Looking back, do you wish you'd havebought a smaller house? (relocate, community)
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Although I might have considered a smaller place, in the area I was looking the modest structures were seldom built on premium lots that I wanted. I bought a larger place on the lot I wanted and have found the flexibility and room for guests to be a great advantage. I would do it again.
I know a guy who has four kids and lives in a small house on a 60x100 plot house and says rich folk buy the show off houses his 55 year old split is fine.
He makes around 500k take home bi-week. I always love when folks with a six million salary say rich folks. Sam Walmart and Warren Buffet are just like him.
So if you have more than one bathroom growing up, you don't have a loving family?
My childhood home had three baths. Even though each of us kids had our own bedroom, I often slept in my sister's bedroom and sometimes even in the same bed with her.
I grew up in a 800 square foot two bedroom apts with one bathroom four kids and mom and dad. roller beds in the living room is where stayed as sisters had the smaller bedroom. No room for anything more in room. Worse part was with one tv in house in living room right by kitchen you always were last to go to bead as living room was my bedroom also no place to do homework either. Also weird I had a roller bed I used to have to remove in day. So pretty much from 7am to 11pm every day I had no bed as no place to set it up
. When we finally moved to a 1,400 square foot house when I was 12 with a back yard it felt like paradise as the six of us could spread out.
When I was growing up, my dad was a doctor, so money wasn't the issue. We had a car and a TV - those two posession constituted rich. The house we lived in until I was 5-6 (5th of 6 kids) was a 1000 sq/ft rambler tract house with a basement. My older sisters shared the basement, upstairs it was 2 to a bedroom. The bed rooms were like 10x10.
That was very typical middle class/upper middle class lifestyle until the late 60's. A 1400 sq/ft house or larger was a "McMansion" for "rich people" back then.
The 70's started the trend to larger houses, and sometime in that decade 1200-1400 sq/ft sort of became the standard sized house, and usually included a half bath in the master bedroom.
Fast forward to me raising my own family. I have moved as part of my career, so our house sizes have expanded and contractracted based on how many kids were still at home: 800sq/ft no kids, 1100sq/ft 3 kids, 1400sq/ft 4 kids, 1600 sq/ft 2 teenagers, 2100sq/ft 4 teenagers, 1700 sq/ft 3 teenagers, 1500sq/ft 2 teenagers, 1300sq/ft no kids. All but our 800sq/ft house had 2 or more baths. I was always glad we had the room for the kids, but also was very OK with downsizing at move points as the kids left the house.
We are moving to a low cost area to retire and are building a 3 bedroom 2000sq/ft house. The house doesn't have a ton of rooms, but the rooms are big and we have a dedicated guest room for family/kid visits. We tried to keep it under 1600sq/ft, but the internal room sizes we wanted kept driving us to 1800-2000sq/ft.
If I had to pick one of our previous house to retire to, it would be the 2100sq/ft house. It was 1200sq/ft 3 bedrooms upstairs, with a walk out finished basement. We would ignore the basement unless kids were visiting, but we could make any of them work, could have stayed put raising the kids, except the 800sq/ft house.
The appropriate size of a home for retired people is an interesting question to ponder. Of course the "correct" answers are as different as people are. But given the number of homes I see that are poorly maintained and being lived in by older people, I'd say that many retirees own homes that they are unable to care for properly for either financial or physical reasons (or a combination of the two).
I get it that people hold on to their homes for sentimental reasons, or they can't imagine leaving their neighborhood, or they're physically unable (or just too lazy) to pack up and sell. My own mother was like that after she was widowed. It took long and hard pressure from our entire family to get her to come to her senses and put her house up for sale while it was still in a condition that someone would want to buy it. It's something we should all think very seriously about before we get to the point that we can't reasonably address the issue.
I totally understand that my mother wished to live out her years in the home she and my father had built, but she was in no physical condition to take care of it, her income to hire help was very limited, and even if it weren't her small town had a limited availability of people to do things like clean gutters, rake leaves, shovel snow, etc. It was left to me, her only child who lived in state, to make the hour drive between our two homes multiple times a week to do those things in both houses. Well, I did that for about three years before I came to my breaking point.
In my mother's case, while she finally agreed to sell and move in with me in a new house near where one of my siblings lived, her passive/aggressive nature let her to refuse to participate in divesting her many possessions and packing an appropriate amount of stuff to bring to her new home. So I got a fast and hard lesson into what a huge job that can be when I had to do it for her.
DO NOT LEAVE THAT JOB FOR YOUR ELDER YEARS! Unless you hate your heirs, address your lifelong accumulation of possessions while you still have the physical strength and mental acuity to do it properly. Believe me, I live (by choice) a very minimal existence now. I couldn't bring the vast majority of my possessions to the new house because to placate my mother I had to bring all her living room, dining room, and bedroom furniture. I sold most of the possessions from my home before I moved to Arizona. And when I leave this house, I'll sell all the things my mother brought. Because I am going to a small apartment. I'm resigning from cleaning a whole house and doing the yard work.
And I won't be getting an extra room for guests, either. My mother insisted we needed a guest room because of the constant stream of visitors she anticipated having. In reality, I could count on my fingers the number of times my out-of-state siblings have been here. Of all of her grandchildren, not one has ever visited more than once in nine years. She's now outlived most of her friends and the ones who remain aren't in any condition to have vacations in Arizona. The vital guest room is empty 53 weeks a year.
All I'm saying is: when you make your choices, be realistic. By a home for the life you really will live, not the retirement fantasy you wish you could have.
2 years ago my husband and I were looking to move from the high desert of Southern Ca to the Riverside/Orange County area of So. Cal. I assumed we would have to buy a smaller house as the area is pricier. I was also looking forward to downsizing into a cozy place.
