Anyone here a builder or married to one?

[DawnM]

This question is in regards to bathrooms in a house.   If the house we are building is zoned for 3 bathrooms and 3 bathrooms only, I am curious what we can do to add bathrooms without adding bathrooms.

Like, if we have a jack and Jill bathroom and have a toilet and sink on each end and only have one tub/shower, is that one bathroom or two since there are two toilets?

I know I have seen master bathrooms with two toilets and then of course jack and Jill style.

We are not even planning to build right now, but it is in the back of my mind to get some ideas together as we have talked about it.   So I am coming here, rather than calling the zoning commission as that is a hassle and their answers may not be as creative or informative.

 

[mom2scouts]

Wait, your zoning laws don't allow more than 3 bathrooms!? I've never heard of that. What is the purpose of limiting bathrooms?

[Scarlett]

 Are you asking a structural question or a zoning question?

[Pawz4me]

14 minutes ago, mom2scouts said:

Wait, your zoning laws don't allow more than 3 bathrooms!? I've never heard of that. What is the purpose of limiting bathrooms?

If you're in an area w/o municipal sewer and need a septic permit. Here the county health department tests the soil (a "perc" test) and the results of that govern how many bathrooms are allowed.

[Katy]

2 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

If you're in an area w/o municipal sewer and need a septic permit. Here the county health department tests the soil (a "perc" test) and the results of that govern how many bathrooms are allowed.

Another reason could be limiting multiple families or generations and/or avoiding college rental house scenarios 

[DawnM]

3 hours ago, Scarlett said:

 Are you asking a structural question or a zoning question?

zoning.   

[DawnM]

3 hours ago, Pawz4me said:

If you're in an area w/o municipal sewer and need a septic permit. Here the county health department tests the soil (a "perc" test) and the results of that govern how many bathrooms are allowed.

Yes, this is for land that will need a septic.   

THey also limit bedrooms, but they don't limit other rooms, so you could have 3 "offices" that are used as bedrooms.   

[DawnM]

I am thinking something like this.  I would want it a bit bigger, but the idea is the same.   Each person gets their own sink and toilet, only the shower/tub area is shared.

Is this one bathroom or two?

 

[Melissa in Australia]

Why would you want to clean more toilets? 

I can never understand this thing about having more toilets than people. 

[Halftime Hope]

25 minutes ago, DawnM said:

I am thinking something like this.  I would want it a bit bigger, but the idea is the same.   Each person gets their own sink and toilet, only the shower/tub area is shared.

Is this one bathroom or two?

 

MLS listings often have bathrooms listed as N.N where the first N is full baths and the second N is half baths (sink and toilet). By that rule, your bathroom above would be a 1.1 (full bath + half bath).  Normally, a jack-and-jill bathroom is a single, full bathroom, accessed privately from two separate bedrooms.

Half-way across the continent, my daughter's house has three full bathrooms and one half bath, so the listing said 3.1.

 

 

[KungFuPanda]

I would guess the restrictions are in place to limit the number of residents in the home.  Anything you do to comfortably increase the number of people who can reside there beyond the maximum the septic can handle is probably a bad idea. 
 

Now I’m wondering if a toilet is what makes a bathroom a bathroom. 🤔 The image looks like two half baths that share a single shower. So two 5/6 bathrooms??? Really it’s one full and one half, so two bathrooms. 

Edited May 1, 2023 by KungFuPanda

[Scarlett]

59 minutes ago, DawnM said:

I am thinking something like this.  I would want it a bit bigger, but the idea is the same.   Each person gets their own sink and toilet, only the shower/tub area is shared.

Is this one bathroom or two?

 

Ok I get your question now but I don’t know. Septic tanks can be different sizes so I find it weird they have such a restriction. 

[Katy]

41 minutes ago, Melissa in Australia said:

Why would you want to clean more toilets? 

I can never understand this thing about having more toilets than people. 

In the US the mark of a high end home is generally less about square footage than it is having more toilets than bedrooms. So everyone has their own plus at least one on every floor for entertaining.  It’s not that bad to clean because the usage is spread out. And most people in homes like this don’t do their own cleaning. Even if they do a daily tidy themselves, the have a service come to do deep cleaning 1-4 times per month. 

[Selkie]

15 minutes ago, Scarlett said:

Ok I get your question now but I don’t know. Septic tanks can be different sizes so I find it weird they have such a restriction. 

It's not the size of the tank, it's how much the septic field can handle.

[Innisfree]

Is building somewhere else, which would let you design the house you want without worrying about septic problems or zoning issues, a possibility?

[fairfarmhand]

5 minutes ago, Selkie said:

It's not the size of the tank, it's how much the septic field can handle.

