Tips to Consider Before Designing Your Guest Room

The design is commonly overlooked when purchasing a new home or preparing a guest room for guests. Things are just put together in hopes it will work. Rather than simply having a bed and a dresser, let’s look at more options to make their stay truly an experience.

Who Will Be Staying With You?

Before moving forward in this blog, consider who your guests will be first. Will they be your parents, children, friends, extended family or a mixture of everyone? Knowing this answer will better help you design the best possible guest room.

How Often Will You Have Guests, And How Long Will They Be Staying?

Decide if your guests will stay with you for a day or two or an extended period. Deciding this will help you to determine the amenities you should feature in your guest room. 

If you have guests that stay with you frequently for extended periods, you will want to make the guest room ultra-comfortable. Consider adding a dresser and/or desk. 

Now that you have a good idea of who will stay with you, we can move on to the design.

Where Should You Put Your Guest Room?

The location of the guest room should be carefully considered. The guest room should be a retreat and placed away from all the hustle and bustle of the home. Consider putting it far from the kitchen and living room.

The upstairs or basement might seem like the best place to put a guest room, but contemplate if you will have elderly guests and if the stairs might be an obstacle. 

Another great place in the home for guests is near an outside door, especially if your guests are going to be there long term. This placement allows them to go to work or school without disturbing anyone. It would also work if you ever wanted to use the room for an Airbnb.

Should The Guest Room Be Near the Bathroom?

The best bathroom placement for a guestroom is an ensuite, but that might only be feasible for some of us. If that option doesn’t exist and renovation is out of the budget. Here are a few other options to consider.

How many people can your current bathroom comfortably fit? Ask yourself if there is enough room for everyone’s toiletries and self-care products. Also, how will the schedule be determined?

The location of the bathroom is essential. For instance, if you have two bathrooms and one is in the basement, a no-brainer would be to put the spare bedroom in the basement. It will allow guests easy access to the bathroom and a lot of privacy from the main floors.

Don’t Forget to Consider Storage

Storage in a guest room is overlooked as most guests stay only a few nights. In your list of guests needing to stay over, if some are long term consider adding more storage options or even a more oversized bedroom. Long-term guests might have larger luggage and need somewhere to place it without tripping over it their whole stay. Under the bed drawer storage might be an excellent place to start, or a vertical storage unit if there is no closet.

Can Your Guest Room Double as a Home Office?

A lot of the advice in this article is for longer-term guests, but what about if you don’t have many guests throughout the year that only stay just a night here and there, or you need more space to make only a guest bedroom? Doubling the spare room as a home office is a great way to use the area daily while still having a comfortable place for people to stay. Consider a murphy bed that can be tucked against the wall and have all that open space to work. Another excellent space saver in an office is a self-inflating air mattress that can be put back into storage when not in use.

Stay a Night in Your Guest Room

A great way to test your guest room is to stay a night in it yourself. Pack a light suitcase and toiletries and pretend you are the guest. Doing so will let you know if the room is comfortable enough and will allow you to figure out what works and what doesn’t in the room. One thing I like to include in my guest room is a pod coffee machine with a few different flavours, packets of sweetener and milk substitutes. If guests wake up earlier than the host, they can make coffee without feeling awkward.

Make your guest room an experience so that people will be happy and cozy during their stay. And, of course, they will want to come back again and again.

If you need the perfect home with the ideal guest room, contact your Local REALTOR® today!