Time Lapse Fixing Graham Stephan’s Failed Duplex

and today I expose the real secret to Graham Stefon success it's in this vanity cabinet welcome back to a series on Graham Stephan's a remodel today is episode a2 and I'm going to break apart and destroy what Graham Stephan's architect designer and contractor did in order to re-engineer the master bathroom and master bedroom floor plan to fix what was extremely funky beforehand I'm going to do that by showing you what the architect designed then I'm going to step-by-step take it apart and then I'm also going to show you an entirely new floor plan that I came up with from scratch using the same measurements from the architect so I'm working within the same floor plan and we're going to use Google Sketchup to show you a 3d rendering of what this new floor plan will look like first let's hit the problems and don't worry I'm not only ripping on the design I'm going to solve every problem that I say here with a solution at the end a Graham has an approximately 21 by 14 and a half a foot a rectangle and he's trying to turn this into a master bedroom with sliding glass door master bathroom and a closet of a some form now he's able to do this to this 1920s duplex because in the 1970s the previous owner permitted an addition that gave just enough extra square footage to add a master bathroom it to this room this was an add-on wasn't it yes so this was done in the 1970s was it legal yes permits to do well I guess in the 70s you can get away with doing whatever you want that's true yes here's the outside stucco yeah oh that's incredible so this was done with permits and included on public record now I'm sure you could never do this yeah the problem is the current floor plans proposed by the architect aren't entirely functional here's option number one in this option you have a small walk-in closet as you enter the room and a separate master bath with a single vanity and corner shower this is okay but it honestly it lacks some enthusiasm and frankly I think it's weird as you walk into the master bedroom you basically walk into the closet you also have this weird element of having to go from the bathroom way around to the closet as you're getting ready it's just not as functional as it could be I always look at things like this and say look if you're going to do a remodel you may as well spend the same money and get something that's more functional so this isn't me suggesting that somehow Graham should spend more money it's just saying if you're already doing it you may as well do it in the best way that it can be now version 2 drawn up by the architect is having a linear closet in the hallway as you enter the room which just a note in my design I'm actually not even going to address the hallway that's all gonna be extra bonus square footage but then over in the master bath there's a little bit of cheating going on in my opinion with this diagonal corner shower opening which is somewhat a dated solution to small bathrooms you also have a few problems here once again you're decently separated from your closet but not only that realistically it's tough to determine where you'd want to put your clothes hamper for dirty clothing you don't have the same walk-in closet space as you did on the other side so you'd probably have to dedicate a drawer or a shelf or something and if you're doing a modern redesign there should be some thought for the hamper or some modern conveniences I think they try to solve that by having this 18 inch linen cabinet as we walk into the bathroom but it's a bit of an aesthetic no-no to walk into a cabinet right as you open a door now I know this is an example of function over form but it's just not the best it could be and I have a better solution now just full disclaimer I'm just another real-estate dude on YouTube I'm not an architect and I'm not trying to win any business here I'm just trying to help out my buddy Graham I personally like to use Google Sketchup Google didn't pay me to say that either it's just what I use I started designing this at an airport cafe while my flight was delayed and figured hey why not come up with some ideas first things first the most important thing with design is making sure you get the fundamental dimensions right the original plans have them but you have to be very careful for example the walls are six inches thick but that's not labeled on the plan you cannot have to puzzle that together by putting down the outside dimensions and then realizing oh cool okay they're using six inches for the walls based on some of these other interior measurements in my opinion if you're ever using Google Sketchup you should always try to work from the outside in and I'm not a Google Sketchup expert but I think it worked in this case anyway I spent a lot of time brainstorming and thinking up solutions I asked Lauren for help and I even spent some time googling minimum codes for things like toilet spacing to make sure I was designing something that could actually be installed then it finally hit me if you haven't yet you should go down to the description below and join my real estate investing course finance course do-it-yourself property management course or real estate agent as sales cores they use that coupon link below before December 20th to lock in the best pricing and learn perspectives that will make you a ton more money and then the solution to Graham's problem finally had Mia the master closet should be accessible from the bathroom itself full disclaimer though since Graham