Death of the 'McMansion': Era of Huge Homes Is Over

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They’ve been called McMansions, Starter Castles, Garage Mahals and Faux Chateaus but here’s the latest thing you can call them — History.

In the past few years, there have been an increasing number of references made to the “McMansion glut” and the “McMansion backlash,” as more towns pass ordinances against garishly large homes, which are generally over 3,000 square feet and built very close together.

What sets a McMansion apart from a regular mansion, according to Wikipedia, are a few characteristics: They’re tacky, they lack a definitive style and they have a “displeasingly jumbled appearance.”

Well, count 2010 as the year the last nail was hammered into the McCoffin: In its latest report on home-buying trends, real-estate site Trulia declares: “The McMansion Era Is Over.”

Just 9 percent of the people surveyed by Trulia said their ideal home size was over 3,200 square feet. Meanwhile, more than one-third said their ideal size was under 2,000 feet.

“That’s something that would’ve been unbelievable just a few years back,” said Pete Flint, CEO and co-founder of Trulia. “Americans are moving away from McMansions.”

The comments echoed those made in June by Kermit Baker, the chief economist at the American Institute of Architects.

“We continue to move away from the McMansion chapter of residential design, with more demand for practicality throughout the home,” Baker said. “There has been a drop off in the popularity of upscale property enhancements such as formal landscaping, decorative water features, tennis courts, and gazebos.”

“McMansions just look and feel out of place today, given the more cautious environment everyone’s living in,” said Paul Bishop, vice president of research for the National Association of Realtors.

And homebuilders are heeding the call: In a survey of builders last year, nine out of 10 said they planned to build smaller or lower-priced homes.

Even in Texas, the land of go big or go home, they’re downsizing.

Diane Cheatham, owner of Urban Edge Developers in Dallas, said today, the average size of home they’re building is 2,200 square feet, down from 2,500 in 2005 — which was considered small for Dallas back then.

She said the trend there is more toward building green homes instead of big homes. Right now, they’re building a 1,200-square-foot uber-green home for a couple that’s downsizing from 3,000-square feet, Cheatham explained.

1,200? Some of the hair in Texas is bigger than that!

“We’ve never built one that small,” Cheatham confessed, but added: “I think that’s just a good example of the trend right now.”

For a little historical context, 1,200 square feet was the average home size in America in the 1960s. That grew to 1,710 square feet in the 1980s and 2,330 square feet in the 2000s.

What’s more, many in the real-estate business say they think this trend of downsizing, or “right-sizing,” as Flint likes to call it, is here to stay.

“This is absolutely a long-term effect,” he said. “Think of families with small children who’ve been foreclosed upon … When these teenagers are in a position to buy a home, they won’t want to go through these experiences they saw their parents go through.”

Of course, the question becomes, what do we do with all these McMansions that have already been built?

It's tempting to make jokes about what you might do with a former McMansion but with crime on the rise in neighborhoods littered with abandoned McMansions, Christopher Leinberger, in an article for the Atlantic, asked a sobering question: Is this the next slum?

Luckily, people are starting to get creative: A film collective in Seattle has taken over a 10,000-square foot McMansion there, using it for both living and work space. They turned a wine closet into an editing room and tossed a green screen in the garage. And in a suburb of San Diego, one couple turned a former McMansion into a home for autistic adults.

The demise of the McMansion has stirred a growing chorus of murmurs in the real-estate community about the possibility that it may force a dramatic redesign of the suburban McMansion tracts into mini-towns of their own, turning these icons of excess into more practical spaces like offices, banks, grocery stores and movie theaters.

Though, given some of the poor quality of materials and craftsmanship, it begs the question, would it be better to just tear them all down and start from scratch?

http://www.cnbc.com/id/38757287

[Ban Hammer 12,842]

the bigger they are, the more there is to clean.

[^_^ 5,021]

the bigger they are, the more there is to clean.

Last few years, I see ads for cleaning services all over the place. They leave leaflets at our door, I see flyers at the local Quick Check, I see ads stapled to the board at work, everywhere. It's interesting.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Outstanding.

[KaiserD 12]

the bigger they are, the more there is to clean.

That's my take too.

These damn houses are littered all over where we live, when I made my first visits to my husband 7/8 years ago there was so much beautiful scenery. Each time I got here there was either another lot of massive houses or rows of town homes. There were clearly more large houses than the demand for them even back then and I wondered if it was to the developers ego than running an efficient business. It reminds me of those shows where average joes redecorate and flip houses but they always kit it out with the bells and whistles against advice of people running the program.

Average size two level homes are the bread and butter of US suburban life style, they are sensible, manageable and an ideal amount of space for raising more than one child so how come nobody seems to be developing them? (Before the recession hit, I mean).

I'm sorry that they're making the neighborhoods look ugly but I'm not really sorry that greedy people have lost money from it.

[Pinocchio Liberal 268]

Outstanding.

Call Al Gore! PLEASE!

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IMO 1600-2000 sq feet is more than enough for most families.

[Ban Hammer 12,842]

IMO 1600-2000 sq feet is more than enough for most families.

agreed - house here is about 1700

[one...two...tree 2,762]

IMO 1600-2000 sq feet is more than enough for most families.

I agree.

[JohnSmith2007 353]

IMO 1600-2000 sq feet is more than enough for most families.

1300 is enough for the three of us. The only thing I wish we could expand is the garage. Three cars with only a one car garage is a pain.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

1300 is enough for the three of us. The only thing I wish we could expand is the garage. Three cars with only a one car garage is a pain.

Is Robin driving yet?

[Pinocchio Liberal 268]

I need my man cave.

[natty bumppo 289]

agreed - house here is about 1700

with or without basement?

[BobandXiaomei 14]

I got mine, repo, 4600sqft.

[웃 910]

5,000 sq. ft. with a 3,000 sq. ft. basement.

Here's how my room looked every morning before my wife arrived and terrorized everything: