http://www.housedetective.com/2009/11 ... ents-for-a-legal-bedroom/



The House Detective: by Barry Stone, Certified Home Inspector

Dear Barry: I am looking for the legal definition of a bedroom. I bought a house that was listed as a four-bedroom home. Two bedrooms are in the remodeled attic, with short, doorless alcoves for closets. And I?m not sure if these rooms are large enough to qualify as bedrooms. Can you help me to figure this out? Christine

Dear Christine: Here are the basic requirements for a bedroom:
1) A bedroom must be at least 70 square feet in area, with no dimension less than 7 feet.
2) The ceiling must be at least 7 feet high above the finished floor. If the ceiling is sloped, 50% of it can be less than 7 feet, but no part of it should be less than 5 feet.
3) There must be an openable window for light, ventilation, and fire escape. For light, the window size must be at least 8% of the floor area. For ventilation, the openable portion of the window must be at least 4% of the floor area. For fire escape, the window must be at least 5.7 square feet in area. The opening must have a minimum height of 24 inches, a minimum width of 20 inches, and a maximum sill height of 44 inches. (Note: There are additional window requirements for basement bedrooms, but this was discussed in previous articles.)
4) Contrary to popular belief, no closet is required in a bedroom.

a bedroom need not have a closet not sure about the railroad rooms though

A closet, a door and a window.

I am mostly posting out of curiosity. In MA where I used to live, a bedroom had to have its own door and a closet. Here I'm pretty sure that closets are not required, but I read on another thread that a window is?

I ask because my apartment was marketed as a 2 bedroom but I would consider it a small 3 bedroom. There is one room with a door, window, and no closet that I'd consider a bedroom (we use it as an office). There is another room off the kitchen with a window but no door or closet which we use as a pantry (it's big enough to fit a twin bed but not much else). Then the room we sleep in is a sort of box built out in between the kitchen and living room that has 2 sets of doors but no window. It's basically a modified railroad layout where instead of the kitchen, living room, and bedroom all leading into each other, the bedroom is a box in a middle and the living room and kitchen are connected via a hallway running alongside the bedroom.

We think the building used to be a rooming house because there are also 3 different entrances to the unit (1 into the kitchen, 1 into the living room, 1 into the front bedroom/office) and that it was renovated into a single unit, hence the odd design.

So here's the riddle: which rooms are legally the bedrooms?