Floating spheres.. lol

I bet those Victorian cookie cutters in SF look ok from the street.. But when you get close... Cheesy
I heard about homes which were sheeted with card board. You could literally cut through the wall with a utility knife.

Do you think these new homes will last as long as homes from the 60's and 70's?

Agreed that "cookie cutter" would not be my choice description. As pointed out, in all time periods there was a great amount of copying of whatever particular style was around at the time.

And in 100 or so years only the best of our time will be remaining and there will be some other person complaining that all the new houses are just alike.

The modern trend is more area and simpler and or cheaper finishes. Especially on the exterior. I think that this trend has been in progress ever since modern design started gaining popularity back in the 50s

I do agree that it would be nice to see more variation.

I like to drive through the old neighborhoods. Those house have had time to gain some extra character.

I think a big problem today is the smaller custom builders just can't compete with the larger production builders. They build "cookie cutter" homes because it makes making a profit much easier. They know that they won't come up with costly or time consuming issues because they have all been worked out, and they know exactly how much material they need. It is a much more "production line" feel. I work for a small production builder who has plans you choose from, but there is a lot more options and flexibility than you would get with a national production builder. I don't really like working there because I don't agree with many of the products and practices, but custom builders don't hire construction managers, I would love to build custom homes myself, but I just simply couldn't compete price wise. I know that there are people out there who don't want a 3500sqft home, but still want a custom one.

These days there seems to be a much smaller market for people who are willing to pay for quality, which I don't understand because your home is your biggest investment. They don't care what is behind the walls, or how it is constructed, as long as it looks nice and passes code. For me, minimum code isn't good enough. I read a previous comment on here about using cardboard as sheathing. They also use that here in central Texas. It's called T-ply (thermal ply), which is basically thin cardboard. As long as you have let-in braces, you don't need structural sheathing, so they save a few dollars and slap some cardboard on and call it good. Keep in mind, this is code.

As far as I am concerned, these houses won't last more than 15 to 20 years, which I guess they figure doesn't matter since most people move every 5 to 10 years these days (which is why I guess most people don't care about quality). I went to school for architectural technology and construction management. I have been on both sides, design and construction. I am not impressed with either. No character due to builders wanting boxes for houses because they are cheaper, and crappy materials to make more money.

In my wife's home town there was a neighborhood built in the fifties with the exact same little rectangular red brick boxes. Through the years the trees grew up and many of the houses where changed just a bit.

Now a days I see it as a cute and quaint neighborhood. When it was new I would have called it bare and unimaginative.

Back in those days felt (tar) paper was probably the WP backing of choice and they have stood well for 60 or so years.

Generally the only things that cause a house to fail is lack of maintenance, foundation problems and obsolescence.

The structure of houses these days are most likely superior on average. I know we put in much heavier foundations than we where using 30 years ago. I also think that the drainage plane is generally given better care.

There is always the tendency to romanticize the past and so believe modern culture has somehow gone astray. But that is not really the case. As new technology comes along there will always be some miss-steps but in general I think that the average modern house is pretty well built.

Technology has come a long way, and there are much better and more superior products than there were many years ago. The problem is many builders (mostly production) don't use these. They go for the cheapest products they can find. Structurally they are good, but the quality and craftsmanship aren't there. It used to take 2 to 4 weeks to frame a house. Right now I can get a 4000sqft house framed in a week. This is where the quality and craftsmanship is lacking. They don't take time to make sure things are as level and plumb as they could be, corners don't line up, etc. They are more worried about getting to the next job. I run 10 to 20 houses at a time. I find it hard to make sure that the quality remains as high as it could be with having to constantly run around worrying about so many houses at once.

It also depends on the area. I am originally from a mid-sized city in Wisconsin. It still takes a few weeks to frame a house, and there is no production builders there other than some small local ones. Here in central Texas, 90% of the houses are production ones. It is all about being quick, making money, and just doing enough to pass code.

So overall, structurally they are sound, but the quality of the products and finishes could be better. One big thing for me is the craftsmanship. Seems like people used to be proud to be a mason, or framer, or finish carpenter. They took their time, and took pride and ownership of their work. People like that are few and far between these days.

Profit margins in houses are pretty tight these days and you have to make enough money to stay in business.

I have a friend just south of Houston who is a cabinet maker but tries to do ornamental carving as a side line. He is pretty good but those jobs are far and few between.

We did a house last year where we used a Flemish bond instead of a common bond on the brick.

Most trades people in my experience would prefer quality over quantity but they need people to want that and ask for it.

