Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Contact at least three contractors to get bids. Cost would vary depending upon design and what you want done. As a Realtor, the loss of a garage could affect your pool of buyers when you elect to sell.

Where, exactly? Many homes in this area do NOT have garages.

I think that's sort of pp's point. Having one is a selling-point. Convert it and you lose a selling point.

I ruled out every sinle house that did this.

http://www.redfin.com/VA/MCLEAN/1657-PERLICH-St-22101/home/42085536

We are moving to an area that had several converted garages and to me it didn't take the house all the way off the list but I wished they didn't convert the space. The homes already have living/family rooms so we saw no need for the extra space since the home also had an office. If it was similar to what we are living in now though, I'd love the extra usable space.

Anonymous wrote:Contact at least three contractors to get bids. Cost would vary depending upon design and what you want done. As a Realtor, the loss of a garage could affect your pool of buyers when you elect to sell.

Your house would be off my list, with no garage, that's for sure.

I think about 15k, but we did it as part of a more general basement conversion/finishing.

We did this when we lived California. We had a detached garage that we didn't use and we converted it into an office since it had a separate entrance. Cost was $10k. Totally worth it since we did it right (rather then cutting costs). When we moved we had a lot of offers, well over asking and mostly due to the studio. We had many artist and a few yoga teachers who loved the space before they loved the house!

Terrible and ghetoo, you want two car garage.

We moved into a house where the people had already converted the garage to a rec room and office. It's great! We have a shed and while it would be nice to have a garage, we appreciate the space more!

We considered converting our garage (we've never put a car in it), but our realtor convinced us it wouldn't work quite as we had wanted in terms of flow (very cut off from the rest of the living space), thus not great for resale or our utility.

If you do the conversion, I'd add a shed for bicycles and yard stuff (mower, shovels, etc), and probably an enclosure for trash and recycling. That way you--and future buyers--won't miss the garage storage as much.

Anonymous wrote:Contact at least three contractors to get bids. Cost would vary depending upon design and what you want done. As a Realtor, the loss of a garage could affect your pool of buyers when you elect to sell.

Where, exactly? Many homes in this area do NOT have garages.

We're considering doing this too. Our one-car garage is adjacent to a not-very-big family room and we were thinking it would be great to enclose the garage and make it a nice big family room/office. We're not that worried about resale b/c we're planning to stay in this house for the long haul (i.e. til the kids are grown, and beyond). If you get any estimates, come back and update!

We thought of doing this too! A kind of study/bedroom with electricity and water. However, not sure about permits.

Contact at least three contractors to get bids. Cost would vary depending upon design and what you want done. As a Realtor, the loss of a garage could affect your pool of buyers when you elect to sell.

How much did it cost?