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Janb,
Are you really paying 12 grand per year for prop taxes?
Is that for a huge mansion with a lot of land? That sure beats NY state and NH which IMO are out of sight. Your amount for taxes would give me apoplexy. I'm freaking about my taxes rising to 3 grand next year!!!
I could never pay 1,000 per mo. just for taxes I'm looking for a location where they're 1,200 per year or less. Anyone know where?
Oh don't have an apoplexy, I just looked it up!!
Apoplexy: A venerable term for a stroke, a cerebrovascular accident (CVA), often associated with loss of consciousness and paralysis of various parts of the body. The word "apoplexy" comes from the Greek "apoplexia" meaning a seizure, in the sense of being struck down. In Greek "plexe" is "a stroke." The ancients believed that someone suffering a stroke (or any sudden incapacity) had been struck down by the gods.
Mine is $1,500 for a 1500sf custom country home plus almost 4 acres, one mile outside town (small town of 2k) between Grants Pass & Medford. Homeowners Insurance is very low - around $450 per year. Like I said in earlier posts.... it is very affordable to live in s/Oregon
My little town has a "boutique Goodwill" where every item of clothing is $l.50 regardless of what it is... could be designer labels, high-quality jeans, jackets, dresses, etc. The local community thrift shop sells every item of clothing for $1; less high quality as the boutique Goodwill but still wearable and I've found some surprising items there. ((OK ..... I'm a bag-lady))
I think there is and will be more demand for smaller houses, not necessarily tiny houses. In the 20th century up until the 1980s, houses were on average much more modest than they are now. Our cities are filled with these houses. Some have been added to or razed with McMansions put in their place. They were built to get people into their own houses and they were built small to keep costs down. When you go from a small apartment or rooms and get a small house with a yard, it seemed great.
Somehow, the baby boomers got the idea that we all need a lot of space but much of those giant houses go unused. I currently live in a modest house of 1800 sq ft in a neighborhood of houses ranging from 1600 to 4000 sq ft with most of them ranging in the 2000-2500 sq ft range. This has become a typical house.
At the same time, zoning has become much more restrictive than it used to be. Many places don't just get in your face about orange doors but you can't have non-related tenants any more, you are restricted in the cars you can have, you can't have chickens in your back yard, newer places demand the house be a certain size, you can't have a workshop. The list of restrictions goes on and on all to create neighborhoods that look like the Stepford wives and make us spend more and more on our real estate. The real fuel for this is money in the developers pockets and more and more people jump on that bandwagon with the cry of maintaining property values. (Look how well that ended up!)
The house I live in is bigger than the one I grew up in where we had 3 teenagers and 3 bedrooms/2 baths in about 1200 sq ft. Part of how all those people managed to live in what is now considered a small space is that we lived a lot outside. Home was the place to sleep/eat/do homework but rarely to play or do other things.
I have more house than I really need because I bought an investment that would be acceptable to a family for future resale value. I have 2 rooms that are basically storage units for stuff I don't know what to with and remodeling stuff. 1 is a guest room which I will definitely want to have in the future.
I know the people who want this sort of close neighborhood or co-housing usually end up building them. What keeps striking me, is the cry to keep the costs low but then amenities like the common spaces and a common club/work house are demanded to give us some space that is not in a small cottage. The reality is that as soon as you have the commons, then each member must contribute to the costs of building/maintaining/using those commons. That's where the association fees and limits on equities come in. It is costly to do this sort of thing and the costs are not spread among very many people in the limited communities. Plus developers must make money off these endeavors (more $$) and they are driven to make as much as they can. So each one of these ends up being for fairly wealthy people with a lot of disposable income.
The thing that I think is a real future arrangement is the co-ops that have been created where services are performed for the elderly for a monthly fee. People live in their own homes but when they need something, they call the one number and it gets done for a reasonable cost. Boston started this and there's one in DC now. A Resource Guide to Creating Community in Later Life To me this is the ideal and it can be created in many places. It takes the concept of assisted living and long term care down a step to just being able to keep living comfortably and safely in your homes. We don't have to be isolated in elder communities but it brings people with similar needs together. It takes the concept of buying into it when you don't need it so much to have it when you do (this is the concept that supports insurance). Most important of all, it doesn't require that individuals give up a lifestyle they like or have the same socioeconomic status.
This is what I see here in this group. The thing we have in common is that we expect to live alone without a marriage ora man to help out. But our individual circumstances vary widely as do our desires for how we wish to construct our elder lives. Some of us are facing difficult economic conditions while others have enough to feel safely comfortable but I don't think any of us are really wealthy. All of us want some sort of support community so we don't end up falling with no one to help us or are so lonely we want to die. We want a friendly group to chat with, go on adventures with, borrow a cup of sugar from, discuss the universe with - but not to interfere with our hard-won independence.
This is long enuf, so I'll stop here. Just some thoughts.
