“Starter Home,” Schmarter Home
I’ve always had a problem with the term “starter” home. I’ve been in one version or another of a “starter” home for the last twenty years and I’ve always been happy, never thinking I had to trade up to bigger, better, or newer.
In other countries, the starter concept doesn’t even exist. There’s never the ever-present idea that homeowners have to move up, and up, and up. Instead, people buy houses they can afford, and they spend their lives there. There is no consumeristic notion to buy a small place while saving for anything bigger, increasing the size until everyone ends up with McMansions.
This is a relatively new attitude. Remember, the average size of a family home in 1950 was only about 983 square feet. I wonder if the continual American quest for bigger and better, “great rooms” and vaulted ceilings, is in part responsible for the reprehensible mess we find ourselves in with the foreclosure crisis?
There was an interesting discussion about the starter home phenomenon on Boston Real Estate Now recently. Commenter “Miko” suggested that she and her husband had made more than $150,000 in the last four years by buying, fixing up, and selling two “starter” homes. She reasoned she would have wasted money in rent in all those years and could never have afforded her dream home without “starting” somewhere.
But think about the waste in moving twice in four years. Aside from the doubtful premise that anyone is going to be making out financially these days, think about the transaction costs, moving costs, renovation costs. Constant moving is wear and tear on the planet and wear and tear on the soul.
More in line with my own thinking was the commenter “Walthamolian”, who said it better than I could:
“I think the “starter” home is pure myth. There’s all sorts of people in the world that need all sorts of housing. Not everyone is following the path of buying a small house, then having kids and buying a big house in the ‘burbs and then moving into a city condo when retired. With our economy changing, our mindset should also change. Many of these houses (few bedrooms, 1 or 1+1/2 ba) are fine for decades. I’d like to see the term “starter” die.”
And so would I.
Below, check out three “starter” homes where you could conceivably live out the rest of your life:
145 Chiswick Road, #3
Brighton
BEDS:2/BATHS:1
SQ.FT: 1080
$348K
648 Washington Street, #5
Brookline
BEDS:2/BATHS1
SQ.FT: 1,101
$449K
798 Heath Street, #1
Brookline
BEDS:2/BATHS:1
SQ.FT: 935
$337K
