New Construction Archives » Larry & Kathy Reichle

People move down for all kinds of reasons, but the most common is financial. If you’ve made the choice to trade your place in for less space, you may think dealing with less square footage will be the biggest change. But there’s a lot more to it than that. Here are eight things you need to know about moving down.

You might need to downsize your furniture, too.

What’s one of the first things we say when we tour a new home: “Our furniture would fit perfectly in here.” But if you’re downsizing, that might not be the case. You may have fewer rooms to furnish, and the proportions of the rooms you do have may be smaller.

If you’re looking for a smaller place for financial reasons, you’re probably not keen on spending money on new furniture. Be sure to measure your large pieces and take those measurements with you when touring homes. If it comes down to a couple of homes you’re considering, maybe the one with the larger living room that can accommodate your sectional gets the edge.

You may have to compromise less with new construction.

New homes today are built to feel more open and maximize storage. If you’re worried about going smaller, look to new construction.

Your bills may go down.

If you’re trying to save money, the fact that a smaller home will presumably not only cost you less for your mortgage but also your ongoing bills is great news. If you can get a handle on how much your utilities will be (This is a good thing to ask your real estate agent, who can then reach out to the seller’s agent), you might even be able to use the presumed savings to boost your buying power…or to sock money away every month.

You may also save time.

Less square footage means less to clean and maintain! If you also have a smaller outdoor area, mowing and yard work will also be easier, allowing you to spend that leftover time pursuing other activities and interests.

You may have some tough decisions to make.

City or suburbs. Attached or single-family. Long commute or not. When your homebuying plans are dictated by budget, the decision-making process can be challenging. Written pro-con lists can be tremendously helpful in helping you sort out your feelings. But make sure to be brutally honest with yourself. If you’re leaning toward a move to the suburbs and you’ve written off how grueling a long commute can be, you may be in for a rude awakening.

Other people may have to compromise, too.

“No room for guests: Hosting a huge holiday dinner might be out of the question in a smaller home,” said The Balance. “Out-of-town guests might need to stay at a hotel when they come to visit.”

There may be a mourning period.

People often tend to embrace the IDEA of moving down before they really embrace the reality. The idea of less square footage might be acceptable if it saves you money…but the reality of less space often feels like a loss.

It’s OK to see it that way. Anytime there’s a big life change, we need time to adjust. Give yourself time to mourn the loss of the home you’re leaving. It may make the transition easier.

See the upside.

“While your home lifestyle varies from your neighbors, many homeowners agree that smaller homes enable the family to bond and work together as opposed to large and spread out floor plan homes,” said Freshome. “Smaller homes create an environment where family members and roommates get organized and can compromise over living arrangements, sharing closets, and making a small home feel cozy instead of cramped. Instead of looking at a smaller home as a down-grade, look at it as a way to a happier domicile.”

WRITTEN BY JAYMI NACIRI

Lot usage is at an all-time high, meaning land devoted to green space is at a low

Houses are packing on the pounds, and yards are paying the price.

Since 2015, the estimated median footprint of a single-family home has grown to a near all-time high of 2,113 square feet, according to an analysis from Trulia, while the average lot size has shrunk to 8,940 square feet.

That makes the “lot usage” measurement — how much land is devoted to house, rather than green space — an all-time high of 25%.

Average lot sizes have shrunk by more than one-third since 1975, Trulia noted, and homes have become 15% bigger during that time.

Part of the increase may be due to the rise in “tear-downs” – a home built on a site where a previous structure existed.

The National Association of Home Builders estimates there were 79,200 tear-downs in 2016, up from 55,200 in 2015, and Chief Economist Robert Dietz told MarketWatch that he expects that trend to continue as the housing stock agesand demand for inner suburban locations swells.

NAHB doesn’t collect data on how big the new homes are in relation to the ones that were torn down, but as Dietz puts it, “anecdotally a tear-down typically involves a smaller, less-energy efficient home being replaced by a large structure that is more resilient and energy-efficient.”

Read: When the dining room turns into a play room, you know the kids are in charge

But another reason is simply that America is aging. In 1802, when Trulia’s records begin, the median lot size was 65,340 square feet, or an acre and a half – huge by today’s standards but logical for an agricultural society with boundless space for the taking.

Over time, lot size fell steadily, to about one-tenth that size a century later. But in the mid-twentieth century, thanks to the automobile, the interstate highway system, and the government’s efforts to boost the housing finance system, Americans fled to outer suburbs, and lot sizes surged once again.

More recently, we’ve been lured closer to densely-populated cities, but, as Trulia notes, “many people like the idea of living in a single-family home and having a yard to call your own along with some space between themselves and their neighbors.” Yes, even millennials.

Read: Millennials are buying homes, and they’re buying them in the suburbs

The rise of McMansions may be another reason, although the large, mass-produced eyesores that mushroomed along with the housing bubble have declined in favor.

As always with real estate, local details tell stories of their own. New England boasts the most housing markets where a home’s footprint takes up less space, even for recently-constructed homes, Trulia’s analysis found.

In metro areas like Worcester, Mass., Hartford, Conn, Bridgeport, Conn., and New Haven Conn., homes built after 2014 take up less than 10% of the lots on which they sit.

But single-family homes in Philadelphia and San Francisco, which Trulia calls “geographically small but dense,” have the highest lot utilization rates.