ᐅ Alternative for Office/Home Workspace on the Ground Floor

Hello everyone,

Last week, an interesting discussion about working from home started at our workplace.

Due to the current situation, many employees have been allowed to work from home. However, there is not always a suitable and/or separate room available for this.

The same question arises when building a new house – should I include a home office, or does it take up valuable space that could be better used, especially in smaller houses?

One colleague set up a garden shed as an office. However, this is not always comfortable; for example, sometimes he has to walk through the garden in the rain to use the bathroom inside the house. Another suggestion was to have an additional room in the garage, but living space is not always allowed there, is it?

Has this question come up for you as well, and if so, how have you handled it?

From the beginning, we clearly decided to include an office in the plan, even though no one currently works from home—although, especially by the standards of this forum, we are building a very small house. The office is even designed so that both of us could theoretically work there in the future.
As long as we don’t need it, it will be used as a guest room. In five or six years, when it is needed, a new sofa bed will be purchased, and the guest room will be discontinued.
Just in case, we are also installing the necessary connections in the walk-in closet now, so that another workspace could theoretically be created there.

A family can make good use of a multipurpose room that can serve as an office, gym, hobby room, storage space, or even accommodate a fold-out bed for guests.

In expensive apartments, interior designers often find clever ways to make built-in closets or storage areas more livable by adding a pull-out shelf or desktop for a PC. A sewing machine can also be integrated this way. This works well in niches in hallways, living rooms, or bedrooms, as well as under stairs or kitchen cabinets. Such conversions are often costly, so a small room in a single-family house, which can be closed off with a door for privacy, is usually a more practical option.

If a room is to be used as a home office, meaning it is not intended for temporary remote work as many people currently practice, the workplace regulations must be observed.

I think having a room like that is necessary. For paperwork, possibly a home office, with a pull-out sofa for guests, maybe space for a cross-trainer, and extra storage in addition to the often tiny utility room in houses without a basement... Just some reserve space. Of course, there has to be enough room for it. With 120 sq m (1,292 sq ft) for four people, it can already get tight. But in average houses of 140-160 sq m (1,507-1,722 sq ft), I would always try to allocate 8-10 sq m (86-108 sq ft) for such a multifunctional room. I would rather give up a walk-in closet or a kids’ bathroom for that. For me, such an office is not just a home office but, as described, a multifunctional space.

Base your decision on the following questions:

• What do I need to work effectively?
• When do I work?
• Am I undisturbed at that time?
• Do I disturb others then?
• What requirements does my employer have?
• Possibly a future employer?

I have solved this very flexibly for myself – basically, two of us live in a studio house. I prefer to sit at the dining table, but that annoys my wife when she is at home. Therefore, I also have a small hidden desk (Müller Flatmate) on the mezzanine. When I have many calls, I go to the camper van or use a kind of workspace outside the house. I also meet business partners there.
A separate room would make things much easier – but it would also affect the very private character of our home.
If one of the children moves out of their apartment, I can set up an office there without connection to our living area – with toilet, kitchenette, and separate entrance – so it would be possible to separate the spaces.