After much looking the best deal was an unfinished 3,000 sq ft. house. Wayyyy too big for just my husband and I. But the price was too good to pass up.
After a year of rambling around in it we rented out the master bedroom for $1,000.00 monthly. It is 700 sq ft with its own entrance. We put in a little convenience kitchen for the renter. The funny thing is she is never here. She spends the night at her boyfriends most nights. Best renter ever!
We are now thinking when/if she moves to move into the Master studio and rent out the main part of the house.
2,300 is still more than we need. We could retire. Come and go as we wish and let someone else take care of the bulk of the house. Don't have to worry if we want to leave that the house is empty.
If your house is too big for your needs but you don't want to sell it can produce income for you.
I grew up in a large old colonial built in early 1800's. It had 2 large main bedrooms, 3 smaller bedrooms, 2 bedrooms in the attic, and 1-3/4 bathrooms. We were a family of 4 (living in the home) with 2 siblings who visited and the constant stream of guests on weekends. There was also a large kitchen, formal LR and DR, a back room/den, an independent addition for my grandmother, and a large finished basement for my father's study/office. We used every room almost every day. I loved that house, but what I loved even more was the property it sat on- 300 acres where I could walk and play and explore.
That house was wonderful for the time and family that lived in it.
Now however, I have a small 1200 sf bungalow that is a perfect size for me- even too large actually, because I really only live on the first floor- the second floor will be a source of income once I retire.
I guess my point is that the individual must decide what is important for them. My bungalow gives me room for all the things I treasure- my family antiques, items I have chosen, my books, my dogs. I don't need more. Sure, I would love to have a larger yard for the dogs, but we are content here as is.
I have as much as I need, but not so much that I spend a fortune for heating/cooling/maintenance or have to spend hours cleaning parts of a house that I never use.
I have less stuff than many people, but I own what I have free and clear, and as a minimalist, I don't understand the more is better way of living.
JMHO, YMMV
The appropriate size of a home for retired people is an interesting question to ponder. Of course the "correct" answers are as different as people are. But given the number of homes I see that are poorly maintained and being lived in by older people, I'd say that many retirees own homes that they are unable to care for properly for either financial or physical reasons (or a combination of the two).
I get it that people hold on to their homes for sentimental reasons, or they can't imagine leaving their neighborhood, or they're physically unable (or just too lazy) to pack up and sell. My own mother was like that after she was widowed. It took long and hard pressure from our entire family to get her to come to her senses and put her house up for sale while it was still in a condition that someone would want to buy it. It's something we should all think very seriously about before we get to the point that we can't reasonably address the issue.
I totally understand that my mother wished to live out her years in the home she and my father had built, but she was in no physical condition to take care of it, her income to hire help was very limited, and even if it weren't her small town had a limited availability of people to do things like clean gutters, rake leaves, shovel snow, etc. It was left to me, her only child who lived in state, to make the hour drive between our two homes multiple times a week to do those things in both houses. Well, I did that for about three years before I came to my breaking point.
In my mother's case, while she finally agreed to sell and move in with me in a new house near where one of my siblings lived, her passive/aggressive nature let her to refuse to participate in divesting her many possessions and packing an appropriate amount of stuff to bring to her new home. So I got a fast and hard lesson into what a huge job that can be when I had to do it for her.
DO NOT LEAVE THAT JOB FOR YOUR ELDER YEARS! Unless you hate your heirs, address your lifelong accumulation of possessions while you still have the physical strength and mental acuity to do it properly. Believe me, I live (by choice) a very minimal existence now. I couldn't bring the vast majority of my possessions to the new house because to placate my mother I had to bring all her living room, dining room, and bedroom furniture. I sold most of the possessions from my home before I moved to Arizona. And when I leave this house, I'll sell all the things my mother brought. Because I am going to a small apartment. I'm resigning from cleaning a whole house and doing the yard work.
And I won't be getting an extra room for guests, either. My mother insisted we needed a guest room because of the constant stream of visitors she anticipated having. In reality, I could count on my fingers the number of times my out-of-state siblings have been here. Of all of her grandchildren, not one has ever visited more than once in nine years. She's now outlived most of her friends and the ones who remain aren't in any condition to have vacations in Arizona. The vital guest room is empty 53 weeks a year.
All I'm saying is: when you make your choices, be realistic. By a home for the life you really will live, not the retirement fantasy you wish you could have.
Wise advice from the voice of experience. It sounds like your mother was not able to realize how much you were doing on her behalf and what a burden it was for you. An hour drive "multiple times a week" for three years? Wow, no wonder you reached your "breaking point" - I know mine would have come much sooner. In retrospect, could you have insisted that you were going there only once a week?
The house itself seems to have been the focal point of the disagreement/problems, but perhaps underlying that was the denial that a changed reality required a change of housing. That is, a desire for things to remain "as they were" overrode an objective, rational look at the overall situation.
Let me clarify before we get off track. We only had one bathroom but it wasn't because of poverty. My parents could afford us and the home they owned. We only had one bathroom because many urban homes only had one. I gladly accept the one bathroom problem in exchange for having full loving family. Even sharing a bedroom with a brother 14 years older. He wasn't as crazy about it til my sister got married. It really in retrospect was really as in really annoying but it had a key and being on the right side of the door made it a tad more bearable. Being on the wrong side a nightmare.
Heading into retirement it was just my wife and I and we sold our old house to purchase one half the size of what we had but it's at least $500/month cheaper when you figure the extra utilities cost and property tax.
$500/month is $6,000/year which is an Alaskan cruise (we want one) and trips to see grandkids.
It is also a long way towards the expense of a second home... one large home in the snow and cold or two homes 800 miles apart where you can live winter in relative warmth?
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