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OK, here goes. I want to know what the forum thinks of the following:
We’re going to build a villa as a showhouse. I have debate with the sales manager about whether it should be a large 2 bedroom 2 bathroom or (my opinion) an average size 3 bedroom 2 bathroom. I understand average for a villa as approx. 110 m2.
The plot is 500m2, which is the standard size of the plots we have.
We specialise in made to measure villas but we have seen that off plan just doesn’t get off the ground as there is a serious lack of confidence in that any company will complete so we have to build it first then sell it.What do the forum think. Should we build 2 or 3 bedrooms and why?
Thanks for the feedback
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Thank you Alan, forever the optimist, but the question is two or three bedroom, not to build or not. We have had reasonable success.
As for Mark’s question:
Show house we can show and that can be sold. If it sells as is, fine, if they want bespoke, perfect. Either way its fine.
Typical client is the typical Brit/ Dutch/ Scandinavian:Close to or retired, around the 50+ mark. Kids all grown up, mostly have grand kids.
Now I know where you are going with this but this is not a logical decision. I have found that most people want 3 bedrooms for any number of reasons when the reality is that they only need 2…or even 1.
My question is more an “emotional” question, if you were going to buy, what would it be 2 large or 3 standard bedrooms? -
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Thanks,
3 bedroom is what I would buy but I am not the average client, nor am I British. Visually a large 2 bedroom makes a big difference; a 40m2 living room is a big wow factor and followed up by 2 big bedrooms is always good, but what people like and what people believe they need are two different matters.
By the way, price is practically the same.Thanks for the input it helps a lot.
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What quite a few expats are building here are a large 2 bedroom house with a basement. The basement, that can have windows in the front as long as the back of the house is on a slanting plot and starts at point zero, is not included in the building allowance. Therefore, down there is the laundry room, storeroom and guestroom/bathroom.
Inez, a case of a spare room for ironing and to hide the guests in. 🙂
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Marjal, for what it is worth I’m very much in your target group. I’m fifty, Irish but living in the Netherlands and looking to buy a place that we, plus friends and family, will use for holidays until we retire in about ten years time. After that the plan is to spend winters on the CDS and summers in NL.
For me the preferred option would, without question be two bed, two bath.
– I have no children. Any visitors we’d have would most likely be couples without children.
– As I don’t plan to ‘live’ there a room to hide ironing would be superfluous.
– It will, first and foremost be a place for us. Any room for visitors is welcome but a secondary consideration. -
Brian – thank goodness you came on with that. We’re about to build, preferring the larger 2-bed option and this thread was beginning to make me think we were perhaps making a mistake.
Everything you wrote (including “any room for visitors is welcome but a secondary consideration”) are our thoughts entirely. It is primarily to be our home, and a larger living area where we’ll spend most of our time has much greater priority over a 3rd bedroom. Any friends with young children? Well the young ones can camp in the garden, we have 6,500 sq metres!
Re. ‘an office’, I’ve never liked being shut off in another (often tiny) room. I much prefer the dining table where my laptop can easily be closed afterwards and put away, with a dedicated unit for all the paperwork being adequate for my needs. But then, I’m not running a business like, say, Inez.
As this thread shows, different people have different priorities/requirements.
Marjal, it’s a difficult one. -
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I used to live in a place where we used the dining room as the laptop area, trouble was as both our businesses are workable for 24hrs, it tended to get left out. I preferred being part of the living area in truth, but then we moved and space meant it was better to have the computers in a room so we did walk away and have a separate area for living in – a bit like having the journey home!!
Im no longer in property, DA was sold although I have a hand in it still but only a very VERY small hand!!
Having more fun now and time for that damn ironing!!! 😆
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Hmm, the trouble is you are all being TOO logical (I mean it in a nice way! 🙂
I know for a fact that ALL my clients dont need 3, believe me they don’t but that doesn’t mean they don’t ask for 3 and even 4 (about 3-4%).
It is a hard question to try and be…lets say less logical, but this is what human nature is all about. Apartment wise, I know I will always sell a 70/30 ratio of 2 and 3 beds (30% three beds) but villas is a different type of buyer. Long term, used to living perhaps in a 3 bedroom…Oh, by the way, we will probably be building a modern type 2 bed with a garage and a more traditional type house with 3 bedrooms. I will let you know after April-May which is doing better viewing wise.
But carry on letting me know your thoughts, they really are appreciated.
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@marjal wrote:
Thank you Alan, forever the optimist, but the question is two or three bedroom, not to build or not. We have had reasonable success.
As for Mark’s question:
Show house we can show and that can be sold. If it sells as is, fine, if they want bespoke, perfect. Either way its fine.
Typical client is the typical Brit/ Dutch/ Scandinavian:Close to or retired, around the 50+ mark. Kids all grown up, mostly have grand kids.
Now I know where you are going with this but this is not a logical decision. I have found that most people want 3 bedrooms for any number of reasons when the reality is that they only need 2…or even 1.
My question is more an “emotional” question, if you were going to buy, what would it be 2 large or 3 standard bedrooms?Add to your typical client a german couple – the rest describes perfectly our situation.
We look always at the three bed room ones, as my wife hopes that our kids with future grand childs will visit us.
So one for us, one for the daughter/son – and one for the grand kids.We are 50+, our kids are not married and we have no grand childs neither.
But my wife insists on three bed rooms.By the way, what I heard from couples in Spain who have three bed rooms or even a separat appartm.
The kids with the grand childs hardly ever show up.But don´t tell my wife, she thinks our are different.
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Ok, lets change the question a little as I seem to have a 50/50 split.
Lets say I have a 120 sq m house or I am about to build it for future clients. How would you market it:
Would you talk about the size or number of bedrooms are more important? (I can put it in sq ft as well in case someone says that the Brits don’t do metric… ;P)
I still believe there is something innate that tells us that given the same build size, 3 is better than 2.
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@marjal wrote:
Ok, lets change the question a little as I seem to have a 50/50 split.
Lets say I have a 120 sq m house or I am about to build it for future clients. How would you market it:
Would you talk about the size or number of bedrooms are more important? (I can put it in sq ft as well in case someone says that the Brits don’t do metric… ;P)
I still believe there is something innate that tells us that given the same build size, 3 is better than 2.
what would be the approx. sizes of the rooms in a 3 bed compared to a 2 bed?
to market it we would need to know the area, faclities/infrastructure, tourist market, etc…
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I would imagine it would help if you broke down the square footage for people for inside and outside – external area is very important in Spain you spend such amount of time outdoors that if you said what he plot size was – patio area etc this also helps. My apartment is 142 sq meters but this includes all external areas which are almost as large as the internal area. In my view with regard to the internal dimensions if you gave the square meterage of the house of the house – you would be able to determine the size of the house from that. A good size living area inside for me would be far more important than having that third bedroom so long as I had two good size bedrooms.
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I would concentrate marketing on 3 bedrooms and put sizes in the small print. I did see from a link on here that a house on sale had 3 bedrooms with a size of 84sq. m2.
Oh, there are smaller…but in my case we are talking about a 120 sq metre villa so there are no “externals” to add on. This would be “metros útiles” which in this case are practically the same as “metros construídos”. In an apartment the areas would be different.
Plots are a standard 500 sq metres although they can go up to 1200 sq metres but this really isn’t what I am asking. It is much more about how people feel when they are at the property.
Large bedrooms and living rooms are great when on site; more bedrooms are better off plan and in a brochure.
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