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I am in the process of house hunting for my first home. All advice says, besides location, location, location..your home should be a 3br 2ba for that is the easiest to sell if and when that time comes. The next bit of advice I was given was if my dream home is missing one of the above the next best choice
is a 3br 1 ba.
Honestly I would be fine with a two bedroom home. However, I was told that was almost impossible to sell as most people want a 3/2 or a 3/1 or 3/1.5.
One other point most of the neighborhoods where the 2 br homes are located are either historic or "attractive" neighborhoods with a long history (not recently gentrified)
I guess my question is if I get a 2 bedroom home what would make it attractive for resale or should I follow the advice and go for the 3br/2br or 3br/1ba
I myself am a 3/2 person, because I have 3 kids. But I see a lot of 2/1 for sale and I figure a good buyer for those would probably be someone without a big family who doesn't need the space, or more likely someone who wants to rent the home out. Everything I ever rented was a 2 bedroom, it was only after having the 3rd kid that we needed to move up and then it's cheaper to buy than try to rent a 3 bedroom home.
the house we're buying was a 2 bed 1 bath but they converted the garage into a 3rd bedroom and extra bath, and just added a carport instead. Would something like that be an option for you if you found the perfect 2 bedroom house?
I have no kids, so I don't need 3 bedrooms. I have owned 3 houses that had 3 bedrooms. The house I just bought has 2. Personally I would rather have the extra bathroom than the extra bedroom.
There are a lot of baby boomers looking to downsize, so my tail-end baby boomer unprofessional opinion is go for it I'd love to come back home to Atlanta and find a 2/2 or 2/1, especially in an older, established neighborhood. And I don't even care about granite or stainless!
( just don't 'gussy' it way up beyond what the neighborhood norms are
A 3/2 is generally optimal for resale purposes, it affords you a much wider segment of potential buyers. The minimum 3 bed unit (whether 1, 1.5 or 2 baths) "fits" more folks than the "downsizer" 2 bed unit. In general, there are very few newer two bed units built as detached homes, they tend to be older or attached housing, aka age restricted communities, etc. Yes, the boomers are an emerging market for 2 bed units, no argument there, BUT the 3 bed still has a broader market overall. If you are not buying in a retiree magnet area, the 2 is much more of a dice roll. I'm a soon to be 60 year old retiree and will probably downsize to a 2 bed unit some time in the future. It will be a custom built house on several acres and I really don't care about its resale valve, I plan to croak there. However, the advice I've recently given to both my daughters who are actively house hunting their first home and have posed the same questions as you have is to go for a 3/2 unit. It just makes more sense, has less risk and affords you an optimal position in the future. The differential cost between a 2 versus 3 is a direct reflection of the unit's basic market value. Unless you plan to live in a 2 for a very long time or until one croaks, my view and experience favors a 3. Best of luck. JMHO.
if it's priced right, do the 2 bedroom if it suits you. I bought and sold a 2 bedroom, 1 bath, starter home in a popular town and it only took about a month to sell (this was in 2001). No it's not for everyone but it was great for first time buyers, or seniors. It was actually bought by an investor and is used as a rental. I would expect it to be priced less, unless it's in a better area, or like you said, a more attractive historic location.
I would buy a 2br 1 ba, but that's just me. One thing to also keep in mind (and not to be political) is that energy prices will probably rise, especially if Democrats are successful with their cap-and-trade bill, and energy costs would most likely be cheaper for a smaller home. I think the house version of the cap-and-trade bill had provisions about selling homes, too, and energy standards for that. SO.. if those ideas ever became law, a smaller home might be easier to deal with. Just another thing to keep in mind I guess.
A 2 bedroom can also work well in areas popular with younger (pre-kids) couples and single urban hipsters who want a second bedroom for a home office or for a roommate to split expenses with.
There are lots of reasons to avoid a 2bd home, and only a few to encourage you to purchase such a property.
The "standards of the area" are a HUGE deal, and even if there are LOTS of 2 bedroom homes in an area you have to be very careful about who is buying them and what they end up doing with them. As was mentioned if they are mostly owned by investors that might be a situation that will put your future appreciation and even current investment in jeopardy -- resident owners tend to be a much more stabilizing force.
In my experience it is rare that a 2 bedroom has large up to date bath or kitchen. These are the areas that tend to "hook buyers" and if your home does not have (and neither do the other 2 bds in the area) there will be less interest than in areas that offer such features.
As a general rule it is also uncommon for 2 bd to offer a den. office or even dining room -- again these are the kinds of things that even retired folks like to have as computers, movie watching and entertaining are a big part of why people like single family home over apartments.
I have seen some townhouses and even condos that offer some of the features that I describe in an attempt to attract "downsizers" and you have to understand that the included maintenance offers a much more "care free" lifestyle than a single family detached home.
The upside of SOME 2 bedroom homes is that they can be purchased for FAR LESS than the more desirable 3+ bedroom home -- if the layout and structure of the home is conducive to adding on / up additional bedroom(s) it may be possible that the price gap makes sense, but again this is assuming an awful lot. In my experience about the minimum amount that a new bedroom addition will cost is between $45K and $70K for the BASICS, some of the factors that make the range so wide is the style of foundation that is possible, the kind of roof that can be attached, the exterior material and local requirements for mechanical system (some places will basically make it impossible not to reconfigure all the heating and electrical and in older areas the costs to redo that can make the whole project unfeasible).
In a handful of "high end" areas there might have been some two bedrooms constructed long ago, now most people shopping in such areas will prefer having at least the space that comes with a three bedroom, and the two bedroom MIGHT be a good teardown candidate.
Finally I have seen even moderately new (less than 20 year old) homes that had 3 small bedrooms be "downconverted" to have a large master suite. In such cases the pool of buyers is very small, and even if the place shows like something from a high end magazine you are going to run into issues...
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I'd love to come back home to Atlanta and find a 2/2 or 2/1, especially in an older, established neighborhood. And I don't even care about granite or stainless!
