A friend of mine bought some property a few years ago and has been slowly working toward getting a house built on it. He’s being very meticulous about all of the details of how the landscape gets developed, and going back and forth with an architect to get the perfect floor plan and appearance, and just the right HVAC, and so on. And he’s finally started trying to find a general contractor who will take on the project and manage it to his satisfaction. To be fair, when it’s done he and his wife and kid will have a grand estate - but man, what a hassle, and what a price.
In contrast, my wife and I bought a used house about a decade ago. It’s not perfect - the workmanship isn’t the best, and I wish it had a 3-car garage. But the main features are pretty good: decent privacy in the backyard, big basement, 2-story main room, and so on. Some renovation/remodeling could improve it, but I can’t be bothered with the expense or hassle. The landscaping is getting kind of aged, e.g. the trees close to the house are too big, but I keep the grass mowed, and as long as the neighbors don’t call the city to complain, I’m OK.
How about you? Is your house basically a comfortable retreat in which you store your possessions, with a few redeeming features that you appreciate? Or is it the palace of your dreams, with the perfect layout, perfect kitchen, perfect master bath, and impeccable landscaping?
If you’re shopping for a home, are you looking for the former or the latter?
Yes, I love houses. I already had a 1760 colonial fully restored over 7 years that my kids still live in and I stay in sometimes too (divorce is complicated). Now my girlfriend and I are designing a giant log cabin dream house like we both want complete with an airplane runway, barn, animal quarters, gardens and much more. That one will probably happen in the next few years. I also want a Louisiana style plantation home and a Mediterranean villa but I doubt I can fit those in.
We have the home of our dreams. Bought it for the location (waterfront, Puget Sound) and poured a ton of money making it just the way we like it. We literally say everyday how much we enjoy living in this house. We have a good kitchen, but it’s the only thing left on our list that’s not yet perfect. Need some serious money to make that happen. Maybe next year?
I really like my house. I bought it because I knew the house well and my good friend lived in the other half of the house. And it had some stuff I really liked, like the light kitchen, the city garden, how near everything it is, and the stone steps out the front door to the streets.
We did also invest in the house when we moved in, like in really good soundproofing. And in energy saving isolation.
In the past 10 years, we gradually replaced broken stuff with stuff we really like. The kitchen was old and rickety, so I replaced it with my dream kitchen. The cheap old Home Depot front doors we replaced with custom retro front doors that fit the house, and that we get compliments on from passing strangers. And the red blooming rambler rose I planted out front to cover my white outer walls.
We got used to the disadvantages the house has, like a railway out back and the occasional water problems in the basement.
Our house isn’t perfect, but it’s much more no the “dream home” scale than the “a place to store my stuff” scale. We took a long time looking before we bought it, and when our real estate agent sent up pics, we were like “oh, wow, that’s our dream house!” Of course it was way above what we wanted to spend, but everything else was great, so we bought it.
We’re not lawn people, so no, our lawn is not meticulously landscaped. In fact, it’s mostly the opposite of landscaped; we’re on 11 acres, you can’t see the house from the road, we saw no reason for a lawn so we let the ferns & wildflowers grow in. We think it’s really pretty.
Just remodeled the kitchen too, and I got my dream appliances, so that’s a big plus.
We have a creek in the backyard, and a big wooden deck that overlooks it. Yeah, I really like this house!
I dunno about palace of our dreams - or maybe we just don’t dream too big. But 3-5 years ago I got transferred to a location where we were comfortable staying. We wanted a house that was big enough, but not too big. We bought a 3 bedroom split-level, and had it completely gutted. We put a lot of attention to every detail, so we have EXACTLY the door hardware we want, the lights and switches are EXACTLY where we want them, etc.
We bought a house that was structurally solid, but had not been touched since the 70s. But the location gives me a 6 minute commute. We can walk 2 blocks to the grocery store. There is a schoolyard 1/2 block away where I can throw a ball for my dog. I am 10 minutes from 1 kid and grandkid, and 20 minutes from OHare, where I can fly/pick-up my other 2 who live in Denver/LA.
The lot is even situated so I don’t have a driveway next to my neighbors, so I don’t need to worry about snow piles. And it slopes nicely to the front and back yards for drainage.
The yards were pretty much crap - we took out some huge mulberry trees, and completely redid the landscaping. Even put in an outrageously pricey brick driveway.
We replaced windows, gutters, back patio, fence, and are getting a new roof next week. So the house functions perfectly just the way we want.
