the main thing.
It looks like the 9'x22' room used to be a porch that was closed in to make it part of the living area. Some locales get pretty picky on that so it would be wise to check if permits were pulled [county/city would have a record] Not much you can do short of knocking down walls to make the kitchen bigger. It doesn't cost anything to make good use of the space you have with eliminating clutter being the main thing.
#3
03-30-17, 12:45 PM
Member
Dead Space
Remove the 10 foot wall between the kitchen and dead space to enlarge the kitchen. Divide the dead space between the kitchen and dining room.
#4
03-30-17, 12:59 PM
the thing we are concerned with is you cant knock down that wall without raising up the floor correct? you wouldnt want to expand the kitchen and then have a step down right in the middle of your now larger kitchen. the issue we think with raising the floor is that the ceiling is lower in the dead space room so by raising the floor you decrease ceiling height. also, there is a sliding glass patio door and half bath off the dead space room so if you raised the floor you would have to accommodate a new door and also raise the floor in the bath correct?
#7
03-30-17, 02:00 PM
Originally Posted by marksr
". . . Going by the shape of the house and assuming the 'dead' space used to be a porch - it's very likely that wall is load bearing. . ."
I'd be very careful about removing it, or even portions of it, without plenty of headers to carry off that weight.
