Bremont Homes

I second-hand purchased a townhouse in Derry Chase community. The exterior looks quite presentable, but the finishing inside is terrible.

LAYOUT
Room / bathroom layout is quite moronic.
1. Our master bath has an elongated rectangular layout. On one side it has a hole-in-the-wall shower, and on the other - small-size bathtub (without shower) on the other. That barely leaves space for a toilet and small cabinet+sink - and nothing else - for a master! bathroom. The bathtub is too small to fill and relax. The shower is claustrophobic. The towels are across from the door from the shower - there is no place to hang it closer, so every time the floor is guaranteed to be wet.

They could've extended the bathroom or removed either the shower or the bathtub to make more room. The master bedroom has thus unnecessary corners.

2. The stairs is a main feature of a townhouse. The living room stairs, instead of having an L shape to create a natural boundary, lands right in the couch-or-tv area of the living room, meaning that you can't quite put anything too close there. It "breaks" the flow of the living room and makes it effectively smaller.

3. The entrance is only door-wide and door-and-a-half long (then the stairs start). Thus, one can barely enter and close the door before starting to take the shoes off. If you carry groceries or if 2 people need to enter, everyone waits for the first person to take the shoes off first to proceed, while the door is open. We have Canadian winters!!!

4. Light switches are another highlight of the design. Living room has 2 lights; one is in proper place, the other is on the opposite wall near a corner away from entrance or stairs or anything. To get to dining area you pass the kitchen, but the light switch is in a corner behind an 1-foot wall extrusion (not visible from the entrance). With our rather small dining table, we need to move chairs around in order to reach it. If I was actively trying to place the switch as out of the way as possible, the only other contender would be the balcony.

5. The smallest bathroom is another gem. It's only slightly wider than the toilet, and the toilet is facing... the mirror.. in case you need to look at yourself while going about your business.

FINISHES
1. Stair finishing it terrible, especially in the corners and junctions. Someone was probably in a hurry to finish and didn't want to spend the extra time. Mid-way up, near the ceiling, the rails have to become narrower - the transition is clumsily done, not to mention that this is a design flaw.

2. Where things could align, they don't. Wall under the stairs could have been higher to meet the stairs stringer, or extend further. No. Instead, it stops just before and goes up about 10".

3. The main entrance on the outside has all the utility meters. There is no way to personalize it at all. Why not position it near the back door?

4. Ugly transition from hardwood floors of the living to tiles in the kitchen.

5. Too many other little annoyances, borne out of poor planning and finishing.

It reminds me of a government website - shiny on the outside, but not thought through and buggy on the inside. I design products and experiences for a living. This house is the anti-thesis to everything I do.

Why did I buy it then? When buying second-hand one can choose only from in-market selection and needs to weigh tons of other factors (price, schools, neighbourhood, timing, etc...). Not everything is immediately clear when visiting during open house.