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A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

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Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#261

Post by gdubs »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #93

One of the trends that I can only hope continues is getting rid of this idea that home ownership (especially single family home ownership) is the American dream. I live in and own a detached single family home (was a compromise with my spouse) and to be honest, I hate it. I hate having to take care of the yard, to deal with unreliable tradespeople when things break, to deal with the huge expense of minor home repairs…

When you have kids it’s nice to have some security around the school district of your choice. This is difficult in the Bay Area where in some neighborhoods there’s sometimes just nothing suitable to rent in the district.

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#262

Post by cosmodisk »

JeffreyKaine wrote: post #257
asark wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And walls. "Open concept" might look great in photos and provide good "wow" factor, and it's definitely cheaper to build, but it's also a great way to make a lot of square footage feel small when you live in it. Contrast smaller, older houses with lots of smaller rooms, which can often feel as big as much larger, newer houses. Unfortunately, at least in our market, there's not much built in the last 20 years where th…

What would you use all of the extra rooms for? One room for each person to sleep, a laundry room, a couple bathrooms, and a great room with living, dining, and kitchen is all you ever really need right?

The same logic applies to a living room that doesn't need to be as big as a football stadium: sofa,TV, a few chairs,table and sobe cabinets..what else is there?

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#263

Post by Balgair »

malvosenior wrote: post #241
Balgair wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don't you also lose a lot of the deposit money you put down on the old apartment and the services that went along with it though? Wait, what? It's a deposit, you get it back at the end of the lease. Like, granted, if you have a lot of damage to the carpets, sure, you're gonna be out $80 for the cleaning of them. But I've always gotten it back in full after a month or so. For me, moving is litterally a weekend (mayb…

In my experience I lose hundreds on my deposit every time (with very little actual wear to validate that loss). I've only ever rented in major cities though, so maybe it's less aggressively slum-lordy elsewhere. If you do have more possessions than you can move yourself, or your moving long distances, you end up spending a ton of money. Movers usually cost me 5-10k and I didn't even have a lot of stuff (2bd apartment…

> Movers usually cost me 5-10k

Wow! That is insane!

Here it's about $800 for anything less than 3 hours each way per truck load. And I think that is a rip-off. I've seen college towns that'll charge $50 for frat bros to move you about town all said and done (but then again a frat bro is moving your TV, so beware).

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#264

Post by x86_64Ubuntu »

imgabe wrote: post #243
maxsilver wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also hate maintaining a detached single family home with a yard. I also hate being responsible for the fixes. But that situation is still far better than renting. When we rented, we were subjected to eviction at any time, for nearly any reason, for basically no notice (60 days, which in the US is effectively zero notice). Your subjected to every whim the crazy wildly-irrational housing market throws at you (we've h…

I know landlord-tenant laws vary a lot, but how could you be subject to random evictions with only 60-day notice? Most places I've lived, you sign a one year lease. The landlord can't evict you while the lease is in effect as long as you are abiding by the terms of the lease.

You must not live in Georgia or the South.

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#265

Post by yason »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #93

One of the trends that I can only hope continues is getting rid of this idea that home ownership (especially single family home ownership) is the American dream. I live in and own a detached single family home (was a compromise with my spouse) and to be honest, I hate it. I hate having to take care of the yard, to deal with unreliable tradespeople when things break, to deal with the huge expense of minor home repairs…

I hate having to take care of the yard, to deal with unreliable tradespeople when things break, to deal with the huge expense of minor home repairs

So, how often do things break, then?

I've always thought of home ownership as full control of what gets replaced and when. No unnecessary refurbishments unless you like that sort of work, or opt in for preventative maintenance. Most people I know who live in single family houses haven't had to do much actual or imminent repairs. Wirings last for decades. Ditto for pipes and sewers. Heating too. Some have done minor jobs like repainting a few rooms, or painting the roof every ten years. Others couples do a lot of redesign, refurbishing, and redecorating all the time but they seem to like it.

In my experience, owning your house is a very cheap way to live unless you like to re-do things all the time. There's the risk of disasters like pipes breaking and flooding walls but those are, honestly, dead rare (and you carry insurance, of course).

Ditto for yard. You can make the yard do with minimal maintenance if you choose to do so. Or you can create a varied garden that generates a lot of work throughout the season if you like that sort of thing. But it's quite easy to create a minimal maintenance yard and most home owners I know seem to have opted for just that.

Disclaimer: I don't live in USA and maybe things are different there.

