The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - The Telegraph Magazine
Interiors
A new bathroom can add up to five per cent to the value of your home – but where to splurge and where to save? Jessica Doyle has the inside guide
Turning a bathroom into a money-spinning sanctuary. By Jessica Doyle
What we value in a bathroom has undoubtedly changed over the past year and a half. With remote working likely to continue for many – for at least some of the time – the bathroom has become less a place to grab a quick shower before rushing out in the morning, and more a spot to indulge in relaxation and perhaps the odd at-home treatment.
What hasn’t changed is the value that an extra bathroom can add to your home. According to Peter Elson of online estate agents Yopa (yopa.co.uk), ‘You can add up to five per cent to the value of your property by adding a second bathroom. An average bathroom costs £4,500, so the investment can go a long way when it comes to selling your home; a lot of buyers have a second bathroom right near the top of their wish list.’
An en suite is also high up on a buyer’s agenda: ‘It’s no longer a luxury, it’s a requirement; a four-bedroom home should have a minimum of two bathrooms,’ says Elson. According to research by The Bathroom Showroom, 42 per cent of house-hunters list an en suite off the main bedroom as a must, while a survey carried out by Nationwide Building Society last year found that an en suite can also increase a property’s value by five per cent.
Adding a bathroom, particularly if it’s an en suite, often means carving out space and squeezing the essential elements into a relatively small room. However, according to the experts, there are tricks you can use to get a luxurious look that will last for years.
When it comes to tiles, you have to think cleverly. Marble has become shorthand for a luxurious look, but it comes at a price; to save on budget, mix marble tiles with cheaper ceramic ones, as interior designer Lisa Schiller of Schiller Beynon (schillerbeynon.com) did in this project (left).
Patterned and coloured tiles are gaining traction, particularly Moroccan encaustic ones, but these can also be very expensive and sometimes need specialist sealing. So several tile companies are now offering porcelain versions that offer a similar effect at a more affordable price.
Anyone with a passing interest in interiors and an Instagram account will be familiar with tile company Ca’ Pietra’s
Patterned and coloured tiles are gaining traction
Lily Pad, a hexagonal porcelain tile, which can be rotated to make three different patterns and has graced many a stylish grid. The company has been told by estate agents that the tile is so iconic, it has been referenced in property details when homeowners come to sell.
Yvonne Oliver, pictured above, who blogs about her house renovation on Instagram (@yvonne_loves_paris_and_kit), fell in love with the Lily Pad tile after seeing it on social media. ‘The tiles were the first thing I picked and the rest of the bathroom just followed,’ she says. ‘As they’re such a statement, I pared the other fittings back by using black with pops of gold.’
Not having a bath at all might not actually devalue a house, but could make it harder to sell. According to bathroom company BC Designs (bcdesigns. co.uk), there is currently huge demand for free-standing baths, which are a sure-fire way to add wow factor. Their benefits go beyond the aesthetics, however: a free-standing tub is cheaper to fit than a built-in one and can sit anywhere in the room, or even in a bedroom, leaving more space in an en suite or family bathroom for a larger shower area. The bath of choice right now, according to BC Designs, is the boat or bateau style – socalled due to its boat-like shape, with a rise at both ends – which works in both contemporary and traditional schemes, and currently accounts for 70 per cent of the company’s sales. If you’ve only got a small space to play with, look for a compact 1,500mm tub – a similar footprint to a large shower tray.