Sunset Road Renovation

Bruce –

There are three ideas we’ve been discussing around the property, and we’d love your advice around the following:

1) Does the idea add value to the eventual resale of the house?

2) Does the idea make the house more livable for us, or could the idea be improved in this regard?

3) Does the idea live up to the style of the house, or could it be adjusted to fit better with the style?

Ideas

1) Adding a dormer to the second floor. This is a long-term idea and not something we’d tackle in the first 3-5 years. We can ignore it for now.

2) Rearranging the entry so that there’s an entry hall and visitors aren’t dumped in the living room. We might like to do this before moving in if it made sense:

– Open a doorway into the first bedroom from the entryway

– Build a wall in that bedroom to create a hallway (with a door to the bedroom, and depending on cost / stylistic “fit”, a clerestory at the top of that wall to allow light into the hall)

– Leave the door to the living room in place and insert a custom book/bootshelf in the bottom half to block it but in a removable way

– Maybe puncture the wall between the new hall and living room at the location of the second living room window, also to add light (see sketch below, although this again might go too far and not be a fit)

3) Refinishing some of the first floor:

– The blue areas (living, dining, circulation) would be original or replacement gum wood, and a light color paint (perhaps a bluish white to allow the depth of the gum wood to stand out)

– The red areas (bedrooms) would be painted and finished to match the existing second bedroom to save costs (white clamshell trim, light color paint to match yellowish paint in second bedroom)

– The green area (kitchen) would be left as is for now. (The green walls and blue floor aren’t our favorites, but they’re relatively new so it doesn’t make sense to change that until they wear out.)