Is 4 Rooms better than 3 rooms?

[Craig Parsons]

Ok so we bought a 3 bedroom 1 bath house that we originally  intended on flipping. We bought this before ever hearing of Bigger Pockets.  After learning a ton of great ideas here , we have decided to BURRR this house instead of selling it. Originally we intended to make this a 4 bedroom 3 bath house. to do this we would need to add on and spend an additional 30k  for rehab. What I soon realized was that if we do not sell the house the max rent I would get is about $900.00 per month weather or not we spend the additional 30k.  So we decided to scale back not add on and keep the house in its original footprint.   Last night after my umpteenth revision of the floor plan I realized there was  still some wasted space that we could make into a 4th bedroom  so now we would have a 4 bedroom 2 bath house with rooms that average 10ft by 10 ft with maybe the master bedroom being slightly larger.  If we do a 3 bedroom plan the rooms would be 11ft by 12ft. plus have some bonus space that could be used for an office or a reading room or something else.   So my question is  am I going to regret having 4 smaller rooms versus 3 larger rooms.  Will the 4 rooms bring me more rent in the long run  even if I can not right now get more than $900.00 per month.   Will people walk in and see the smaller rooms and say no thank you?   Thoughts please? and thanks in advance for taking the time to read this.

[Greg Scott]

One way to estimate the impact is to look at properties in the vicinity of yours.  What size rooms do they have?  What do they rent for?  If you cannot figure it out easily enough online, ask a local property manager.

Another question worth asking is "What will it sell for?".  Typically 4BR would be worth more than 3BR.  Even if the rent does not change, it may be a good move to have 4 bedrooms to force equity and get as much out from refi as possible. You may want to check with a local appraiser.