One has to add field lines to accommodate extra toilets.

[lmrich]

2 hours ago, DawnM said:

I am thinking something like this.  I would want it a bit bigger, but the idea is the same.   Each person gets their own sink and toilet, only the shower/tub area is shared.

Is this one bathroom or two?

 

this type of Jack and Jill makes sense to me!

[PeterPan]

Ok, you wanted creative, so don't shoot me. One, you can use a commercial septic system; we do. Two, doesn't sound like where you want to live. Three, given the inhabitants are largely male I'd probably be inclined to consider a *larger* bath rather than a jack/jill. How often do they even use the toilet? Some males go for long stretches, so it might be sort of a nice master (double sinks, large floor space, toilet closet with a door, shower cave with two heads) would be just as functional and nice for resale. Could be an inlaw suite, whatever. I'd think about what you actually need more of for them to functional tidily. The bigger my ds gets, the more things like space for laundry, a counter for shaving, etc. become issues. 

Does this floor plan include a finished basement? Then that's 1 master, 1 kid/guest, and 1 basement. So now you're asking whether a guest wants to use a j/j, which is negative. One larger bath with two sinks, private toilet, multiple people can function at once but it still feels normal to guests.

When we built our house, we took the space where most people would have put the central kid bath and put the laundry. Gotta say I enjoy that view every day, haha. The kid bath ended up interior, no windows, but oh well they're kids. 

[Scarlett]

2 hours ago, fairfarmhand said:

One has to add field lines to accommodate extra toilets.

Right. Maybe the lot is too small to handle more? 

[Scarlett]

3 hours ago, DawnM said:

I am thinking something like this.  I would want it a bit bigger, but the idea is the same.   Each person gets their own sink and toilet, only the shower/tub area is shared.

Is this one bathroom or two?

 

Side note—-Do you like J&J bathrooms? 

[Innisfree]

17 minutes ago, Scarlett said:

Right. Maybe the lot is too small to handle more? 

Or the soil doesn’t perc (drain) well, or the water table is too high. The harder it is for the water to drain, the lower the capacity for the septic system.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percolation_test

[Scarlett]

6 minutes ago, Innisfree said:

Or the soil doesn’t perc (drain) well, or the water table is too high. The harder it is for the water to drain, the lower the capacity for the septic system.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percolation_test

My BIL is in that business and Dh has been in construction his entire life and they haven’t heard of limiting bathrooms if it passes a percent test.  But it is possible different parts of the country have different soil/geography ect. 

[Pawz4me]

1 minute ago, Scarlett said:

My BIL is in that business and Dh has been in construction his entire life and they haven’t heard of limiting bathrooms if it passes a percent test.  But it is possible different parts of the country have different soil/geography ect. 

Here the perc test used to be timed, and the rate that the hole drained determined the size of the house that could be built (or whether it passed the test at all). It's been eight or nine years since we last had one done, so I don't know if the process is different now or not.

[Innisfree]

9 minutes ago, Scarlett said:

My BIL is in that business and Dh has been in construction his entire life and they haven’t heard of limiting bathrooms if it passes a percent test.  But it is possible different parts of the country have different soil/geography ect. 

Yes.

I had to put in a septic system at an old house in an area which, seasonally, had a very high water table. It was limited to three bedrooms because of the limited drainage when the water table was high, even though the soil was essentially sand and drained very freely at other times.

[Melissa in Australia]

3 hours ago, Katy said:

In the US the mark of a high end home is generally less about square footage than it is having more toilets than bedrooms. So everyone has their own plus at least one on every floor for entertaining.  It’s not that bad to clean because the usage is spread out. And most people in homes like this don’t do their own cleaning. Even if they do a daily tidy themselves, the have a service come to do deep cleaning 1-4 times per month. 

Guess it shows how low end I am, but seems to me that collecting toilets is a funny way of displaying wealth. 

[KungFuPanda]

42 minutes ago, Melissa in Australia said:

Guess it shows how low end I am, but seems to me that collecting toilets is a funny way of displaying wealth. 

It’s not so much a wealth display as it is a convenience. I grew up in a home with 6 people and one bathroom. I now live in a home with three people and three bathrooms. (It was four before Dd moved out) We’re not wealthy and our home is older, but we do enjoy this luxury. It’s not unusual for all three bathrooms to be occupied at once. Not having to wait is REALLY nice. DS can tie up a bathroom for an hour! 
 

If all the bedrooms in a new construction have an en suite bathroom then it makes sense that you wouldn’t want your houseguests using those; especially if they’re on another floor. I get that it does sound like a ridiculous level of privilege, but it doesn’t feel over the top fancy; it just feels convenient. Instead of cleaning one toilet a couple times a day you clean several toilets a couple times a week, so it’s not really more cleaning. 

[domestic_engineer]

I'm not a builder nor am I married to one, but here are my thoughts anyways ....   😛

You're really wanting 4+ toilets, not necessarily 4+ tubs, correct?  Assuming so, I think adding half bathrooms would be the way to go.  But I don't know how that would add up for the zoning rules.  (If you did want 4+ tubs/showers, then you'll want to plan your water heater accordingly.)

Here are my creative, but possibly illegal and/or gross, ideas especially since you have gents ...

• Can a bathroom contain a toilet and a urinal(s)?  What about a trough-style urinal in the bathroom?  
• Have a large half bath in the basement.  Also be sure to have a floor drain & epoxy(?) coating in the same area.  
• Outdoors, fence off a portion for privacy and set up a camping shower or go more permanent with an outdoor shower.  
• I've seen a (legal) home have one bathroom with jack and Jill entry into the sink area (there were two sinks), then opposite the sink was a door to the toilet & shower.  So sink users could be doing something while someone was showering.  This design is similar to what I'm trying to describe, but it happens to add a third entry!

Once upon a time, there was a thread on here that discussed a large family having a communal-style bathroom for each gender.  I even remember a sketch on the thread, but I'm not sure of any keywords or memorable words to google it.  Maybe someone else will remember it.

All this "creativity" but I'm sure there's some math and science behind the restriction, and I'm not really advocating or promoting that people should ignore that.  Maybe, at this point, you could get clarification from the zoning commissioners about how many full baths and how many half baths are allowed ... or if X half-baths are equivalent to 1 full-bath in their assumptions/calculations.  (<-  This seems much more palatable than living with a trough urinal in your home!)

[DawnM]

22 hours ago, Scarlett said:

Side note—-Do you like J&J bathrooms? 

I don't much care either way, but if it solves the number of bathrooms dilemma, I will use them.

[DawnM]

1 hour ago, domestic_engineer said:

I'm not a builder nor am I married to one, but here are my thoughts anyways ....   😛

You're really wanting 4+ toilets, not necessarily 4+ tubs, correct?  Assuming so, I think adding half bathrooms would be the way to go.  But I don't know how that would add up for the zoning rules.  (If you did want 4+ tubs/showers, then you'll want to plan your water heater accordingly.)

Here are my creative, but possibly illegal and/or gross, ideas especially since you have gents ...

• Can a bathroom contain a toilet and a urinal(s)?  What about a trough-style urinal in the bathroom?  
• Have a large half bath in the basement.  Also be sure to have a floor drain & epoxy(?) coating in the same area.  
• Outdoors, fence off a portion for privacy and set up a camping shower or go more permanent with an outdoor shower.  
• I've seen a (legal) home have one bathroom with jack and Jill entry into the sink area (there were two sinks), then opposite the sink was a door to the toilet & shower.  So sink users could be doing something while someone was showering.  This design is similar to what I'm trying to describe, but it happens to add a third entry!

Once upon a time, there was a thread on here that discussed a large family having a communal-style bathroom for each gender.  I even remember a sketch on the thread, but I'm not sure of any keywords or memorable words to google it.  Maybe someone else will remember it.

All this "creativity" but I'm sure there's some math and science behind the restriction, and I'm not really advocating or promoting that people should ignore that.  Maybe, at this point, you could get clarification from the zoning commissioners about how many full baths and how many half baths are allowed ... or if X half-baths are equivalent to 1 full-bath in their assumptions/calculations.  (<-  This seems much more palatable than living with a trough urinal in your home!)

Oh gosh, no, no outdoor showers (although near the pool might work) and no urinals or troughs.   I don't think we will have a basement.   I would prefer two sinks and two toilets and just share the shower area if we can make it work.

I toured the USS North Carolina and my boys loved it, but they display trough toilets and have pics of multiple men sitting on them together, out in the open......NOPE!  

 

[Halftime Hope]

I viewed a home with the second (#2) option in the link that the poster referenced above. The second floor Jack & Jill had a shared bathtub/shower and john, with a sink/vanity on either end, with a locking door between the tub/toilet room and the sink/vanity area. (Total of four doors in the whole J&J area.) It was quite nice for the inhabitants of the bedrooms. There was no door into the middle section with the toilet from the upstairs living area, a gameroom, so anyone in the gameroom either had to pop downstairs to the guest half-bath, or they had to go through a bedroom. I thought it was pretty poor planning, given the upstairs living area, but the sink and vanity adjacent to each bedroom was nice. As I recall, they also had a pocket door between the toilet and the tub and shower.