Are Two Bathrooms Too Much to Ask For?

We have been looking for a modest house in Montclair these past few months and viewed many in a variety of styles and state of upkeep (or not, as the case may be). Our budget is a tad lower than we'd like, having moved last autumn from Toronto, where our attempt to sell our home there ran headlong into the global recession. That house has since been leased (to be sold at a more fortuitous economic time) and we are renting in Montclair, hoping to find out more about this city and our neighborhood doing so. By Gad, do we love them!

Back to the home purchasing plan, several in our sought-after $500,000 to $680,000 range caught our fancy, so we placed bids on them, at the asking price, and lost. We expected to get each of these houses, given the gloomy housing market, but in each case, somebody else marginally outbid us.

As we had yet to fall 100% in love with a prospective home, we moved on, but ran into another hitch. We were having trouble finding homes within our budget with lavatory sufficiency. Is it too much to ask for two bathrooms? It appears it is.

Before I elaborate, here's a puzzle: Among the selection of photos that home sellers or their agents pick to display a house on a site like GSMLS, rarely do you find photos of lavatories. And among these exceptions, few seem to be taken sensibly on a wide-lens camera, offering a comprehensive look at a room, rather than just the bathroom vanity, a corner of molding (interpret any way you please) or a commonplace bathtub - all taken in poor light by a shaky handed cameraperson. I mean, they're trying to sell this house? No?

One house claimed to have two bathrooms and a powder room. It turns out that one of the two is ensconced in a barely finished basement, with dodgy shower curtains adding unneeded mystery to a pink bathtub (my mind strayed to Hitchcock's Psycho) into which I couldn't picture ourselves or any guests venturing on a regular basis. Or in desperation.

Another really pretty and well-maintained house came up on Wildwood Avenue and I pounced upon it with enthusiasm. It was priced attractively, had a great porch and back yard, and, uh oh, just the one family bathroom. Indeed, to find one's way up to the attractive attic wherein lay an exquisitely furnished, sun-lit bedroom, one had to traipse THROUGH this one family bathroom.

After calculating the cost of hacking down the back of the house to introduce a second lavatory and moving the attic stairs to a more sensible location, purchase plans were abandoned.

Homeowners would do well to note that a second full bathroom could add value to their cosy nest, while raising its appeal to prospective buyers.

Says real estate broker Carol Tangorra, of Schweppe Burgdoff, "If a home has three bedrooms, the expectation is not necessarily that there will be two full baths, so a premium of at least $10,000-$15,000 might be realized if there are two full baths."

For homes with at least 4 bedrooms, going all out and adding a third lav could enhance the value of a home by $20,000 to $30,000, Tangorra says.

Needless to say, we're still looking.