Which type of home would you live in or do?

Our current house was pretty well fixed up when we moved in. There are things I'd change, but mostly we just painted and put new window treatments up. The yard is my major project.

The prior house was certainly a "diamond in the rough." It was fun, imho, to do all the work to it. And it was nice getting it to really be "our" house and done the way we liked it. I love doing that sort of thing. With this most recent move though there was no way that we could tackle all the projects (two kids now, instead of one, and no relatives near to help us out, and a much more expensive area so less money for fixing up a house).

I would not buy a very old house (like 100 years old) because I grew up in one and know from experience the amount of work that they take. Our current house was built in the last 50's or early 60's and has updated systems (heat, etc.), insulation, and new windows.....

I've lived in one "cookie cutter" house and it was ok. It was actually well designed and the neighborhood was super. This would typically be my last choice though.

I grew up in a cookie cutter style subdivision in a colonial built around 1970. Great neighborhood and the house suited our family's needs very well but I always even as a child loved older neighborhoods and homes. We were attracted to our current home because all the houses are different since its one of the first areas in our town to have settlement- around 1840! Our home was built post WW2, but looking around our neighborhood, the housing stock kind of tells the story of our history just by looking at the homes. Like we have american 4 squares, victorians, ranches, new larger homes, lustroms (metal home) and the standard late 1950/60s split level. Plus some farm style homes etc. Add in there a few smaller apt buildings and condos plus some coach homes on larger properties rented out and apts over older homes its a nice mix of different types of people.

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Our first house was a brand new house, custom built for the people we bought it from, although they have never lived in it. It was 8 months old when we moved in January 1979, two months before our wedding. In 1995 we completely renovated it. We lived there until 2001, when we moved to a new town. We lived a 'temporary' mobile home on property we bought and built a totally custom built home that we designed. We moved in on April 4, 2004 (4.4.4) and we've lived her ever since. It's very much my dream home.

Our house is the one where I grew up; it was built in the '50's, and needed a lot of updating (it looked the same when my dad died as it did when I was 2!). I loved being able to update it based on the knowledge of already living in it - I knew where windows/doorways would make sense, how the kitchen flowed, etc. We love it (though we wish we weren't on a suburban plot of land - we'd love an acre or more).

Our dream though is to buy land and build our own. I want a craftsman style home (that or mission, dependent on where we built). I don't need huge; our house is 1500 square feet, and the only thing I would add would be one more bedroom (I'd like the boys to have their own). It would be one story (dh and I have bad knees, so no stairs would be nice), though I'd love a basement and/or root cellar. I love designing houses (always wanted to be an architect but my dad talked me out of it), and always dream of actually designing my own house. I know we'll do it some day.

We bought our first house in 2002. It was built in 1992 in a cookie-cutter neighborhood. It was a good price b/c it needed to be updated. We went with neutral paint and berber carpet through the whole house. Very blah! The house has cathedral ceilings and I really HATE them. The house never seems cozy. There isn't a single tree on our lot. But it was our first house ... you have to start somewhere. =)

We bought our second house in December 2008. It was a foreclosed house built in 1952 that has oodles of character. It's a cape cod with lots of trees on the lot. The interior layout is wonderful. However, we had to gut the WHOLE house. Absolutely. Everything. I agonized over every last decision (paint colors, cabinets, countertops, bathroom fixtures, etc.) and it nigh unto drove me insane. But you know what? I absolutely LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my new house and I'd do it over again in a heart beat. I want to live in this house until I die. (FWIW, I was 7% under budget. Talk about being a frugal gal.)

Erin

Our house was a livable pit when we bought it "a diamond in the rough", right? Built late 40s, never had anything done to it--other than the water heater moved outside and new vinyl in the kitchen. Why did we pick it? 1) The price was significantly below our budget, 2) we looked at A LOT of houses that had had mediocre or poor-quality work done (ugh!), 3) it wasn't on a corner, and 4) the lot was on the larger side for this area. Dh got tenure 4 years later, and we remodeled. Added a bedroom and bathroom, redid the kitchen, added circuit breakers (yeah, it had fuses), added forced-air heat. Now it's fabulous.

Before we moved here we had a brand-new cookie cutter house (which we could afford--yes, we all have to start somewhere!). It was a fine house, most of our work went into the veggie garden, which we started and got to be awesome. But the god-awful CC&Rs were so restrictive it was ridiculous.

I grew up in a classic c1970 ranch a la the Brady Bunch. Very cookie cutter, CC&Rs (not as bad as the ones we lived in recently though). The neighborhood has mature landscaping now, but not much character still. That's not allowed per the CC&Rs My parents still live there. I also think the houses are too big for 90% of the people living there. You don't need 2000+ square feet for 4 or fewer people!