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March 20, 2009
Cellar access
In our 25' rowhouse, our tenant's garden rental will have a bathroom that opens onto the hallway. Does anyone have suggestions for landlords' (us) access to the cellar from the upper triplex without inconvience to the tenants? Thanks.
Comments
not sure what the bathroom opening onto a hallway has to do it, but if by that you mean that you cannot access the cellar via the garden apartment, I'm with you.
We had same problem and opted to dig out the coal chute (that little square hatch you see on many houses in front of the garden apt. window opposite the stoop) and install stairs/metal door. We keep this locked with a pad lock. It's not ideal: you lose a good part of your front yard (but not all of it), and you have to go outside to get to the cellar. Plus, the door we have leaks like crazy. Alternative is to dig out an entry in the backyard -- but then anything you want to store in the cellar will need to travel through the house first. good luck.....
Posted by: slopenick at March 20, 2009 2:44 PM
Could you explain this a little better?
Posted by: annieny at March 20, 2009 3:14 PM
Explain it better? Well, you understand what the coal chute is, right? A hole in your front yard used to deliver coal. We expanded - "dug out" - the hole so it would be big enough to accommodate stairs. The stairs provide access from the front yard of the house to the cellar. We had some metal cellar doors installed on top of the stairs to secure the cellar, which are locked with a pad lock. So, to get into the cellar, you go out the front door, down the stoop, across the yard to the metal doors, open them, down the stairs and you are in the cellar.
Obviously, this is in the front of the house. You could do the same thing in the rear as well.
Posted by: slopenick at March 20, 2009 3:37 PM
Anybody has any suggestion about getting access from the parlor floor (occupied by the owner) to the cellar without taking so much space from the garden floor (rental)?
I am sure many people had this problem and I am also sure somebody must have a good solution, using the least amount of space. The building is 20 feet wide.
Posted by: Dean5th at March 20, 2009 4:00 PM
1. cut 2-foot hole in floor on parlor level
2. cut 2-foot hole in floor on garden level, immediately below the parlor hole
3. hang shower curtain in cylinder shape between the two holes
4. install fireman's pole and/or rope ladder from parlor floor to cellar
Posted by: z at March 20, 2009 4:41 PM
I just kept the stair hall for the upper owner's duplex.
I reconfigured the garden floor rental so that the tenant enters under the stoop into the vestubule and then an immediate 90 degree turn to their front door.
The door in front of them leads to the stair hall and is locked and a secondary entrance to the upper duplex. (this door was needed in addition to the locked pocket door from the stair hall into the tenants front parlor for some of their furniture moving as the hard turns into their entrance is too tight for some larger pieces.
Posted by: SenatorStreet at March 20, 2009 6:02 PM
I'm not sure that we understand each other with regard to the layout (and not being able to post images here doesn't help).
Please email me (ron @ senatorstreet . com) and I'll send a couple of diagrams showing what I mean.
Ron
Posted by: SenatorStreet at March 21, 2009 2:44 PM
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