Living in a smaller house

[kealina]

Re: Living in a smaller house

i'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you meant 1100 sqft? otherwise WOWSER!

lol.... wasn't paying attention to those zeros, which is where they really add up huh? nope, i meat 1100... which is actually fairly spacious here in hawaii where land is very, very expensive...

[banana]

Re: Living in a smaller house

we live in a 1300 square foot house with a partially finished basement of about 500-600 square feet. We never use the basement. We have a nice family room down there with a tv and a bar and it sits there empty. The only time I go downstairs is to do the laundry. The only other thing the basement is good for is storage. There are 3 of us.

[Broken Arrow]

Re: Living in a smaller house

I am someone who wouldn't mind small spaces at all, especially if it lowers the overall cost of home ownership.

[tinapbeana]

Re: Living in a smaller house

I am someone who wouldn't mind small spaces at all, especially if it lowers the overall cost of home ownership.

BA, i've got a nice, um, 'guest house' i can rent you for only $100 a month... cozy, private, garden location...

[PRICEPLUS]

Re: Living in a smaller house

Looks like it needs just a little work BA!

[Broken Arrow]

Re: Living in a smaller house

LOL! Yes, I still got my eyes on that one, Tina. Yeah... nothing that a little drapes, a new coat of paint, and a bulldozer can't fix.

(In case anyone reading this didn't know, that's Tina's actual backyard tool shed! Too funny! )

edit: "Garden location". LOL!

[Bookie]

Re: Living in a smaller house

LOL! Yes, I still got my eyes on that one, Tina. Yeah... nothing that a little drapes, a new coat of paint, and a bulldozer can't fix.

(In case anyone reading this didn't know, that's Tina's actual backyard tool shed! Too funny! )

edit: "Garden location". LOL!

Hey, I thought you had dibs on Ima Saver's garage efficiency?

Fickle youth. Next they start competing for you.

[ren]

Re: Living in a smaller house

I don't know, can Ima Saver beat Tina's offer of only $100 a month? Will BA keep his word and go with the original offer even if she can't?

Find out next time, on As the Saving Advice Forum Turns!

[Broken Arrow]

Re: Living in a smaller house

Hey, I thought you had dibs on Ima Saver's garage efficiency?

I do! See, I'm a high rolling whale now, with all these real estates I'm a'flippin'. The best thing about it all is that it's so easy! Easy! And with your hard earned cash *cough* er hard work and my system, you can't lose! Tune in on the following informercial message and find out how you TOO can get in on the action! (Operators are standing by!)

I don't know, can Ima Saver beat Tina's offer of only $100 a month? Will BA keep his word and go with the original offer even if she can't?

Find out next time, on As the Saving Advice Forum Turns!

LOL! Mentally, I hear an organ chord playing in the back.

[sakigt]

Re: Living in a smaller house

My condo is 945 sqft and perfect for me. Its cheap, easy to maintain, and I dont have to fill it with "stuff"

My boyfriend wants to buy a house with a garage and Im thinking: Why? We can rock my condo for some years, save money, then throw down for a nice home.

Perhaps the reason is he is 25 and out of school and I am 23 about to dive back in.

[Diolla]

Re: Living in a smaller house

My house is 900 sf and it is perfect for me, after my divorce I realized I couldn't afford the upkeep/utilities on the 1600 sf house we owned when we were married so I moved here. Instead of $150- $200 a month just for heating/cooling it is $50 a month. I bought it for $34,000 ($27,000 mortgage) and my payment is $165.00 (P&I only) a month. I got a really good deal on a fixer upper owned by a nice guy. It is the crummiest house in a nice neighborhood. The move has allowed me to make some goals that would not have been possible had I stayed in the larger house and frankly I like the smaller house.

I agree that it is the layout that counts though. My house has nice sized BR closets, storage built into a windowseat, storage under the benches in the eating area, built in closet in the laundry and bathroom and a small (3x6) pantry off the back of the kitchen. Any unused space is a storage space and there are no hallways. The rooms just flow together with the bedrooms off the livingroom and the bathroom and laundry off the kitchen. It is very efficient.

I would not however like a condo, I can't stand sharing walls. BTW-so you will know houses in this neighborhood are usually much bigger 1600-2100sf and sell for $90-$100k so as you can see housing is cheaper here but not as cheap as my house. It was probably built as a 'mother in law' house for the huge house next door. Estimates on the renovations are around $15k and the 'after' appraisal is $83k. We'll see I plan on making it my last house.

[syracusa]

Re: Living in a smaller house

OK...topic I'm unusually passionate about!! House size.
I did not read all the other posts but...let's see:

IMHO (which by the end of this post may not turn out that humble, apologies in advance), Americans on average, live in indecently large houses, usually of mediocre to poor quality/built, whose purpose is still unclear to me - other than maybe the following:

1. To acommodate people's lack of knowledge as to how to make use of space and how to make the house look full and beautifully decorated at the same time.

2. To acommodate the large amount of junk on sale people collect by thinking of shopping as a sport or as a passtime, because well...there's nothing better to do (weak personal relationships, few touristic, cultural attractions, the inexistence of the concept "strolling about town, down a boulevard" as leisure pursuit instead of shopping; or "hanging out" in the local plaza cafe, in the street, European style).