This is what I see here in this group. The thing we have in common is that we expect to live alone without a marriage ora man to help out. But our individual circumstances vary widely as do our desires for how we wish to construct our elder lives. Some of us are facing difficult economic conditions while others have enough to feel safely comfortable but I don't think any of us are really wealthy. All of us want some sort of support community so we don't end up falling with no one to help us or are so lonely we want to die. We want a friendly group to chat with, go on adventures with, borrow a cup of sugar from, discuss the universe with - but not to interfere with our hard-won independence..
Mine too. My space is 1,100. If it is well designed it's more than enough. I have a one car garage, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths. I think I still have a fair amount of stuff without so much it is difficult to clean. It really is all in the design. I even have a small hallway to the 2 bedrooms and garage which I think ideally is a waste of space but it keeps those rooms away from the rest of the house and make it ideal to have a roommate on that side of the house--the master is on one end and the two bedrooms, bath on the other side with the living/dining/kitchen (all open to each other) in between. There are vaulted ceilings to give a sense of space in the living/kitchen area.
Anomoly - will you be around Las Cruces between May 29--Jun 1? Two friends are coming out the 28th and they want to see Roswell. I thought we'd start on the east/central side and go south--I want to see more of LC and go to Silver City before heading north again. I want to camp unless the weather doesn't cooperate. I haven't planned out the trip yet so I will have a better idea where we'll be when once I do.
Location: We_tside PNW (Columbia Gorge) / CO / SA TX / Thailand
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dancingearth
... will you be around Las Cruces between May 29--Jun 1? ...
Be sure to check into events at the college on any trips to LC (Tho it may be between terms). It is a real asset to the region with a superb music and arts department. It is a good place to meet the local retirees, as they are big supporters and it is cheap entertainment, I've been to a few events and the audience is at least 50% 'non-college', mostly well beyond that age group
Be sure to check into events at the college on any trips to LC (Tho it may be between terms). It is a real asset to the region with a superb music and arts department. It is a good place to meet the local retirees, as they are big supporters and it is cheap entertainment, I've been to a few events and the audience is at least 50% 'non-college', mostly well beyond that age group
I definitely want to check out the college because that is one very important item on my retirement town list. Right now it's snowing here! Yikes, LC looks better all the time.
Mine too. My space is 1,100. If it is well designed it's more than enough. I have a one car garage, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths. I think I still have a fair amount of stuff without so much it is difficult to clean. It really is all in the design. I even have a small hallway to the 2 bedrooms and garage which I think ideally is a waste of space but it keeps those rooms away from the rest of the house and make it ideal to have a roommate on that side of the house--the master is on one end and the two bedrooms, bath on the other side with the living/dining/kitchen (all open to each other) in between. There are vaulted ceilings to give a sense of space in the living/kitchen area.
This is so much of what is wrong with a lot of houses. They are designed by developers and not by people who live in them. What you describe is a good use of space. A smaller foot print can work really well if it is designed well. And volume does make the space feel larger along with good light from the windows. I have a friend who has an 80 year old bungalow that has 9' ceilings and only a tiny 4' hallway to get to the 2 bedrooms, bath, kitchen, and basement. It makes good use of space but has oddities like windows in the closets.
I like many of Susan Saranka's ideas for efficient use of space, altho I don't like some of her ideas and the houses she calls small are fairly big. They just aren't mansions. One thing that ought to make a comeback is the utility room next to the kitchen so there is a good place to wash garden veggies, park your shoes, and in general have a convient place to come and go. My mother's small house has this and it is really useful.
My house is a blueprint for how not to design a house. It really has plenty of room but it is carved up in a lot of useless areas so they could list it as having this amenity and that. I enlarged my kitchen by using up a small nook and greatly helped the usabilty and storage in it. I built a 5'x3' closet in a corner of my unused living room and put in double shelves, hooks, and short shelves in the front plus a couiple of electric outlets. Now, I have a place to stash all those things that need a home, need to be charged, and need to be handy as I come and go. There's room for coats and the vacuum and cleaning supplies. It just works really well. And once I ripped out the old tiny coat closet, the house feels bigger and is easier to move around. It really should have been done in the first place, but builders don't think about how people live day in and day out.
Mine is $1,500 for a 1500sf custom country home plus almost 4 acres, one mile outside town (small town of 2k) between Grants Pass & Medford. Homeowners Insurance is very low - around $450 per year. Like I said in earlier posts.... it is very affordable to live in s/Oregon
My little town has a "boutique Goodwill" where every item of clothing is $l.50 regardless of what it is... could be designer labels, high-quality jeans, jackets, dresses, etc. The local community thrift shop sells every item of clothing for $1; less high quality as the boutique Goodwill but still wearable and I've found some surprising items there. ((OK ..... I'm a bag-lady))
Your area and situation sounds wonderful! I am lucky in some ways, 1344 sq. ft home, property taxes $1,119.00 but homeowners insurance, $2,400.00!! I need to look into S. Oregon! I don't need the coast, I've had the coast for 36 years; been there, done that!..
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I'm looking for a location where they're 1,200 per year or less. Anyone know where?
Yup, yup, yup !
We be in different leagues, m'lady...