When they bid a project the first question they are often asked is -How little money can you get the job done for?

I do agree, I had the same experience building houses and the constant struggle to eliminate unnecessary problems caused by sloppy work. It is a challenge to build quality and stay competitive at the same time.

I just think that this has pretty much always been the case and it is nothing particularly different today. I have read that wages for construction workers have been pretty stagnant for the past 30 years while upper incomes have grown fairly significantly. I think would have an effect on their attitude.

Budget is usually fixed, so smaller homes mean higher quality...and vice versa. If people want to have better quality homes, they'll have to lose some square footage. Most people want as big a home as they can afford. Sarah Susanka talks about this in her 'Not So Big House' books.

I agree with lavenderlass. I'm coming from a 1930 Tudor and in order to get the level of quality I want in my new home, I had to go smaller than many people would be comfortable with, especially if they have children.

Part of the reason I started looking at building in the 1st place is that most of the homes out near my work, are bigger than I want and not built to a level of quality that I'm comfortable with.

Another reason is that houses today have a lot of stuff that houses 100 or more years ago did not have to spend money on. HVAC, electrical, indoor plumbing, etc..

And much less selection on materials. So good detailing was one of the few things that you could actually upgrade.

My wife's mom grew up in a house with a stove, a wind powered generator and battery, three light bulbs, a radio and an outhouse.

Even the kitchens back then used to be empty rooms where people would use furniture with the kitchen sink about the only built in if even that.

This post was edited by ChrisStewart on Mon, Nov 11, 13 at 13:10

FWIW, it's easy to look down on people for wanting a larger home badly enough to be willing to sacrifice details, but "quantity has a quality all its own". The house we're building isn't huge, but making it smaller would mean giving up functionality that I care about more than I care about precisely what my moldings look like.

We all have to set our own priorities-- if being able to host a large family meal is more important than having handcrafted cabinets, that's a reasonable trade-off in my opinion. And I'm fine with people going the other way too-- for some people a jewel box of a home is ideal, and for others space is more of a priority.

Zone- It's not looking down on anyone (at least from my point of view) it's about the math...

Quality + Square Footage = Budget

If square footage increases, quality has to go down.

If quality increases, square footage has to go down.

They are inversely related.

The only way to increase square footage and increase quality...is to increase the budget.

That's why good DIY is so popular. Providing your own finish work or even clean up can help lower some of your costs, thus effectively increasing the budget.

A $200,000 home with $40,000 in DIY savings is now only going to cost the homeowners $160,000 (save $40,000),,,or keep the $200,000 budget and it could be the equivalent of a $240,000 home with more quality details or square footage, or combination of the two.

I think it also has to do with architectural guidelines in some neighborhoods.

In the new neighboorhood we are building in, there is only four siding colors allowed (yes, you "must" have siding on the sides and rear of the home and the color you get is pre-determined with your lot).

You can choose one of two trim colors, one of two shingle colors, and you get to pick your stone that covers the whole front of your house from about fifteen choices all very similar.

Only way to make it seem your own or different is picking the color of paint for the front door, but it must be at least a medium to dark shade of paint. All fences are the same black wrought iron material and style. All exteriors must be similar to ensure the look of the neighborhood......... Even goes to say what type of trees and plants you can use in your yard, all has to be approved first.

This seems to be getting more common in many of the new areas here in Alberta.

I agree with all of this. Some people just think bigger is better and will pay the same for large cheap house even if they don't need the space, just to say they have a big house. I think some people aren't very realistic with how much space they really need. Years ago larger families lived in smaller homes. People today just have an infatuation with having as many "things" as they can get and need the space to put it all.

Pointing out the obvious: Everyone in the past didn't have a cute little bungalow or a stately Victorian. A whole lot of people had thrown-together mess-of-a-houses that were no better than today's tract houses.

It is true that the last "new" trend was Mid-Century Modern, which appeals strongly to a small group of people . . . but leaves a whole lot of us cold. The oft-repeated ranch house of the 70s was practical: simple shape, cheap to build, economical to own, but it isn't a design that excites people.

So perhaps its natural that many of us look to past designs -- farmhouses, bungalows, Victorians -- and want a modern version of those charming styles.

That is true. We where just in Venice, Italy last month and it had row after row of about the same 4 story buildings sometimes only 4 ft. apart. Uniformity is not even remotely a modern phenomena.

A lot of people consider uniformity a desirable condition and thus I agree many subdivisions regulate to achieve it.

Conforming to society seems to be ingrained in our nature.