3. Finally, to allow builders to make profits. Huge profits I mean.

After all, Americans are about the same size as the other humans on this Planet and they still have two legs and two arms, not more - same kind of creature. So no additional need for space here.
And yet...you hear so many Americans currently living in very spacious houses by world standards... that they need to move to a bigger house because their family has grown (ta-daaaaa!!!: they have one child now!!)

I have been in this country for 8 years and I still cannot get over the enormous amount of wasted space that the average American family fails to make use of in a typical house - and then they complain that there's no more space, hence they need to move into a bigger house. And bigger. And then bigger.

To use HBO Bil Maher's concept: NEW RULES!!!!

1. Stop buying the amount of junk you buy. Buy few and buy high quality - yes, yes, yes - the kind of stuff "rich" people buy.
You CAN afford it if you stop the "junk buying" sport.

2. Use up your space, not just horizontally but also vertically.

Stop placing a small little picture (or two) in the middle of that McMansion's humangous wall and then call that "decorating". It's not decorating - it's just a bad idea that only ups the cheap factor and it's plain bad taste.
Take those kitchy framed pictures off and buy instead some serious, tall furniture that would cover your room wall-to-wall and ground to ceiling. You'll see how much storage space you'll get then and how the appeal of a bigger home might actually go down.

Use armoirs in addition to those-built in closets!
(edited for "sweeter tone" though, honestly, I am still simmering when I see people with completely empty walls complaining about space).

And again, cover your walls with furniture specially made to deposit lots of things in. In the little space left on the wall then place your little framed pictures (the less kitchy, the better). Little pictures belong to little spaces.

Unless you really are rich (ok... newly-rich, because if you were "rich" you would be living in a Mansion, not in a McMansion) and have some huge, glorious framed art to place on walls to the point where the walls will be almost entirelly covered - don't assume that that huge wall is for placing a little mediocre picture on it.

Or even worse, several little pictures.
Or the worst - tons of little pictures with family photos.

Walls look better almost entirely covered - by furniture and art. Period.
(Your kids' scribbles do not qualify as art, sorry).
Otherwise your house looks barren and as if you are in a constant state of "ready to move out". And by the time you sink all your money into that McMansion mortgage that will impress friends with its size, you will surely have no money left over to decorate it adequately with heavy furniture and glorious art - as houses of respectable size require.
I've seen about a million big American houses suffering from this "empty" syndrome on realtor.com. Or the other syndrome: "filled with a million chaotic nicknecks".
Not sure which is worse.

3. Stop assuming that the number of bedrooms you must have should IMPERATIVELY equal the number of kids you have + 2 or + 3 (parents, guest, office).
Instead, start raising siblings that will actually love each other and will be best friends later in life, offering each other hands-on, real support ... why? Because they have built common chidlhood memories, having grown up close, giggling together and sharing kid stuff at night in their bunk-beds by simply being forced to share a room - as opposed to doing their own separate thing in their own separate rooms: perfect strangers in the perfect American home.

Physical closeness can contribute to emotional closeness and sentiments, believe it or not. How can you get to know your sibling really well when you spend most of your childhood either in outside-of-home activities or in separate rooms, sharing little to nothing?

I for one, even if I had 10 to 20 bedrooms in the house (which I would never actually agree to have even with Bill Gates' assets transfered to my account) I would still have my children share the room with a sibling.
Siblings should grow up together, not separately.


Conclusion:
You already ARE living in a big house!

[Diolla]

Re: Living in a smaller house

IMHO (not humble, honest)

Maybe you should read the other posts.

I find generalities irritating and the attitude insulting. I agree with some of your points but your way is not necessarily always the best way.

[syracusa]

Re: Living in a smaller house

IMHO (not humble, honest)

Maybe you should read the other posts.

I find generalities irritating and the attitude insulting. I agree with some of your points but your way is not necessarily always the best way.

It could be. :

I am aware that many people on this forum may live in small places. But what I wrote was not addressed to specific persons on this forum.
It's about a national trend that anyone can notice. Yes, it is a generality - but generalities have their place.
As for "humble", there's nothing humble about people living in very big, unused spaces and then saying that they have no more space and they need more.
It just begs for abrasive, less-than-humble comments.
Maybe the reason why what I described feels "irritating" - is because it is real and unwarranted?

I don't know. I just wrote what I have observed throughout the years. That's all.

[PRICEPLUS]

Re: Living in a smaller house

syracusa, I live in a Cape Cod house. The ground floor of my house has about as much square footage as the aprtment I grew up in with my eight siblings and parents. It is somewhat true that people get a bigger house and then have to get more "stuff" to fill it! I am looking to de-clutter myself. My basement is a disaster! My wife would have liked a bigger house but that comes with bigger expenses and taxes!

A greatmany folks on this site are not in huge houses nor do they want to be. I orefer the coziness of my home. I don't want to live in a McMansion that is a cookie cutter of all the others going up! I have oak hardwood floors in my house. You don't get that today! I have a one car garage and we live on a 1/3 acre. That is palatial compared to how I grew up!

Don't assume that all AMericans are the same. You need to travel the country a bit to see what it is all about! We are as diverse a group as you'll ever meet!