Trading a big house for a new semi-detached home near Otterburn Park raises a perfectly natural question: will you have enough room? On BÉAcité's Duo cottage, one option partly answers it: the mezzanine. Here's what a semi-detached home with a mezzanine near Otterburn Park brings, with figures taken from the floor plans.

BÉAcité is going up in Sainte-Julie, in the Vilamo neighbourhood, about 14 km from Otterburn Park town hall. Maisons Pépin offers three semi-detached models there: a single-storey bungalow, the Urbain model and the Duo cottage. It's on the Duo that the mezzanine is available as an option, alongside other choices such as a rooftop terrace or a cathedral ceiling.

Roomy homes in Otterburn Park

Homes in Otterburn Park are big. According to Statistics Canada's 2021 Census:

50.1% of dwellings have eight rooms or more, versus 23.6% across Quebec;
33.9% have at least four bedrooms, versus 19.5% in Quebec;
the average dwelling has 7.5 rooms, compared with 5.8 in Quebec;
83.4% of dwellings are single-detached houses.

So moving to a semi-detached home often means wondering what to do without the extra rooms: the guest room, the office, the playroom, the sewing corner or the workshop. The answer depends on the model you choose, and on the options.

The Duo cottage, before and after the mezzanine

The Duo cottage floor plans give these areas:

without a mezzanine: 2,018 sq ft of living space (858 sq ft on the main floor and 1,160 sq ft upstairs), plus an 858 sq ft basement and a 292 sq ft garage, for a total of 3,168 sq ft;
with a mezzanine: the mezzanine adds 338 sq ft, bringing the living area to 2,356 sq ft and the total to 3,506 sq ft.

In other words, the mezzanine increases the living area by about 17%; on the plans, the main floor, upper floor, basement and garage keep the same areas. On beacite.com, the plan of the cottage with a mezzanine is presented as an example of a possible configuration: the final layout is something you work out with the representative.

Semi-detached home with a mezzanine near Otterburn Park: what can the space do?

A mezzanine isn't an extra bedroom: it's an additional level, often open to the space below it. Depending on your needs, it can become:

a home office, away from the kitchen and living room;
a reading or lounge corner, under a high ceiling;
a play area for the kids;
a workshop for a hobby that needs room.

On remote work, one benchmark: in May 2021, at the height of the pandemic, 25.2% of Otterburn Park workers had worked from home, according to the census. That share may have changed since, but it's a reminder that a home office matters to many households. Before turning the mezzanine into your office, check on the plan how it opens onto the rest of the house, especially if you take calls.

A semi-detached home with a mezzanine near Otterburn Park is still a semi-detached home: the space you gain goes up, not out.

What the homes on Geoffrion Street show

BÉAcité's four turnkey homes let you see mezzanines for real:

at 405 Geoffrion Street, the home combines a mezzanine, three bedrooms and a rooftop terrace; the photos show the mezzanine set up as an office under a high ceiling;
at 423, a Duo, the photos show the living and dining rooms under the mezzanine, with a double-height ceiling; the house also has an open office for working from home;
at 435, the photos show an open-concept area with a glassed-in residential elevator and a mezzanine.

The areas given above are those of the Duo model as drawn: they don't describe any of these addresses in particular. The representative will tell you what each home includes.

Other options: the roof, the ceiling, the yard

The mezzanine isn't the only way to adapt a semi-detached home. According to the BÉAcité Duo project listing and beacite.com:

a rooftop terrace is available as an option;
a cathedral ceiling can top the dining room;
a pool or a spa is possible;
several lots have no neighbours behind them;
several interior finish choices are part of the standard package.

As standard, every home has 9-foot ceilings on the main floor and large windows in every room. If you're after a made-to-measure home, BÉAcité offers several customizable homes ready in about four months, and 20 more homes, cottages and bungalows, still to be customized. Ask the representative which options apply to the one you have in mind.

Mezzanine or single storey: choose by the way you live

A mezzanine adds a level, and therefore stairs. If you'd rather have everything on one floor, the semi-detached bungalow offers 1,006 sq ft on the main floor, the same in the basement and a 294 sq ft garage. The more compact Urbain model has 1,622 sq ft of living space over two levels.

Whatever the model, the landscaping is delivered finished and an all-inclusive program handles the upkeep: our article on the maintenance-free home near Otterburn Park explains what that changes. And if you're still weighing the move itself, another article looks at living in Sainte-Julie or Otterburn Park.

To see a mezzanine with your own eyes, drop by the sales office at 435 Geoffrion Street between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. on a weekday, or book an appointment for an evening or a weekend day. Eddy Guessous, sales director: 514-812-9633 (call or text) or ventes@beacite.com.

Conclusion

A semi-detached home with a mezzanine near Otterburn Park lets you leave a big house without giving up space: on the Duo cottage, the mezzanine adds 338 sq ft, for 2,356 sq ft of living area. A rooftop terrace, a cathedral ceiling and a lot with no rear neighbours round out the possibilities. The best way to judge is to see, at 405, 423 or 435, what a mezzanine looks like once the house is lived in.

Semi-detached home with a mezzanine near Otterburn Park: space that goes up