Teardowns only seem to be in Dearborn? (Detroit, Warren: cul-de-sac, new home)

[Tex?Il?]

I'm curious: During the housing boom of the mid-90s to mid-2000s, many older neighborhoods of houses built in the 1950s, inner ring suburbs of Chicago underwent many individual teardowns, where people would tear down the old small house to build a much larger one.

While the extent of this certainly varied from suburb to suburb, it was generally quite extensive over many inner ring suburbs. The inner ring suburbs of Detroit saw very little of this, even during those better years, except Dearborn for some reason.

Dearborn seems to be the one inner ring, post-war suburb, where there teardowns of older smaller houses seems to be fairly common. From what I see on google maps, you don't even see this aroudn Royal Oak, which suprises me, because I would think that Royal Oak, being somewhat hip and trendy, might have seen property values go up for this to happen.

Why Dearborn? Is is the Arab community, who might live in extended families and therefore like bigger houses?

[us66]

It also happened in Birmingham, and in some other areas, but outside of Dearborn (and to a lesser extent Dearborn Heights) and Birmingham it was very uncommon around here. I really like the houses that were built. They're a bit out of place, but not bad.

I do know of some examples in southern Macomb County (a few in Eastpointe, mostly replacing burned houses, and one on Moravian in Clinton Township) but it wasn't widespread at all.

[ForStarters]

Metro Detroit is different because instead of rebuilding in established neighborhoods, people simply dumped their old neighborhoods and moved further out to build new ones.

Dearborn is an exception because (for the most part) the Middle Easterners are content in East Dearborn. They have an attachment to Dearborn so they continue to teardown and rebuild in the same neighborhoods, unlike everyone else who continues to move further out.

Sadly, you have inner-ring suburbs like Redford, Wayne, Oak Park, Garden City, River Rouge, and south Warren that are struggling with abandonment and blight. It's like an epedemic here that you have to keep moving outward every 10 years or else. Oddly, some of these older suburbs offer the best access to the region's cultural and entertainment destinations, have some of the best public parks, good freeway access, and nice housing stocks. But, most people can't resist the splendor and charm of a cul-de-sac of fresh Pultes built on someone's farmland 35 miles from Downtown Detroit.

[Slappy san]

I think I remember reading that a stop was being put to that in Dearborn.

[Coldjensens]

It is more common in waterfront properties.

[MIW14]

I've been wondering that. In Dearborn you will see these huge new homes built on small lots in older neighborhoods. I wonder why it doesn't happen as much in other inner-ring suburbs.