I’m of the mindset that the term “den” has come to mean absolutely nothing in the condominium world.

These “dens” have been slowly shrinking in the past few years to the point where you can barely fit six pairs of shoes in your “den.”

Let’s take a look at what passes for a “den” these days…

See that photo above?

Now that is a den, no if’s and’s or but’s!

But just as you might be disappointed to purchase a house and see this in your backyard posing as the “den,” you’d be quite disturbed to see what passes for a “den” these days in the condo world!

I was having a conversation in my office the other day with a colleague and I was telling him about a new listing I have coming out in the St. Lawrence Market area.

I told him, “It’s a really great unit – about 1200 square feet with every conceivable upgrade from the builder.  Totally open-concept; not an inch of wasted space – like no hallways or nooks or anything.  Two bedrooms, two bathrooms; parking and locker.”

And then, he said it: “Is there a den?”

I asked him, “What?  Why?  Who cares?”

He replied, “Well I’m just wondering….you said 2-bedrooms and 2-bathrooms….I’m just trying to picture it in my mind.”

So I told him, “Yeah…there are four dens.  Each corner of the room….”

He surmised that a den could make “all the difference” in the both the price of the unit as well as the functionality.

Really?

Because when I picture a “den” in any practically any condominium built in the past year, I picture a complete waste of space that was only built so that developers could advertise “…plus a den” in their pre-construction marketing.

What is a den?

When I was a kid, my grandmother’s house on Invermay Avenue had a “den” where we would go to watch Ferris Bueller’s Day Off for the thousandth time.  There was a large picture-window, two large three-seater couches, and enough room for five kids to wrestle on the floor after eating that poor disguise for pure sugar: Lick-A-Stick (aka “fun dip”)

My point to this trip down memory lane is that what qualified as a “den” when I was a kid would now be classified as a master-bedroom!

About twenty-five years ago, when God handed down condos to mere mortals in Toronto for the first time, a “den” was essentially a bedroom or a room without a window.

That was the one and only difference between a bedroom and a “den.”

You could NOT advertise a room as a bedroom unless it had a window, and thus the “den” was born.

But slowly, slowly, slowly, over the past few years, the “den” has been reduced to a four-by-three area that is just large enough to put a desk.  No longer is a “den” essentially a second bedroom where you could easily fit a double bed, a dresser, a couple night stands and lamps and have enough room for a person to live their life….without a window.

A “den” has now become anything that a developer wants it to be, since there are no hard and fast regulations about what a “den” actually is.

I remember when a few kids from the Queen’s Crew that I work with reguarly called me and asked for my help in finding them a 3-bedroom condo downtown.  I told them that there is no such thing as a 3-bedroom condo, save for maybe a few units in older buildings that come along a few times per year.

So they told me they wanted to look at a whole series of “two-bedroom-plus-den” units in hopes that one of them could turn the den into a third bedroom.  I knew this was a fruitless task before we could even begin, but I went along for the ride just to provide them with a learning experience.

We walked into the first unit at the evil CityPlace and took our shoes off, placing all four pairs of shoes next to a bunch of other shoes and a couple of sets of golf clubs which were leaning against the wall.  We looked through the unit – saw one, two…..just two bedrooms. 

We were utterly confused.

Luckily, there were a few floor plans sitting on the counter next to the feature sheets for the unit, and low and behold – the “den” was shown on the floor plan as the very area where we took off our shoes!

The “den” was an extension of the foyer which happily housed some shoes and golf clubs, and could hardly be considered a “living” area, let alone a third bedroom!

We walked through six units at CityPlace, all 2-bedroom-plus-den units, and all of the “den’s” were little more than an area to store a cabinet or a computer table.  In the end, my three kids pared down to two, and found a great two-bedroom condo.  I think the third kid lives in his mother’s basement…

Take a look at the floor plan below:

How can you possibly call that a DEN?

You walk in through the front door and you enter a foyer.

That’s all that really is – a foyer!  It’s not a den; it’s not a living space.  It can’t be a living space since you have to walk through it to get to the kitchen, living room, and bedrooms!

It is a complete and utter waste of space, and it’s what developers do to advertise “…plus a den” with all their new projects.

Here is an example of what passes for a den:

This is an extra-wide hallway that connects the bedroom and the living room, and the owners are using it to store a desk and a whole pile of something called “compact discs” or “CD’s” as they were known before my time…

However, this is listed as a “1-bedroom-plus-den” on the MLS listing!  This is the den!  Welcome home!

I get frustrated beyond belief by what Realtors and their sellers try and get away with these days.  But it’s the old adage, “Everybody else is doing it, so why shouldn’t I?”

If you list unit #2810 at Building X, and you see that all the other “Model-10” units are being listed as 1+den’s, and you know that it isn’t a true den, you’re still going to list it as a 1+den simply to keep up with the historical sales prices!

So what should a “den” look like in a condo?

How about this:

This room is 12-feet deep and 8-feet wide.  It’s as big as many bedrooms in the downtown core, and if you really wanted to, you could install a sliding door and utilize this as a second bedroom.

I could totally market this as a true “den.”

Then you have something like this:

This is more of a “nook,” wouldn’t you say?

Is this really a den?

This is a desk; a very small desk at that, which rests up against the wall around the corner from the living room.

Maybe that’s what we should do – make a new category called “nook!”

We can market “two bedroom plus nook” or even “one bedroom plus den plus nook.”

I think that’s the only viable solution.

I’m going to bring up this “nook” idea at the next Condo Task Force meeting at the Toronto Real Estate Board.  It’s not what you think – I don’t get to wear a cape or anything as part of the Task Force, but I do like the way tights feel against my skin…

There’s no solution to this “den” problem that I preach about incessantly, and there is no end to the madness on the developer end either.

It comes down to what it always does – buyer beware.

Call it a den, call it a nook, or call it something else.

Just know what you’re buying and whether or not the layout is functional.  Don’t be lured in by the “extra” den if you don’t see yourself using the space.