If you dont need all three bedrooms, and are maybe short on a bathroom, that 9 x 10 foot room could pretty "easily" be transformed into a new bath and a couple of closets. Sadly, most older houses have had really horrible closets additions. One that I saw in an otherwise outstanding home in Louisville was a block about 6 x 6 feet and rather than going up to the ceiling, actually had its own ceiling/roof - it was horrific and ate up most of the room.

Far easier than the above suggestion is this: keep the closets as is, but if you can, use the 9x10 room itself as a closet by keeping the door and windows closed, and install a few hanging rods to hold the clothes. With doors and windows closed, there should be no more dust than in your normal closets. Saves a heck of a lot of money too!

Further, you won't lose the resale value by reducing your number of bedrooms from 3 to 2.

We've also got ridiculous closets. The one in our master is 3'x6', that is three feet wide by six feet deep. I call it diving for clothes. Our solution was to move all of DH's stuff to another bedroom. That's still not enough, so I'm also using a free standing wardrobe. When we go to sell, I will pack up most of the clothes and hide the wardrobe. The buyers won't have any more clues than I did regarding how lousy the closets are.

In our littlest bedroom, the closet door only opens about a foot and a half before it hits the radiator. So for 90 years, only the skinny kid could use that room. What were they thinking?

Ha............at least you had closets. In our 200 year old house we had ONE, in one of the four upstairs bedrooms and not deep enough for a hanger. Just hooks. The rooms are quite large, however, and when the husband bought this house before we were married, he had plenty of room to run them in the inglenooks by the fireplaces. Our old house in France didn't have a closet one. We used wardrobes. I'd also suggest using the third room as a clothes room and most folks can really get rid of 3/4 of the clothes they own and never miss them.

If stairs are an issue, I would also agree that using a spare bedroom would be a good option, if you can spare it (no pun intended).

My late 1800s house has one small closet in one large bedroom and a small closet in the pass through room that will become my office. My master bedroom has no closet and is on the small side so I didn't want to fill it up with furniture so I opted to finish part of the attic and make it a closet. The only access to the attic is through what is now the master bathroom so it made more sense to use it than to lose a spare bedroom since I have frequent out of town visitors.

Good luck!

Thanks to all for your ideas and some of you really brought it home when you talk money! I live alone and I am single, disabled, 61 years old and this house most likely will be donated to the Animal Shelter in my area. My child does not want the house or to be tied up to it, so at this point the house remodel will be for my comfort and also I was thinking of getting a roommate! One of you suggested that I should get rid of some clothes (I will, I promise) So for the purpose of my comfort I think I will revisit Columbusguy advise. Thank you all for your advise, you helped me save a lot of money and you helped me put things in perspective!