So - yeah - to the extent a relatively modest brick split-level can fulfill one’s dreams - this house does ours.
We built on our acreage when my kids were small. We built it too big, IMO. Now we are empty nesters and it’s too much house. What I really like is our very rural, secluded locale. I can’t really deal with a bunch of people, I would just die if someone knocked on my door. Being out here with no neighbors, no passers-by suits me. We have everything we need in the house and more. So I am happy.
We love watching the house porn on HGTV, but we bought our house mostly for location (middle of nowhere).
It met our criteria in other ways (split plan, large living room, high ceilings, etc.) It also has some cool stuff we weren’t counting on (drive-through garage, shower in the laundry room :dubious:).
However, the kitchen and master bath would cause those HGTV folk to scream “dated!” or “gut job”. Not a speck of granite in sight. I’m talkin’ blue formica, people.
We talk about remodeling those rooms, but I seriously doubt we’ll ever get around to it. We still call this place our dream house and talk about how lucky we were to find it. Remodeling might be fun, but I don’t care if we never do it, either.
I love my home. It may not be a perfect dream, but I don’t think I could have found a place I love more. However, I didn’t have a lofty dream to begin with. I just wanted a small home (less than 900sq ft) that was within walking distance to my office, with some semblance of a front porch, and less than $170K.
Timely question, my wife and I have been looking at houses for about 6 months. We are definitely more in the former category. We have been able to find several houses that ticked all the boxes for us, but I wouldn’t call them “perfect”–there were a few things we would change if given the option.
Even though we have the resources to purchase land + build, I think that would just be too much effort, stress, and time. I’d rather just buy something that’s been stress tested already.
I choose to live in an expensive city. As a trade off, my homes have never been as grand as my station in life might suggest, because housing is so expensive. I don’t aspire to put my money and time into pursuing a dream home.
To me a house is a place to live and keep my stuff. If I can get into a house with enough space for my stuff, a good space for my projector, and a five-minute commute from my workplace, that would be a dream. If it had no lawn and the windows all had shutters I could use to close out the world that would be icing on the dream cake!
What do you mean by “aspire to”? There’s a home that I definitely daydream about, but I’ve never taken any real steps to make it happen, nor am I realistically likely to, because it’d probably cost more than I could ever afford.
I like my house, it’s just too small for the number of people in it. And its age is betrayed by the lack of the near ubiquitous vaulted ceilings new homes have. That doesn’t bother me though, as I would guess it saves on heating and cooling.
Growing up, I moved a lot and lived a lot of different places (military). So what I wanted in a dream house was, a place I could always come back to and would never have to move out of. I bought this house, and things changed. By the time I got married and had two kids it was too small, and it was always in a bad neighborhood. And now I know my dream house would always change to be something I wasn’t currently living in. So, no, I don’t aspire to own a dream house.
My dream house, as in actual dreams, would just be so weird. It would be kind of like that character’s house in The Good Place (the bad girl character), only without the clowns, and in reality I would hate it. Also in my dreams I keep discovering new rooms in it, which delights me in the dream but in real life? Again, no.
There are many things I love about my house, but so, so many things that need to be done to make it more livable. I need to upgrade the electrical (60 amp service just doesn’t cut it in the modern world) and subsequently install central heat and air (the older I get, the less I like hauling in wood pellets for the pellet stove). I need to have the floors leveled and a real foundation built (in 1849, they cut trees down and laid the framing on the stumps). The floors need refinishing and I’d love to turn the upstairs into a nice master suite with a bathroom. I’d love to tear down my rackety old barn and build a new, smaller barn.
The good news in all of this is that I only have 7 more payments until it’s paid off.
My wife and I used to play the “maybe we should move” game every few years. Our current house is nice, but not perfect, and has the decided downside that it’s a split-level. We would look at ranch-style houses that fit our budget, but we always came back to the fact that we love our neighborhood, and nothing we ever saw was enough of an upgrade to get us to move. We live in a unique part of Phoenix, on a acre that has horse privileges, so it feels like being out in the country, but there is all the shopping and restaurants and coffee shops that anyone could want within a 5-mile radius. There’s just nowhere else like it.
So, we ended up remodeling the kitchen, bathroom and living room, adding a deck, and filling in the damn pool. Now the house is much more updated, and looks great.
The next project will be to build me a huge shop/office, which is all I ever really wanted, and then I will be ready to be buried here.