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#267

Post by rayiner »

asark wrote: post #251
rayiner wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So don’t buy a house with a big yard, etc.? We’ve got a house in a waterfront area that was laid out in the 1920s. Back when Americans were still free and there were no zoning codes. The houses are detached, but the lots are tiny (less than 3,000 square feet). No yard to take care of, close to neighbors, etc. And because people own rather than rent, you’re not getting a new set of neighbors every year.

Around here you sacrifice school quality, hard , for almost anything other than a typical big yard, large house, boring suburb house. The intersection between older neighborhoods or any trendy newer ones built more "urban" style and places with schools you'd be happy to send your kids to is practically nil. YMMV in other places, but that's why we're in a non-walkable boring suburb with dumb, giant yards making the di…

Where we live it’s illegal to make tight neighborhoods where children can walk around. Minimum lot siZe is 1/4 or 1/3 of an acre. We got lucky because we’re grandfathered in.

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#268

Post by rdiddly »

On one of my harder-hearted days I would've felt schadenfreude (rich assholes waste obscene amounts of money on tacky shit, get burned, film at 11), but today I feel sorry for them. The whole thing is just sad. On the macro level, such a tragic mis-deployment of resources. And on the micro level, misplacing one's priorities on material things and finding out the hard way that it doesn't bring any meaning to your life. I know someone going through this now in a more modest house... slowly but surely, starting to get tired earlier and earlier in the afternoons (granted, she smokes), getting sick of chores like cleaning gutters, mowing, clearing spiderwebs etc.

And all those empty rooms in the photographs! I don't imagine they see many days of being filled with smiling, laughing guests. Which is really the only true use of a house that big... you need to entertain, you need hundreds of friends to share it with, right? Otherwise what's the use? Maybe that's just me. I would probably get supremely depressed otherwise, all that space around me, waiting to be used, reminding me how empty it is.

Everybody gets old. Everybody dies. Everybody follows each other in a grand parade to oblivion. These people won the game the mid-20th century told them was being played, but everybody ultimately loses the Big Game.

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#269

Post by asark »

JeffreyKaine wrote: post #257
asark wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And walls. "Open concept" might look great in photos and provide good "wow" factor, and it's definitely cheaper to build, but it's also a great way to make a lot of square footage feel small when you live in it. Contrast smaller, older houses with lots of smaller rooms, which can often feel as big as much larger, newer houses. Unfortunately, at least in our market, there's not much built in the last 20 years where th…

What would you use all of the extra rooms for? One room for each person to sleep, a laundry room, a couple bathrooms, and a great room with living, dining, and kitchen is all you ever really need right?

A lot of the open concept houses around here use enough space for four rooms for one big one. Usually kitchen + dining area + a single living room easily large enough to be two. If you're lucky you have one other room in the public area, designated by design as a dining room (distinct from the merely-yards-away dining area!), and if you're super lucky it's at least got three walls rather than just being designated by flooring and maybe like one pillar.

More rooms is nice if you don't like being on top of every single other person in the house all the time, without having to go to your bedroom (aren't we supposed to only go there for sleep, for sleep-hygiene reasons?) to escape. In recent houses this means using ~3x the space you actually need to accomplish that, mostly by adding a room or two in a finished basement, because the main public area's gigantic, yes, but also entirely open.

It's also very nice to be able to contain messes. So nice. One large shared living space plus kids means no part of your house ever doesn't look like shit without heroic efforts or paid help.

Re: A Growing Problem in Real Estate: Too Many Too Big Houses

#270

Post by kasey_junk »

mox1 wrote: post #252
cblum wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you enjoy making repairs though? In my experience that’s what makes people either love or hate owning their place. Personally I loathe doing any kind of maintenance work. I hate dealing with drywall, paint, wiring, pipes, and whatever else you have to deal with when maintaining a home.

As an engineer (software) who owns his own SFH, I absolutely love doing repairs to my house. I preemptively replaced my water system this spring (electric to gas heater, added water softener). Took me a whole week (5-10pm work) and lots of pre-planning, but every time I walk downstairs I can't help but admire all the coppers lines I piped in. I dunno it was kinda like Hello World of the building trades, hearing the h…

As an engineer (software) who owns his own SFH and also did a gut rehab. I hate doing repairs on my house. Between not having the correct tooling, the time premium I pay beyond what a reputable tradesman will take and how much I prefer working on software for dealing with home repair, it makes _zero_ sense for me to do this work. Every time I do repairs I think of my run rate vs the professional I could be paying to do the work and get disgusted. The only reason I ever do it is that finding said professional is a gig unto itself.

I like the _control_ I have in owning my place, but I abhor the responsibility of fixing systems.

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