New York City bathrooms tend to come in decimal points: There's the 1.25 bath (a full bathroom, plus a second bathroom comprised of a toilet only), 1.5 bath (the second bathroom has only toilet and sink, a combo frequently referred to as a 'powder room'), 1.75 (shower stall but no tub in the second bathroom), and the traditional full 2.0 bath. But you'll rarely see a 1.75 bath apartment listed that way, even though it has become trendy to replace one tub with a large walk-in shower.
"It's fairly common now--about half of the second bathrooms we see are renovated with the tub out," Halstead Property's Ivana Tagliamonte tells us. Yet in entering the apartment into the listings databases, "it's more of a trend for brokers to go from 1.5 directly to 2.0, because a buyer who would like a full two-bath probably wouldn't mind the second bath not having a tub. If you listed it as 1.75 bath in the database you wouldn't capture someone searching for the full 2 bath."
From a resale perspective, "as long as there is one tub in the apartment, a stall shower is no detriment," says broker-blogger Malcolm Carter. "A half-bath is another story."
Bottom line for future sellers: Squeezing a shower into a .5 bath is a good idea, but taking the shower out of a .75 not so good....unless, of course, you're putting a washer/dryer there instead.
Related posts:
Will converting my half-bath into a laundry room hurt my resale value?
Making your bathroom sell-worthy