is already planning on adding this bathroom and a shower and closet I don't believe my design will be more expensive than his designs so I'm not doing this breakdown endorsing that Graham is doing all of this to a rental I'm just saying since he's doing it you may as well consider doing it like this so here you go here's the finished product the distance to the closet issue is solved that is while you're in the bathroom you could easily walk into the closet and out of the closet you don't walk into a closet door when you enter the bedroom and if you want you can even add a door to the master closet I designed or the master bathroom itself both of these are probably doors people would decide to add now you also have a functional space for the hamper and you have a normal-sized vanity and shower now Graham's prior floor plan also included a sliding glass door and a center wall for a TV I made sure to include those this is where it's important to test your design the room I designed is 13 feet five inches wide this is exactly what the prior design had now keep in mind you see 13:11 but you have to take off six inches for that wall on the right now the length of their bedroom is 12 feet 10 inches and this is actually where I borrowed some space from the master and gave my design about another 1 foot 4 inches to the bathroom so my designed master bedroom is 11 feet 6 and is long which is still pretty decent that gives you about a thirteen and a half by eleven and a half master-bedroom and technically you're supposed to describe the longer length as the length instead of the width but because of the way we're looking at this floorplan it's easier to describe it the way I just did and then the real magic happens in the bathroom see I don't like non-standard showers unless they're bigger corner showers aren't really functional to me so here I have a normal two and a half by five foot shower which if you wanted to do a tub shower enclosure you could do that if you wanted to fully wall up on the right side instead of having glass and then enclose the toilet you could do that as well I made sure they include eighteen inches from the centerline of the toilet left and right I believe usually 16 inches is required by code so I wanted to leave a little bit of an extra buffer there though I did make the wall between the toilet and the closet only four inches thick instead of six inches thick so you might have to use two by three lumber for that particular partition wall between the toilet and the closet which shouldn't be a big deal also since I did give the bathroom about one and a half feet of extra space which I took from the bedroom you might have to put a beam right here where this red line is but that shouldn't be a problem since it could rest on the outside wall and that new wall on the inside the closet is also a walk-in closet it's nearly the same size as what the prior architect had drawn up but it does have about two linear feet less of space remember though in design you have to be okay with give-and-take and this bathroom setup in my opinion is much more functional and I'm not that worried about two linear feet of closet space you'll also notice there's storage down below which it looks like here Graham's hoarding more Nespresso machines last Graham really wanted a two sink of vanity so here it is a fully functional 60-inch vanity with two sinks mirror and I even included some fancy wall sconces in fact this vanity is so functional take a look at this design that we can come down here and we can open this door and oh my gosh there's spilt coffee now this model isn't designed to be perfect but it's a way of getting great ideas flowing hope you enjoyed now here's a little bonus right as I was wrapping up my video I received an email from Daniel Kahn Kon who apparently makes automotive YouTube videos anyway he sent me his take on the floorplan and here it is daniel starts off by saying that he definitely agrees there's not enough closet space in the existing rendition and what he ends up doing to solve that is creating two closet spaces one in the master bedroom and one in the hallway this makes me think that in theory if you wanted to with the design I made you could use that little walk-in closet and that hallway as well and also have two closets that's a really good idea doubling up on the closets here and this is actually where you could see that design can be very collaborative the more people come together on a design the more ideas you can put into function I really like this idea now what I do like about Daniels floorplan is his bathroom the seams are pretty large and functional and you get that three by five a shower as well with that double vanity and maybe even that barn door slider there one flaw that I might see is the positioning of this closet and bathroom might make it a little bit harder to hang a TV but overall huge shout out to Daniel for the creativity in the floor plan and taking the effort to come up with this and design it mine just has spilt coffee and runescape logos so again big shout out to Daniel and folks let me know down in the comments below what you think about all these different variations [Music] [Applause]

Channel: Meet Kevin

Views: 101,274

Keywords: graham stephan, floor plan, design, architecture, real estate, real estate investing, RENTAL PROPERTY, duplex, rental remodel, contractor, architect, designer, stephan, graham

Id: HEtEYTFgSU4

Length: 10min 36sec (636 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 15 2019