Weird features spotted while house hunting

[exitzero]

This wasn't when I was house hunting, but I visited someone once and had to use the bathroom.
To get to it, I had to climb a flight of stairs. The stairs ended at a door. I mean, right at a door. If you  didn't want to go into that room, you had to shimmy through a gap in the stair railing about 8" wide to get to the rest of the upstairs.

Someone, one day, thought that was a good idea.

[mandycorn]

I found a couple of really interesting things while I was house hunting.

A townhouse I seriously considered buying had the master suite as the only room upstairs; the other bedrooms and the public areas were downstairs, which seemed like a good setup, however, the master bedroom had an opening in one wall above the kitchen, overlooking the living room. That opening meant that the master bedroom had a view of the living room and people in the living room could look up into the master bedroom. Also, the stairs to the master were a spiral staircase, so the only way to get a bed up there would be to hoist it through the opening in the wall above the kitchen.

I saw several condos that included a split bathroom: the toilet and shower/tub were in a room with a door and the vanity was outside in the hallway. It's the sort of setup you see a lot in hotels and sort of made sense if you were attempting to share a bathroom with several people, but invariably, they all had light carpet in the hallway that ran right up to the bottom of the sink. I couldn't imagine how much water had been spilled on that carpet. I think the weirdest part of this one was how many condos seemed to have this. I'd never given much thought to it before but after seeing five or six in a row, it became a major point on the "no need to see more" list I had.

A friend of mine has a house that has a really weird feature. They have a round alcove off their living room that they use a breakfast nook, which is really cool, and from the outside it looks like it's inside a turret that goes up higher than the house with a pointed roof. I assumed it was just an attractive feature and didn't think much of it, until one day I went to visit and when I made it to the living room, my friend was hanging upside down from a trap door in the ceiling of the breakfast nook. When I questioned him, he came down and gave me a tour: turns out there's a whole second floor of the turret, but it can only be accessed by climbing through the back of the upstairs linen closet and creeping down a long, low-ceiling-ed hallway. They cut the trap door in it so they could do the finish work on it to turn it into a playhouse sort of thing and it's got carpeting and drywall and wall sconces and it's furnished almost entirely with beanbags so it's a perfect reading room.

 

[gramma dishes]

The stairs ended at a door. I mean, right at a door. If you  didn't want to go into that room, you had to shimmy through a gap in the stair railing about 8" wide to get to the rest of the upstairs.

Someone, one day, thought that was a good idea.

It must have been a real circus watching people trying to move furniture into the other rooms through an 8" gap!!

[WhiteTigerCub]

I was apartment hunting when I came across a strange place. It was being advertised as a one bedroom but was really a studio setup. On the outside the apartment buildings looked very nice and well kept like one would expect from an apartment complex.

One got to the apartment by climbing the stairs that accessed the roof of the building. That should have given me a clue about what was to come.

The place was all one room with the exception of a small nook where a toilet had been plumbed. Beside the toilet (which was cordoned off with a shower curtain) was a pedastal sink. According to the landlord the sink was both the bathroom and kitchen sink as there was a very small fridge located just on the other side of the sink. There was a small countertop/cupboard thing which had  two hot plates on it that served as the stove. There was single light fixture in the center of the 'roof' with an extension cord that ran across the floor to the hot plates. This was the only electrical hook up in the room.

The floor was that sort of black tar paper they put on roofs before they add shingles to it with remnants of carpet strewn about. There were no windows into the place at all, no closests or anything else, just one big 'room'.

The landlord was really disappointed when I told him the place would not work for my needs. "it's a great neighboorhood!"

[Wulfie]

One apartment I looked at (and did rent, I couldn't resist it) you entered into the apartment through the bathroom. You could sit on the throne and answer the door at the same time (and I did with Door to Door sales people/religion vendors) The shower was a fiberglass shower stall set up on some bricks. You had to be very careful not to lean against the shower side or it would fall over.  The "Kitchen" was this really cool unit about the size of a wash machine. The top of it was a sink and two burners, the bottom was a fridge. It had a lid that came down over the top to enclose it. It was part of a walled off deck and was cheap and had a FANTASTIC view of Honolulu and the water!

Friends of mine had a strange bathroom set up. The house was built before indoor plumbing. Someone along the line converted the stairway landing between the 2nd and 3rd floors into a half bath.  To get to the 3rd floor, you had to go into the bathroom, slide the doors shut and the door to the 3rd floor open. climb over the toilet and go up the stairs. They used the 3rd floor for a storage area and kids playroom.

[jaxsue]

I once saw an antebellum home (not a plantation, a normal home) in NC that sat at the end of a long country road. Local legend had it that there was a hidden room above the entry where someone could see far down that road.

Supposedly they could see the Yankees coming from a long distance away and could sound the alarm. Also, the home may have been built by Huguenots; it was common in the US at that time for them to build hiding places in case they were attacked. Attacks had been common in Europe in Catholic-controlled countries - I guess old habits die hard.

The house burned to the ground shortly after my visit. Very sad.

[Marisol]

A friend of mine has a house that has a really weird feature. They have a round alcove off their living room that they use a breakfast nook, which is really cool, and from the outside it looks like it's inside a turret that goes up higher than the house with a pointed roof. I assumed it was just an attractive feature and didn't think much of it, until one day I went to visit and when I made it to the living room, my friend was hanging upside down from a trap door in the ceiling of the breakfast nook. When I questioned him, he came down and gave me a tour: turns out there's a whole second floor of the turret, but it can only be accessed by climbing through the back of the upstairs linen closet and creeping down a long, low-ceiling-ed hallway. They cut the trap door in it so they could do the finish work on it to turn it into a playhouse sort of thing and it's got carpeting and drywall and wall sconces and it's furnished almost entirely with beanbags so it's a perfect reading room.

I want this.  Minus the trap door.  Any windows in it?

[KenveeB]

A friend of mine has a house that has a really weird feature. They have a round alcove off their living room that they use a breakfast nook, which is really cool, and from the outside it looks like it's inside a turret that goes up higher than the house with a pointed roof. I assumed it was just an attractive feature and didn't think much of it, until one day I went to visit and when I made it to the living room, my friend was hanging upside down from a trap door in the ceiling of the breakfast nook. When I questioned him, he came down and gave me a tour: turns out there's a whole second floor of the turret, but it can only be accessed by climbing through the back of the upstairs linen closet and creeping down a long, low-ceiling-ed hallway. They cut the trap door in it so they could do the finish work on it to turn it into a playhouse sort of thing and it's got carpeting and drywall and wall sconces and it's furnished almost entirely with beanbags so it's a perfect reading room.

Very cool!  When I win the lottery and build my dream house, I'm determined to have a couple of secret passages (including at least one accessed by a sliding bookcase) and at least one completely secret room.  I haven't decided what I'd use it for, though.

[Marisol]

I haven't decided what I'd use it for, though.

Secrets.

[LazyDaisy]

I haven't decided what I'd use it for, though.

Secrets.

hidden treasure of course

[RingTailedLemur]

I haven't decided what I'd use it for, though.

Secrets.

A chamber of secrets.

[Marisol]

I haven't decided what I'd use it for, though.

Secrets.

A chamber of secrets.

And possibly an evil chamber.  Or good.

[Black Delphinium]

I'd make a secret room my RPG/gameroom.

[VorFemme]

Secret chamber?

Library & reading room

Crafts room and supply storage for those crafts

Computer room

Chocolate storage

Master bedroom

Playroom for the grandkids

Hide various collections in it - coins, stamps, music, books, chocolate bunnies..........

[jaxsue]

I haven't decided what I'd use it for, though.

Secrets.

A chamber of secrets.

And possibly an evil chamber.  Or good.

This reminds me of a prank my friends I pulled when we were teenagers. We did this at the church my dad was minister of. It was an awesome place, built around 1910, and still had original features like the coal room and hard-to-find passageways. There was also an attic that was big enough that you could walk around standing up. It was used for storage.

We had the bright idea to make it look like someone had had a seance up there, so we made a circle with the chairs, put candles in the center, and made up some ridiculously fake scary chalk drawings.

Apparently the cleaning person had a bit of a scare when she went up there after that!