HUGE houses (Pepperell: mattress, new house, buying)

[baysky]

Hi All, I am exploring relocating towards the NH MA border and I am seeing lots of newly constructed homes of an extreme size, over 3000. As a family of two, we are looking for something between 13-19 sq feet, ideally.

Are people today looking for homes of this size? Are there families this big?!


https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-71985?view=qv

https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...9_M32520-19025

[jayrandom]

Originally Posted by baysky

Hi All, I am exploring relocating towards the NH MA border and I am seeing lots of newly constructed homes of an extreme size, over 3000. As a family of two, we are looking for something between 13-19 sq feet, ideally.

Are people today looking for homes of this size? Are there families this big?!


https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-71985?view=qv

https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...9_M32520-19025

They wouldn’t build them if they didn’t expect to sell them. As someone who sort of fell into a larger house (was looking for a medium-sized house but couldn’t find the right one), I can say that it’s definitely nicer than living in a small house. It’s more expensive, to buy, to repair, to heat. All that aside, it is nicer. Maybe not worth the extra money though.

13-19 sq ft seems a bit small. A twin mattress is 20 sq ft.

[MMS02760]

I will assume you mean 1300-1900sf.

Unfortunately, very few houses in that square footage range are being built in this region. It is very rare toward the bottom of that range. Builders are supposedly not interesting in constructing such homes as their return is not great due to the cost of land and construction costs in this area. Most new home construction these days seems to colonial style dwellings in excess of 2,000 sf. The only smaller single family homes getting built these days seem to be restricted to retirement communities.


If you want a smaller home, you are going to have to probably look at existing older builds that date back to the 1950's to 1970's. Unfortunately, many of these will have small rooms and be outdated. You would have to remodel to get open living space and today's finishes.

[in_newengland]

Originally Posted by baysky

Hi All, I am exploring relocating towards the NH MA border and I am seeing lots of newly constructed homes of an extreme size, over 3000. As a family of two, we are looking for something between 13-19 sq feet, ideally.

Are people today looking for homes of this size? Are there families this big?!


https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-71985?view=qv

https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...9_M32520-19025

I know what you mean. At least the two you showed aren't ugly, they are pretty attractive. A lot of new houses are so huge and strange looking--those McMansions,, as they are called.

I agree that for two people you don't need that much space. It's wasteful and it's expensive to maintain. I think my last house was 2000 sq ft and was too big for two people. But it was a Cape and was designed so that two people could have lived on the first floor and just closed off the upstairs. A family of five had lived there and it was just right for them. We had two extra bedrooms that were very seldom used--would have been smarter just to set up a folding bed in the family room when someone came to stay overnight. In fact, we did have a sofa bed in the family room so we never really needed those extra bedrooms.

It looks like you have to buy an older house, 1950s/1960s to get what you want. When we looked at houses we wanted a basic ranch but that's what everyone wanted and they were selling before they ever went on the market. That's how we ended up with a "too big" house that always felt sort of vacant and echo-y (?)

Good luck!

[CaseyB]

You may be able to find a smaller colonial 1800 - 2000 sq. ft.

Both our houses are over 3,000. sq. ft., but we had 3 kids.

[gf2020]

Hollis, NH, is a wealthy town, so yes, people are looking for new large homes there.

That house in Pepperell was built in 2004 so big homes there is not a new phenomenon.

[id77]

Originally Posted by baysky

Hi All, I am exploring relocating towards the NH MA border and I am seeing lots of newly constructed homes of an extreme size, over 3000. As a family of two, we are looking for something between 13-19 sq feet, ideally.

Are people today looking for homes of this size? Are there families this big?!


https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-71985?view=qv

https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...9_M32520-19025

You're not alone in this frustration. Every time we look at buying a suburban home, it usually winds up being either an older home in need of significant repairs or a gigantic newer McMansion only the pretentious could possibly appreciate. There is the occasional right-sized home that's tastefully updated and maintained, but it's pretty rare.

The people I know in the large homes are either empty nesters or small families. Large families usually pack into the smaller homes.

[OutdoorLover]

They're not new, but there are some craftsman and ranch style homes in the 1100-1500 sq ft range, and you'll find some smaller capes and dutch colonials in the 1300-1800sq ft range too... all of these homes built somewhere from the 1920s to 1960s. There are some builders in southern NH building some pretty nice new homes in the 1200-1800sq ft range; PM me if interested.

[johngolf]

Let us assume a typical family of 4. They need 3 bedrooms if the children are not the same sex. Also nice to have a guest room, so most are wanting a 4 bedroom home. Most want ant a master bath adjacent to the master bedroom so this means at least one more for the other 3 bedrooms and preferably two more plus 1/2 bath guest bathroom.

So now we are at 4 bedrooms, 3 full baths, and one 1/2 bath. This could certainly be tightened up to 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths, and 1/2 bath. They could squeeze into 3 bedrooms and one bath if they had to. Such as where I was brought up with a family of 5.

I have a one floor patio home of about 1400 sq ft. It has 3 bedrooms and 2 full baths. Master has its own bath. The other bath has two doors into it. One from a bedroom and the other from a hall. You could easily have a family of 4 living here and have a guest room if the kids could share one bedroom.

[matrix5k]

I've been told that there's no profit unless the builders make a mcmansion.

We have one toddler and bought a 2000SF home and it feels huge. We don't even use 1 bedroom and 1 full bath, even when we have a guest over. Our heating bill is high. The space is great for our toddler to run around though, and great for parties.