I'm nearly positive that NC requires a bathroom on all floors with bedrooms. They might even require a bathroom on all floors. There is a ceiling height limitation and I think it is above 7 foot. Every floor needs to be separately zoned on HVAC. Shortcuts are generally not allowed in new construction in NC. In my jurisdiction, if they think it looks like it could be a bedroom, it needs to be set up like a bedroom. Smoke detectors, ARC fault, enough egress windows etc. That is a pretty strict interpretation and I realize that is local.

At a pet store, they have a product called 'Nature's Miracle"...which an enzyme designed to remove odor ands tain from "pet accidents"....but works for human accidents too..... Linda C

If one of the two baths is an en suite devoted to one bedroom, I would say it's worth adding at least a half bath. If you have the space, go for a full bath. An extra toilet is nice and even just a small standing shower can help make your home run more smoothly when all of the bedrooms are full. I don't know the exact trade-off on resale. There are a lot of factors that will determine that, including the finishes you choose in the bathroom, the cost of the work in your area, and the overall impact the bathroom has on how your home flows and fits together. A bad reno can be worse than just leaving the house as is, so the question of "will it help resale?" can be really tough to answer without managing the project every step of the way. Example: Removing the master bedroom's walk in closet to add a bathroom or adding a bathroom that opens directly into your once fabulous kitchen.... Probably won't have the desired trade-off. Those are some decently obvious pitfalls, but there are many, many other less obvious ones that would only come up on a case-by-case basis. That said, I've been doing a lot of research on bedroom:bathroom ratio. It isn't an exact science, and I didn't crunch hard data, but anecdotally, this is the estimate I come up with. If n is the number of bedrooms.... The number of toilets should be at least n-2. ... 4-2 = a 4 bedroom home should have at least 2 toilets. The number of toilets in the home gains little above n+1. ... 4+1 = a 4 bedroom home gains little value from having more than 5 toilets. So, having between 2 and 5 toilets is good for a 4 bedroom home. The home loses sell-ability with only 1 bathroom. The resale increase diminishes for more than 5. The number of showers in the home should be at least n-2. ... 4-2 = a 4 bedroom home should have at least 2 showers. The number of showers in the home gains little above n. ... 4 = a 4 bedroom home gains little value from having more than 4 showers. So, having between 2 and 4 showers is good for a 4 bedroom home. All homes should have at least one bathtub. If there is only one bathtub in a home that has at least 3 bedrooms, that bathtub should be kid friendly (most people buying 3+ bedroom homes are parents or people planning to be parents). I haven't figured out a rule of thumb for when it becomes necessary for there to be a second bathtub, but at some point, more bathtubs become essential to provide the luxury that fits the home. Hope this helps.

Cork is an excellent carpet replacement product. It is warm and quiet underfoot. It comes in two formats: A floating click-together format for 'dry' areas and a glue down tile for wet areas such as bathrooms and mud rooms. Yep...you heard me. The glue down cork tile is 100% water proof. As in MORE water proof than vinyl click together products. How? The glue down cork tiles are butted together (no grout lines) when installed. They are then coated x2 with water based polyurethane. The poly seals the seams to create a continuous sheet of cork. The only areas of concern (as with ALL floors in a bathroom) would be at the walls where cork meets drywall. I'm a cork flooring expert. I've done this more times than I can count. A situation like yours were you do NOT want to refinish the entire house because two rooms had issues. Cork is an oak. It has many of the same colour tones as White and Red oak. In fact it starts out quite orange (sigh...ignore that phase of it's life...it doesn't last very long) but soon calms down to a lovely soft yellow which is IDENTICAL to the current laminates you have. Here's how I would do it: I would pick a floating floor that has an IDENTICAL glue down tile option. I would install the floating floor in the bedroom. This gives you the 'total' floor height that you need to match. Now you remove the bathroom flooring and lay in new plywood OR cement backer board (cork doesn't care) to raise the floor up. Now you glue down the cork tile (6mm or 8mm) so that it matches the existing floating floor. Finish the floor in two coats of polyurethane and Voila! A continuous floor with minimal effort. A glue down tile floor (if you hire this part out) is going to cost (labour plus materials) the same as a porcelain tile installation. That's roughly $12-$15/sf. Sounds horrible until you realize you have 30sf to cover...now that's not too bad! A floating cork floor will cost (roughly) the same as a HIGH END vinyl floor installation ($4-$5/sf for materials + $3/sf for labour). www.icorkfloor.com Cork Flooring Tiles Glue Down - Forna Silver Birch 6mm Flooring (icorkfloor.com) Floating Cork Floor - 12mm Forna Floating Cork Flooring (icorkfloor.com) Those are just and example of how to get a continuous floor in two different formats of cork.