History of the two and three (or more) family home... (Boston: middle-class, apartments)

[*Capo*]

Somebody please enlighten me. All over in NY and NJ do I see houses which are two and three families. It seems that these houses are no bigger than a single family in most other suburban areas of the country, but yet they are divided, by floor, into dwellings for multiple families. I am assuming at one time they were only built with intentions of one family to live there.

I've also heard that the brownstones around NYC were once single family and converted later. Were affluent people living in the brownstones when it was a single unit residence? A brownstone actually seems huge for only one family in this case.

I'm just wondering if some of the historians on this board could shed some light on the era (and reasoning) that homes were converted by floor into separate dwellings on a widespread basis.

[Viralmd]

The multi-family dwellings are larger than they often appear on the exterior.

As for the brownstones, they were, in many, many cases, single family dwellings. However, in the day that they were built, families were larger and there were also staff (like the cook and the maids) who also needed to be housed. It was luxurious but there was no excess space.

[Andysocks]

My house has two adjacent doors on the front and a family on each floor.... if you connected the two units into one, it would be a proper McMansion, like 1800 square feet not even counting the basement. some people from the 'burbs don't realize how big urban/inner-ring houses are in general because they're used to seeing houses built sideways on the lot. ::shrug:: What are small are the backyards... check out how far back a two-family goes compared to a single-family two-story house... usually a big difference.

[DAS]

In most parts of the country 1500-2000 square feet is the size of a regular house for an average working/middle class family. 4000 and better would be considered a McMansion.
We are used to dealing with small spaces in NYC.

[Andysocks]

^^ Whoops. Well then god bless them and their extra room to pace around in.

It's funny to me how people living in the same country could find the other's house odd. Back when I lived in a two-family semi-detached split-level house in Douglaston, I was going to NYU. Every transplant kid (most of them from suburbs in Cali, the midwest, or NoVa) who visited me at home was baffled by what I lived in. I tried to explain "it's two separate houses, each with two separate units." I guess in their minds there's the city buildings and brownstones and then there's the suburban single-families, and it never occurred to them that there's a whole world of diverse housing somewhere in between, haha. some of them found it odd that my family rented an apartment at all, like it never dawned on them that not every kid in the country grows up in a house with a backyard. I heard lots of "that's it?" after showing them around. On the other hand... NYU kids tend to be pretty loaded, so that's probably the reason for the latter...

By the way, Capo, the Boston area is famous for triple-deckers, though they have a different history, so NYC is not alone.

[*Capo*]

Originally Posted by Andysocks

^^ Whoops. Well then god bless them and their extra room to pace around in.

It's funny to me how people living in the same country could find the other's house odd. Back when I lived in a two-family semi-detached split-level house in Douglaston, I was going to NYU. Every transplant kid (most of them from suburbs in Cali, the midwest, or NoVa) who visited me at home was baffled by what I lived in. I tried to explain "it's two separate houses, each with two separate units." I guess in their minds there's the city buildings and brownstones and then there's the suburban single-families, and it never occurred to them that there's a whole world of diverse housing somewhere in between, haha. some of them found it odd that my family rented an apartment at all, like it never dawned on them that not every kid in the country grows up in a house with a backyard. I heard lots of "that's it?" after showing them around. On the other hand... NYU kids tend to be pretty loaded, so that's probably the reason for the latter...

By the way, Capo, the Boston area is famous for triple-deckers, though they have a different history, so NYC is not alone.

Interesting!

I'm wondering mainly about which time period were these houses divided up into separate dwellings, when they appear to have been reconstructed from a typical single family home (living room and kitchen on the first floor, bedrooms on the second floor, etc.). Just by looking at most of these houses in NYC and north Jersey you can tell they were initially meant for a single family to live in before creating subdivisions within the structure of the house.

[DAS]

I don't think there is a single time period that houses went from 1 to 2 or 3 family. Actually some were just built as multi-family. The process is constantly on-going. A family may want to live in a particular area and they may want a certain amount of square footage, they may opt to buy a 2 family and convert it to one family. Houses are constantly being changed like this.

[Andysocks]

^^ There are a lot of conversions, especially in immigrant and working-class neighborhoods closer to Manhattan, but most of the houses that you can tell from the street are two-family (i.e. have two front doors) were built after WWII as two-families and are most often found in more suburban neighborhoods of the city. staten Island and Eastern Queens are chock full of 'em. The house I live in now (probably built in the 50s) and the one I described in my last post (I know it was built in the 70s) were never single-family. Probably built because a developer can make a lot more $$$ selling two-families to middle-class families instead of ranches or capes.

[Marie1249]

Most brownstones went from single family houses to multi-family dwellings or rooming houses during the Great Depression, when many families' level of affluence plummeted. Few could afford to maintain a large house and pay servants. Owners rented out rooms or small apartments to make ends meet.

It wasn't until the late 60s and 70s that the popularity of brownstones as single family houses revived.