Hi, I’m hoping someone might be able to shed some light on an issue for me … we’re looking to buy a terraced townhouse in a town outside of Dublin that ticks a lot of our boxes. It’s being advertised as a 3-bed house, but the middle bedroom doesn’t have a window, it has a skylight instead. Are there legal/safely implications with this, e.g. would it considered a fire hazard and maybe therefore unfit to be classified as a bedroom, and therefore the house should really be sold as a 2-bedroom house rather than a 3-bedroom? Does anyone know or could they point me in the direction of where I might find out more before we go sale agreed on this and get surveyors etc involved? Thanks Pinsters!
Part B - Fire Regulation (2006) p.53:
1.5 Dwelling Houses
1.5.2 The following provisions apply to dwelling
houses where the height of the top storey is not
more than 4.5 m (see Appendix C, Diagram 38).
This type of dwelling house typically has one or two
storeys:
(i) any habitable room which is an inner room
should be provided with a window for escape
or rescue in accordance with 1.5.6.
Wow that was quick! Not to go too mad on the superlatives or anything, but you guys are awesome! Thanks for that.
To conlcude this thread the answer you are looking is… It’s not a bedroom. Therefore it should be classed as a 2 bed. I had a similar issue when going to view a rental a few years ago. Attic conversion was not a bedroom despite haven beds in it, it certainly as not a legal bedroom up to standards. Somewhat miffed at the sloppiness of agents on this matter. Wasting peoples time.
I think dublife is more awesome than you are because (s)he’s memorised the building regs, so yah boo sucks! 
If only! My copy/paste skills are reasonable though…
Of course, I’m sure you are all awesome in your own very special ways 
It depends:
If the room dates from before the building regulations, it is legal (though unsafe). The fact that it is a rooflight suggests this is not the case however.
Secondly, if the means of escape is by a protected staircase, then the fact that there is no escape window is ok.
[e.g. 3 storey houses (as opposed to 1, 2 or 2.5 storey) must have protected stairs to escape - thus whether there is a window or rooflight doesn’t matter. Same applies in apartments].
Thanks Superman, that’s interesting. It’s difficult to know when the room dates from, it’s part of the original structure of the house I think (dating back about 90 years I guess) and an extension was built onto the house at some point with an extra room, which left the original back bedroom with no window of its own, so hence the skylight I guess. I can’t say when the extension was built on, being totally inexpert in this area - I guess that’s just one of the many reasons we’ll need to get a survey done if we decide to move ahead with it. The staircase is totally open, definitely no fire doors etc. However the room itself would make a pretty good home office I think, it’s a good size with plenty of natural light from the skylight window (which opens, but I wouldn’t fancy trying to clamber up there if there was ever a fire!). It’s just annoying that the estate agent is trying to pass it off as a three bedroom house when it isn’t … not that I’m surprised of course, in my experience they’d try to pass off a cat litter tray as a bedroom if they could.
No, that would clearly be a downstairs WC