Dwellings you LOVE

[Pax]

I love my current home, it's a 1943 bungalow, only 810 sq. ft. but has a full basement and a large front screen porch. It has all original wood work, hard wood floors, and a fantastic galley kitchen.

But I'm not really a house person either, I'd love to have a place like pll, a nice balcony to hang out on... with a great city view. But I live downstate where such a place doesn't exist, so I'll stick with my little house.

[shootingstar]

It's incredible that homes of any size aren't better designed and built for our aging population. It's one thing to want to downsize, but you'd think people would still be able to get in and out of their homes and still be able to use the bathroom, kitchen, etc. even as they lose mobility. Moving is stressful, especially if you have strong ties to a community.

This has been an area of study for me for the past few years. Retrofitting is often expensive, awkward, and not fast enough to keep up with people's needs. Why not include accessible design in new construction? If you design those features in from the beginning, they don't have to be these costly retrofits that stick out like a sore thumb and often stigmatize the people who need them.

Well, maybe it's our definition of a perfect home that changes at different stages of life. I'm not convinced that many people even think rationally how their body's capabilities will change, when they look at homes to choose. When my parents bought their home in Toronto, before I spent time advising that they get one with less levels. That was over 10 yrs. ago. Of course, they had a right to follow or not follow advice. It was the latter that happened.... I guess the good thing is that they stuck to a home near transit...they always have each time, they moved. Always no more than a 15 min. or less to the transit stop.


I always wanted a 1 level home...and I've always had one: I just can't be bothered the hassle of vaccuming staircases. Again another childhood memory/task....into my 20's when we had to look after a 2nd house for our absentee landlord-parents who lived in another city at the time.

We do have grab bars....but too low, for lowering oneself in a whirlpool jetted bathtub --another frill I didn't EVEN notice when I got this place. I didn't look hard into the bathtub. I've barely used the whirlpool jets and should, just to keep the lines free-flowing.

My place is 770 sq. ft. But if you include balconies and storage locker (where 2 bikes are kept), I guess that's another extra 150 sq. ft.
Plenty of room, some of it under-utilized right now.

An ideal situation might be have a large lot with a house and then a small cutie, studio house. When things get difficult in physical abilities, sell or rent the bigger and occupy the studio house.

[NbyNW]

An ideal situation might be have a large lot with a house and then a small cutie, studio house. When things get difficult in physical abilities, sell or rent the bigger and occupy the studio house.

It doesn't matter how big or little the house is, it's absolutely useless for getting in and out of if there are steps required to get in. Try getting up even two steps if you are using a walker or wheelchair. When I was discharged from the hospital after fracturing vertebrae, my little sister had to lift me up the steps to get into my parent's house. Just two steps, but impossible for me to navigate in my condition. Thankfully she is trained as an EMT so she knew how to do it without injuring me or herself.

It's possible to design homes with zero-step threshhold, and still keep the rain out. I know an architect with a young family who designed his home this way. They love that they didn't have to lug strollers up and down steps when their kids were little. Also it's a 3-level home but he has stacked the closets on top of each other so that if they ever need to put in an elevator they will save a ton of money on structural.

The point is, the way our current housing stock and even most new housing stock is built will probably not be able to accommodate the needs and wants of our seniors, who are increasing in absolute numbers every year. That's basic baby boomer demographics. Concepts like aging in place and universal design need to be a lot more mainstream than they have been.

[shootingstar]

It doesn't matter how big or little the house is, it's absolutely useless for getting in and out of if there are steps required to get in. Try getting up even two steps if you are using a walker or wheelchair. When I was discharged from the hospital after fracturing vertebrae, my little sister had to lift me up the steps to get into my parent's house. Just two steps, but impossible for me to navigate in my condition. Thankfully she is trained as an EMT so she knew how to do it without injuring me or herself.

.............................The point is, the way our current housing stock and even most new housing stock is built will probably not be able to accommodate the needs and wants of our seniors, who are increasing in absolute numbers every year. That's basic baby boomer demographics. Concepts like aging in place and universal design need to be a lot more mainstream than they have been.

Yes, totally agree ++1 NByNW.

This thread hasn't gone the way, that Reesha might have expected. But still it's wanting the ideal place for a long time.

[Reesha]

This thread will be what it will be, but when I have an awesome house that I love to post, there is a place for it!

[zoom-zoom]

It's interesting the discussion of design and aging. Recently DH and I have talked about maybe someday building a house. We had planned to do this before DS came along, then ended up buying our current fixer-upper moneypit.

I found a plan that I really liked, but it was 2 stories. DH immediately put the kibosh on that thought. We're not people who like to move a lot (we've been in our current house nearly 12 years) and he pointed out that anything we build would likely be the house we retire in (we're both pushing 40).

[Koronin]

I would love to have a two story home with a full finished basement. However the basement part is basically impossible apparently in most of the state of NC. In western NC the mountains make it very difficult and at the coast the water table is too high. The two story homes I like are just way, way too expensive. (I think that's partly from growing up in a two story home that I loved). The one bigger thing I wish I had was a nice front porch, we have a great back deck, but I'd love a large front porch. Also a childhood memory from the home we lived in when I was pretty young before moving across town. (Both homes were two stories with a finished basement). Otherwise I really like our home.

[skhill]

There's a place down the street from me that I just love. The house itself is pretty typical-- about 100 yrs old, cottage, roughly 1000 sqft, big front porch. It's the yard that's fantastic. There's a pear tree in the front, and in back, the chickens have a well-fenced area with a handsome coop/house. There are a series of raised garden beds, and a tiny greenhouse. The family's chickens have more room to play than the kids!

[ny biker]

My father has lived in the same house since he was 12 years old. He is now 76. My mother has lived there for more than 50 years, and she is 74. It's two stories with a basement. The house is on a hill, so the basement is below ground in the front of the house but ground-level in the back. When they go out to the car, they usually go out through the basement. The basement is also where they do laundry, store a lot of their food (the kitchen is small so there is a pantry area in the laundry room, along with a full-size freezer). There's also a work room for my father and his large model train layout.

Their bedroom is on the second floor of the house.

So my parents walk up and down stairs all day long. Honestly, I think it's one of the reasons why they are in such good health for their age, because they are constantly getting exercise as they go about their lives.

(If they had to, they could move their bedroom to the main floor, though my father would hate that since there is no heat in that room.)

[emily_in_nc]

So my parents walk up and down stairs all day long. Honestly, I think it's one of the reasons why they are in such good health for their age, because they are constantly getting exercise as they go about their lives.

I totally agree. I'm 50, and DH is 58, and I wouldn't hesitate to build a two-story house again if we were going to build a house. My mom is 77 and still lives in a two-story house and does fine. It's actually some of the only exercise she gets, so I am glad she has stairs to climb! I fully intend to be able to do stairs for a long, long time. Only time living in a two-story (w/all bedrooms and showers upstairs) wasn't good was when I fractured my pelvis and had to have a hospital bed in the living room until I could butt-scoot up the stairs.

We live in a four-story condo building now, and the wife of the couple who live in the penthouse is scared of elevators and always takes the stairs. She's 72 and very fit. That's exactly how I plan to be. And if by chance I'm not, I'll deal with it. I've moved enough in my lifetime that having to move again due to a physical limitation wouldn't be a huge deal.

We happen to live on the first floor in a single-story condo now, but that wasn't by choice; it was just the only condo available that suited our needs. If we could have put this condo on a higher floor, we would have done it and taken the steps. It's just more private being on an upper floor.