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Forum
-> Household Management
amother
Purple
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Sun, Mar 11 2018, 11:52 am
We are seriously considering buying a house. Its a two bedroom over two bedroom and wed convert it into a one. We dont have the money to do the whole thing right.now. I was thinking of doing the first floor right away and not touching the second floor at all. Its a shame to even paint and carpet when im going to hopefully renovate in 5 years or so.
The first floor is mainly cosmetic. Maybe id knock one wall down to have living room dining room connect but its not the biggest deal if they are totally separate.
The upstairs needs a lot more work, building walls to make open spaces proper bedrooms and the kitchen will either become laundry room pesach kitxhen or just a bedroom.
I would love to make the stairway to the second floor part of the first floor. Right now when you walk in the house there are two doors. One leads to the upstairs apartment and one leads to the first floor apartmrnt.
Did you buy a two family and convert it to a one. Any advice?
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amother
Ecru
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Sun, Mar 11 2018, 11:58 am
We explored this option recently, but ultimately decided against it (for unrelated reasons). In our case, the staircase to the second floor apartment was external. This complicated the project exponentially. In your case, you are looking at a standard renovation of two floors. The cost will vary depending on the level of renovations and finishings you want. Cost is also very location-specific. We got estimates of around 180K.
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Rubber Ducky
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Sun, Mar 11 2018, 12:09 pm
I live in a 2-family home converted into one — originally a small 3-bedroom home on the 1st floor with a rental apartment above. In my residential design business I have worked on a few conversions.
You may be able to make a little entry hall by opening up the walls there and changing the entry door to something like a door with sidelights or a double door. Opening up the stairway to the first floor (would it be open to the living room?) will give you more volume, but may be limiting as to placement of taller furniture such as bookcases.
The floor plans on 2 family homes can be a bit awkward when used as a 1-family. In my home I moved a lot of walls and took out 2 bedrooms on the 1st story to make larger rooms. But it's hard to make blanket statements because the homes vary so much.
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amother
Navy
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Sun, Mar 11 2018, 12:19 pm
We converted but the houses were side by side so all we had to do was make an opening in one wall on the first floor. All the bedrooms are on the second floor.
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Ruchel
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Sun, Mar 11 2018, 3:05 pm
My husband's cousin did it. It's doable but a LOT of lost space. Two entrances, two living rooms (granted you can make one into a room, or a playroom), two kitchens (that's the worst for them, one is basically empty, not they have no interest in a pessah kitchen).
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amother
Mustard
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Sun, Mar 11 2018, 7:59 pm
Sounds quite doable. If you aren't planning on touching the second floor apartment, why not get tenants for a 1-2 year lease and then you have all that extra income to spend on renovations? Lots of times other houses on the block were built similarly back in the day and if any already converted, you can ask them to take a look for a better idea of what the final house may look like. Anonymous because I own a two family and I'm feeling paranoid today.
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