Comments on: How Do You Define a Mansion?

By: Charsusa75

Charsusa75 — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 13:33:06 +0000

I think I grew up in a mansion. My parents built it with their own two hands back in1949-1950. There are 5 bedrooms and 4 full baths, 2 large kitchens, a 5 car garage with a single apartment area.there are two formal dining rooms, a fireplace room with a home theater, a huge attic, and an indoor "back porch" that serves as a slightly less formal dining room with gorgeous view of the wooded back portionof the 2-1/2 acre property. There are lake views from almost every window and lake access from behind the neighbor's property.
There are pear trees, fig trees, peach trees, a rose garden, a lily and iris garden, huge old oak trees, dogwoods, smoke trees, oleanders, redbuds, a huge old jasmine/gardenia bush, next to a huge french mulberry....also a very old brideswreath surroundedby tiny white bells, honeysuckle vines, Carolina jasmine, an English dogwood vine, and many nandinas and wild mountain hydrangias that grow wild. Oh also a palm tree, and various rare sesanqinns and camillias.

One bathroom features a gigantic luxury shower with glassblock windows and two walls made of the same permastone as the exterior of the original house. It has a marble bench with its own handheld showerhead and a traditional up high showerhead at the other end.

There is a fishing and sunbathing pier, a back patio with a hot tub, and a partially underground basement bomb shelter.

Does that qualify as a mansion?

By: Jackgoldman1

Jackgoldman1 — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 01:29:02 +0000

A mansion is any shelter with sewer, water, heat, electric, phone, natural gas, internet, heating, cooling, and all the amenities to support life. The size has nothing to do with it at all. Most homes in America are mansions.

By: Mary Pope-Handy

Mary Pope-Handy — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 02:32:24 +0000

As a Realtor for 15 years who also grew up in the biz (my mom was a local Realtor and Broker for 40 years, starting well before I was born), I have seen the gamut of construction and condition, from tear-down to excessive conspicuous consumption.

I tend to think of “mansion” as extreme oppulance, or ostentious housing which is “over the top”. I would disagree with you that any house can become a mansion. No matter how much you cram into a 1700 square foot house, it’s not going to be a mansion. Not even if you used gold leave in the paint. It will just be an overimproved house, at best.

There are mansions in the San Francisco Bay Area. I have been in a few. Truthfully, I find them creepy. Who needs a 10,000 square foot house?? (I don’t mean lot size, I mean home size.) I once saw a house with diamonds in the toilet flusher handle – 3 of them in descending size, plus large (2 carat?) diamonds in the faucets of the sink in the powder room. This “Monte Sereno mansion” was big, on a big lot, with many fine amenities but many excesses that I could not see how anyone could possibly justify.

On the other hand, I have seen 4000 square foot homes that were actually modest – just big – on large lots. I would not find them excessive because the intent wasn’t to be a statement of wealth.

I guess that is my perception of a mansion – it’s something intended to display one’s accomplishments. Some people even use the phrase “trophy house” to make the point.

For that reason, I find them distasteful and would not encourage anyone to attempt to make their home into a mansion. . . .