Level 03 and above, on foot
The top floor, built last and built steepest
The storey most often described wrongly on a quote form, and always for the same reason: the building has a lift, so the form says there is a lift. The converted top floor is up a separate later flight — usually the narrowest and steepest in the building — and that flight is the job.
The mattress is the item that reveals the problem. It always was.
What to measure on a top floor
Why the last flight is always the worst one
Because it was added after the building was finished, into a space that was not designed for it. A loft conversion or a top-floor flat gets whatever staircase will fit within the existing structure, and that means steeper, narrower and more turned than everything below it.
It also means that whatever furniture is already up there either came up in pieces, came up before the flight was installed, or came in through the roof. All three happen, and all three are worth knowing about before you plan to take a wardrobe down.
Eaves, slopes and what fits where
Top-floor rooms frequently have sloping ceilings, and the usable height against the wall may be well under full height. A tall bookcase or a wardrobe that fits the floor area perfectly may not stand up at all.
That matters on the way in as much as the way out. We will tell you when we think something is not going to stand in the room it is destined for, because the alternative is discovering it with the van already empty.
The mattress problem
A pocket-sprung king mattress folds against the person carrying it rather than with them, and on a steep narrow flight with low headroom it becomes genuinely difficult. It is the item that most often proves a top-floor route is tighter than described.
Where the flight will not take it, a roll-up or vacuum-packed mattress is a real option for the next move, and occasionally the honest advice is that the mattress stays.
Roof terraces and external routes
Where a top-floor flat has a terrace, it is sometimes the only viable route for anything large, and that is a surveyed operation with the freeholder's agreement rather than a decision made on the day.
We raise it at survey when we think it applies. We do not improvise external lifting, and anybody who offers to is not doing you a favour.
- The flight is measured before anything else is discussed.
- Anything that will not pass it comes apart or does not go.
- Bannister lifting only where the stairwell is genuinely open.
- External routes are surveyed, agreed in writing, and never improvised.
- We will say plainly when an item should not make the journey.
LVL 03+
Questions about top floor and loft conversions
- The listing said there is a lift. Is that wrong?
- It is usually true and usually irrelevant. The question is which floor the lift stops at, and for a converted top floor the answer is frequently one below you.
- How did the existing furniture get up there?
- In pieces, before the staircase was built, or through the roof. Worth asking whoever lived there before — the answer tells us more than any measurement.
- Can you get a wardrobe down a loft flight?
- A flat-pack one that comes apart, yes. A glued carcass, frequently not, and we will say so at survey rather than take it apart destructively on the day without asking.
- Is a top floor more expensive?
- We price the route. A top-floor flat with a straight wide flight can be cheaper than a first-floor one with a vicious turn. The flight is the question, not the number of floors.
Send us one measurement
The clear diagonal across the tightest turn on your staircase, corner to corner, with the handrail in place. That single figure answers more questions about a London move than a room-by-room inventory does.