Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: sofa beds in guest rooms?

[Kay Argyle (Kay.Argyle]

The downstairs guest room at Wasatch Commons does double duty as a small
meeting room. Based on our experience, even though a Murphy bed costs maybe
twice what a sofa bed does (or as much as a high-quality one), it's worth
it.

The sofa bed we used to have there wasn't that great as a sofa, and worse as
a bed. My brother would request a sleeping bag on the floor in preference
(mind you, this is not some agile twenty-something, but a portly gentleman
who has strangers stop him on the street to ask if he ever does gigs as
Santa Claus). My elderly mother insisted on making the long drive home
rather than try to sleep on the sofa bed. That meant she had to leave while
there were still a couple hours of daylight so she wouldn't be driving after
dark, which tended to cut her visits short. :(  For a guest making a week's
stay, we spent hours moving furniture to get a borrowed bed into the guest
room.

Admittedly, the sofa bed was a hand-me-down like all our common house
furniture; maybe a new one would be better. Others in the community found it
perfectly adequate. On the other hand, perhaps they never had guests with
bad backs -- but because all we had to offer was the sofa bed, my household
rarely did either. 

We found a used Murphy bed. Installation by a professional cabinetmaker
added a couple of hundred to the cost. It can be gotten down or put away by
a single not-very-strong person. When closed it simply looks like an oak
cabinet, maybe 18" deep. 

Kay
Wasatch Commons
Salt Lake City
 

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