New Site For Green Earth Equities

“McMansion” Era Coming To An End?

November 21st, 2009 categories: Buyers, EnergyWise Renovation, Home Performance, Investors, Marketing, Politics and Programs, Real Estate Tips

“McMansion” Era Coming To An End?       So wondered a recent Wall Street Journal article.  Read it Here.

You can recall the history of homebuilding by taking a driving tour in your city.   What you’ll notice is that there has always been a small percentage (5-10) of the “Grand Old Homes”  Mansions or Near Mansions, and then the rest of the housing stock.   In my town of Fresno, CA the Grand Old Homes were on Huntington and Van Ness Boulevard in the early 1900s.   Two Stories with 4ooo square feet or more was the order of the day.    (Today these are nightmares to renovate from an energy efficiency perspective.   Those desiring to do so should view Tom Hanks movie “The Money Pit” and have plenty of patience and cash and check with the Historical Society before proceeding.

During that time, the rest of the town built in the Craftsman and Bungalow style.   Two bedroom, one bath from 700 to 1000 feet was the norm with some larger homes having 3 bedrooms and sometimes 2 baths.     There were larger homes between the two extremes, but not that many.

The Housing Boom that came with the Baby Boom after WWII brought a new invention to the market:  The American Classic Tract Home,  3 bedroom, 2 bath, 1100 to 1500 square feet moving up to about 2000 square feet as the century closed out.

But along with it came the “Executive Home” aka McMansion.   These have the things necessary to impress, not just to live.

Grand Entries with Grand Architectural Staircases

All the Rooms are larger than they need to be, and there are more of them.

As many Baths as Bedrooms is common.  Walk-in closets larger than your bedroom growing up.

All the Ceilings are taller than they need to be and they are mainly different from each other

Home Theaters and Gyms and 3  to 5 car garages.

European Chef’s style Kitchen with commercial appliances

And a huge energy bill to go with it….Because these opulent shrines to impressing the neighbors weren’t built any better than their smaller cousins.   Actually the smaller home is harder to do poorly and easier to fix than the McMansion.   And the McMansion with its architectural wizardry is very easy to get wrong from an energy and comfort perspective.

So here’s the good news:

1.  There is going to be a huge opportunity for Home Performance Contractors to fix McMansions.

2.  Another huge opportunity is doing a complete EnergyWise Renovation on the All American Tract Home.   These homes are actually drawing many of the Baby Boomers who have had the McMansion and are tired of keeping them up

With Mature Landscaping, all automatic, a new 40 year roof that will outlast them, all new appliances, all new HVAC, Energy Saving Windows and fixtures and paint inside and out and all new tile and floor coverings, what’s to not like about that for easy living?   In my experience these renovations are in high demand and sell quickly at full price.

In California there will soon be money available to fund both of these opportunities with the AB 811 funds for Energy Retrofits.   There are sites about fixing McMansions.  (Check out CBPCA.org for a list of trained Home Performance Contractors) This site will continue to focus on Energy Wise Renovation of moderate sized homes, especially on the Golden Opportunity presented by Foreclosed Homes.

Back to the WSJ article:   I didn’t get the impression that the McMansion builders were going away.  Or that the buyers demanding the Big House have learned their lesson and changed for good.  It seemed they both are pulling back only as much as they have to and a recovered economy would launch them into new realms of opulence.   Did I read that into the article? or did you get the same impression?    Let me know in the Comments section.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 21st, 2009 at 1:15 pm and is filed under Buyers, EnergyWise Renovation, Home Performance, Investors, Marketing, Politics and Programs, Real Estate Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

Comments are closed.