Dream House or Nightmare? (regretting building a McMansion)

[Liberal_in_LA]

http://www.newsweek.com/id/52608/page/2

Builder's Remorse: The Elliotts' four-bedroom home in Palm City, Fla. Dream House or Nightmare?
For years Americans custom-built homes with pricey extras expecting high returns on their investment. They're in for a letdown.

**snip**
The Elliotts are also realizing they have more house than they need. Like some of the people described in Daniel Gross's story in this week's edition of NEWSWEEK, Roger regrets building a home that has so much unused space. "If I could do it again I'd do it a lot differently. I'd scale it back in every area," he says.



http://www.newsweek.com/id/43345

The Latte Era Grinds Down
Average Americans were living like the Riches, thanks to easy credit and the real-estate bubble. Now they're trading down instead of trading up.

By Daniel Gross | NEWSWEEK
Oct 22, 2007 Issue

*** snip

"The top 20 percent of households haven't seen a decline in real income, but the bottom 20 percent is suffering and the middle 60 percent is getting by," says Michael Silverstein, senior partner with Boston Consulting Group and co-author of "Trading Up."

[MADem]

1. I suppose they could turn it into a duplex, and rent half to some poor bastards who fell down the

forclosure well....

[annabanana]

2. This may be the fate of many of those monstrosities...n/t

[ret5hd]

4. HA! McLodgingHouses!

[Warpy]

8. They're going to need a lot of work, first

because they were big on play spaces like formal living rooms, formal dining rooms, family rooms, game rooms and media rooms while they were small on actual living space.

They'll need to be renovated to chop huge rooms downstairs into bedrooms and convert small rooms upstairs into sitting room and kitchen.

There is nothing less practical than the "investment property" dream house unless maybe it's some of the marble "cottages" in Newport, RI.

If they think those places are money pits now, wait until they find out how much it'll take to convert them into reasonable housing for 2 families.

[SoCalDem]

19. Zoning laws will bite them in the ass if they try to rent the rooms out

Most suburban areas have very specific laws about stuff like that

[MADem]

20. Depends on the hood.

I live in a mostly single family hood, with the odd duplex. I think many homes in my area wouldn't have trouble if they made it LOOK right.

I'm guessing if they rigged the place so the exterior looked the same (open front door, go into a vestibule, apartment one to the right, apartment two to the left) they might get approval.

If neighborhoods are going to start looking like ForclosureLand otherwise, the towns will be motivated to have taxpayers in there instead of having the feds own the empty, overblown joints...

[Froward69]

3. Here on my block

one went in about 5 years ago, that touched off a boom. three more followed... one the builder once he couldn't sell converted into a fourplex and rented to Students.
two others sit vacant with for sale signs in the yard. of those two the builder of one tore down his house across the street, planning to build his own mc mansion. since the one is built and not sold he has run out of money. He, his kids and his wife are living in the garage of the lot with the hole in the ground. until the finished one sells they cannot build their own house.

[Liberal_in_LA]

5. 'living in the garage'. d*mn.

[Froward69]

17. welcome to DU!!

:hi: he told me that i was chickensh*t for getting out of flipping houses so soon. I bolstered my apartments. he continued, saying "I have nothing to worry about while bush is President". as for myself I have 1100sq feet total. I have cordoned off about 800 of that and heat only 300 sq feet. on an electronic thermostat. the fridge is in an unheated part so it runs less. me and my cat. I listened to my grandmother insofar as how to keep warm without heating unnecessary parts of the house. I feel I am as green as I can be. however I know I could do better. like recycling my shower water to the toilets. if it gets really cold this winter I may ask my neighbor if they would like to stay here. then I would heat the rest of the house for them. I think I will let the cold and humiliation turn him Democrat first.

[Liberal_in_LA]

18. Sounds like you stopped 'flipping' just in time. :-) Good for you.

[annabanana]

7. Damn, Karma is one tough broad. .

(as a broad myself, I can say this)

[dysfunctional press]

22. why wouldn't they live in the built but unsold home...?

instead of a garage?

[AlCzervik]

6. when we lived in Texas our house was 3500sf with a 3 car garage, we moved there from Boston

and we could not believe how cheap the houses were there, anyhow thats a lot of space for 3 people and the energy bills were crazy, we had 5 rooms we didn't even use. I've had a big house and i never want another one.

[cali]

9. When my mother sold her house in CT

5 years ago, the new owners found that 6000 sq feet wasn't enough for them and added on another 4,000. Sadly, my Mom bought a new house of 1,00 sq feet and knocked that down, putting up a house of 3,500 sq feet. And so it goes in the town I grew up in.

[AlCzervik]

11. wow the people that bought your mom's house must really not like each other.

our current home is 2000sf and really if i didn't have the formal dining room and living room i wouldn't care, we never ever use those rooms, complete waste of space.

[NJCher]

12. same here!

I have no use for wasted space, so I am busy putting these two rooms to use. Here's what I've done:

• The formal dining room is a media/dining room where we watch movies while dining. We do a lot of extensive gourmet dining here because my spouse is in that field, so it makes sense to have an entire room devoted to that.
  
  
• The living room, which is huge, is being converted into a computer room. There will be four systems in there eventually: Linux, 2 Windows OS, and a Mac. No desks. All our computer setups are a recliner (the kind that doesn't look like a recliner) with a monitor on a pedestal next to the recliner.

In addition, in this room we have lined the walls floor to ceiling with library shelves. Some of the shelves will have doors that will close off the items being stored there for a clean, uncluttered look.



Cher

[cali]

14. well, 10,000sf houses are not at all unusual in

Fairfield County, CT. And grew up partly in the house she sold, and it seemed plenty big to me, even though it was actually quite a bit smaller than the house we moved from when I was 15. There have always been big houses in that neck of the woods, but lately it's gotten really nutty. My house is small- and very green. It's only 1500sf, and I love it.

[AlCzervik]

15. my Dad lives in Mass and about 10 years ago he built his house, he's a developer

by trade and it's a big house for 2 people, it's a little over 4,000sf but i will say that the space is all usable, very well done but still for it would be too big, Who the hell is going to clean all that?

[cali]

16. heh.

that's one reason I love my little house, but my mother doesn't do windows or floors or anything else, and never has.

[Warpy]

10. My dad mentioned using my inheritance to get a better house

in a better area, and so did the financial planner. Honestly, though, I'd rattle around like a pea in a barrel in one of those barns and this area, while it still has a bad reputation, is statistically the lowest crime area in town. Plus, it's convenient to nearly everything, and I'm talking walking and biking distances.

I'd rather fix this place up a bit and stay put, although I'm also looking at property in Mexico for vacations (and national health insurance).

[AlCzervik]

13. i'm not putting another dime into this joint, my daughter has 6 1/2 years to go and then

she's (hopefully) college bound and seeya later homeowner ship for at least a few years, were selling and then we've decided that we will rent for a year or in Pacifica Ca, and then maybe a year in Monterey and then if we figure where we like it the best than maybe we'll by a small condo.

[earth mom]

21. Cry me a river. His house is an "investment" instead of a home.

:nopity: