I understand that some on FHB have a problem with McMansions, those homes which seem to be unneccessarily large in scale compared to whatever matrix you find in order to not like them. I think some have applied this position to infill conditions in downtown areas in which small homes are renovated or replaced with homes of much larger square-footage.
But what about properties of scale that are commercial in design and construction that get renovated decades later into residential?
Replies
Huh?
More power to them. Because if they didn't they would get torn down.
be I think?
'Nemo me impune lacesset'
No one will provoke me with impunity
Nuke, I think the anti McMansion crowd would complain if Frank Loyd Wright himself was desinging and building 1000 house tract developments.
It's just impossible to build 50,000 "unique" houses in one community that would appease the tastes of those that think living in a 750 sf house is fun. I don't care how tasteful the exterior of a shoebox is, if you're cramming too many kids and stuff into it....you'll always want for more square footage.
Square footage sells and I'd be a buyer if I had a growing family.
For what it's worth, I'm pro McMansion in any setting. Bulldoze the comercial or the old housing stock, farms, whatever. If there is a market for housing...supply it. If they want 3500sf..sell it to them.
Incidently my daughter just contracted to buy a McMansion in Texas. She's taking full advantage of the cheap labor and land. I'll know more details about what and where when she lands later today.
blue
A couple of weekends ago I watched the show Rezoned and that 33,000 SqFt pants factory that got renovated into a home made me wonder what the Anti-McMansion Club would have to say. Sure, they only used half of the 33K SqFt, but that's got to be like 22 750-SqFt homes, right?
Makes me wonder where common sense draws the line. Do we tear down these buildings, leave them to sit unused for a few more decades and see if mother nature tears them down, and hope like religious zealots that business picks up and someone will use the abandoned/unused commercial properties for making future Enronian CEOs. :)
Nuke, I never saw that show, Rezoned.
We have a lot of industrial stuff that will need some rezoning around here as soon as China clears out all the manufacturing.
I recently heard of a friend's Dad that went bankrupt last year due to the Chinese pressure on auto parts. He once had over 125 employees. He built the parts business (supplied GM) for over 40 years and ended up with nothing (from the business). Luckily, he stashed a great deal of wealth in his personal holdings.
This is a story that is being repeated continuously here in MI. There will be a lot of abandonded buildings when the final shakedown ends.
blue
The "anti McMansion" thing is about people building the largest house they can at the expense of quality.That is, if the choice is 4000 sq ft of fiberglass and spit, vs 3000sq ft of foam insulated w/an air quality system... the 4000 sq ft choice is frankly irresponsible.Of course, there are no shortage of irresponsible buyers out there willing to buy all the luxury they can afford without regard to their consumption. Someone's going to build their stuff, might as well be you. But it still sucks.-------------------------------------
-=Northeast Radiant Technology=-
Radiant Design, Consultation, Parts Supply
http://www.NRTradiant.com
I'm just curious what professional builders thought - how much more difficult is it to build a NotSoBigHouse/anti-McMansion home vs. a McMansion? What are the good and bad points [i.e. green materials harder to source, nosier home-owners, the smell of petuli oil from the architect overwhelming :) ]
"Makes no difference. If I build it they'll buy it." This is the reply I got from a builder a few years ago regarding building 'more' rather than 'better'. Its was a common attitude of builders I've spoken with over the years that specialize in tract-building.
Whatever it takes to close a sale, and that includes making cardboard look like painted drywall. :)
Developers don't build small homes.
It's the land and the roads/curbs/drains etc that costs them the major $$$, not the home.
They make more profit selling a 4,000 sf home than they do on a 1,200 sf home on the same lot.
The "anti McMansion" thing is about people building the largest house they can at the expense of quality.
I'm not so sure. There has been more than one person preaching that size simply counts and nothing more. If I were to go into a neighborhood full of 750-SqFt homes and build a high-quality 7500-SqFt home and post the construction details on FHB I am betting there will be FHB member complaints and opinions to the opposition of effort.
Of course, there are no shortage of irresponsible buyers out there willing to buy all the luxury they can afford without regard to their consumption. Someone's going to build their stuff, might as well be you. But it still sucks.
So, how would you have classified those folks that bought that old, unused pants factory in Rome, Georgia (featured on the show Rezoned)? Were they irresponsible? Instead of a dead building sitting there it now has occupants--all be it they have 15-16K SqFt of used living space. :) Or better yet, how about the older folks that took the equally unused 1928 former bootstore and turned it into a two-person home of much more size than humanity says the really need.
Not info enough. What did they do to increase their efficiency? If you're going to condition that huge of an area, call me anal if you like but my feeling is you have a responsibility to do it (or make sure it is done) right. You = owner/buyer. It's great to reuse existing buildings, no doubt, but if you just gut it and put up new drywall and fixtures, you're still guzzling energy at a tremendously wasteful rate. Especially at that kind of square footage... cripes, imagine the cooling load!Even if you can afford it... that does effect the rest of us.-------------------------------------
-=Northeast Radiant Technology=-
Radiant Design, Consultation, Parts Supply
http://www.NRTradiant.com
My Def of a McMansion is a Large SqFt cookie cutter house on a small lot - leaving next to no room (sometimes, no more than required by city ordinance) on any of the sides to the propert line.1 - measure the board twice, 2 - cut it once, 3 - measure the space where it is supposed to go 4 - get a new board and go back to step 1
Square footage sells and I'd be a buyer if I had a growing family
But size is not the criteria for a house to be a McMansion. The primary criteria is building a product that "looks" like it has quality, but is in fact built from the cheapest materials that can be slapped together the quickest--that's the McMansion. It's an offshoot of the big national builder/developer who will inflict entire subdivisions with five or six (only) floor plans.
Ok, it's true, I find that too many of these things are badly proportioned, and they often have huge useless spaces in them (if you never use the formal dining room, is it any use that it's 19' x 27' x 15'?) And far too many are shoehorned on to too small lots to get more (very profitable to the builder) structures into a given subdivision.
Ok, there are those who are offended by anything over 3000sf (or 2000 or 1500, or whatever)--they have their own worries. But, just because a house is 9000 or 15000 or even 30,000SF, that, alone does not make it a McMansion.
No, it's getting people to drop a quarter or half million on a structure shot together with what ever wiggly finger-jointed rejected-for-pallets 'lumber' the national builder can get for 0.001¢ the board foot--and not telling the buyers that they are paying premium prices for discout materials.
There's another, separate issue--not that these waters need any more muddying--where "ciy" lots go from 1100-1500sf houses to 3500sf that are hard against every setback. That's a separate issue, one for which the financers can get a bunch of the blame. (It's jsut not helped when a national builder comes in and puts a "maxi-sized" built-from-junk monster in on a tear-down lot (or every infill lot they can grab) . . . )
Occupational hazard of my occupation not being around (sorry Bubba)
How dare those people build large homes that we builders build.
How dare those people buy huge homes that will be maintained by the trades.
How dare those people buy large mcmansions that are taxed to the max.
those people and their silly mcmansions...what do they know?
stinky
Yeah, they support that poor energy industry well too. Good for them, eh?Doesn't matter I guess, as long as you get a paycheck, right?-------------------------------------
-=Northeast Radiant Technology=-
Radiant Design, Consultation, Parts Supply
http://www.NRTradiant.com
sorry but,yes you are right the mcmansions do pay the bills.
love your web-site stinky
Hey, I do the work too, I don't mean to sound so preachy. But, it doesn't make it right or ok. Just the way it is.-------------------------------------
-=Northeast Radiant Technology=-
Radiant Design, Consultation, Parts Supply
http://www.NRTradiant.com
Hey, I do the work too, I don't mean to sound so preachy. But, it doesn't make it right or ok. Just the way it is.
Doesn't make it wrong, either. Your beliefs are obviously not shared by the 'right' people or things like this would have prohibited. hahahahaha
It's unfortunate that McMansions do tend to pay a lot of bills. I believe that property taxes are one of the main drivers of sprawl (unwanted, uncontrolled growth, not just growth) and all the ills that come with it. Individual units of government (each township, city, county, etc) all want to maximize their income from taxes, and since property taxes are largely based on the size of the house and lot, they zone or allow for big lots and big houses, and subsidize the sprawl by expanding the infrastructure (roads, sewer, schools) farther and farther, usually becoming less and less efficient and more and more expensive to maintain. If property taxes weren't the main source of revenue, many incentives for building large individual homes on large lots would disappear.
Sorry if this appears to hijack the thread, but I think it has a lot to do with why we end up having very large houses, and having spent so much money on square footage, why the resulting houses are lacking in character and liveability.
Good points.
'Nemo me impune lacesset'No one will provoke me with impunity
Not good points.
Sprawl occurs because more people are purchasing homes. If we eliminate people, we would eliminate sprawl. Perhaps we should look into adopting some of China's social policies?
Let's face it: the buyers are wanting more square footage. They grew up in smaller homes (1000 sf or slightly larger) and see the advantages of having more space. We live in a large country and are not forced to adapt the frugal methods of the Japanese. Maybe someday our population will explode and we'll have to adapt, but we are hundreds of years away from that scene.
In the meantime, we could eliminate the larger homes and just build all small ones (1000sf). The buyers will have to buy two or three to satisfy their cravings and the subdivisioin would be infintely more boring than what we are seeing today. After all, how many ways can you dress up a 30' wide one story elevation, with an almost flat roof?
The whining of "quality" has to stop too. Our modern materials are being developed to speed the process, then when the builders take advantage of it, you guys cry about it. If you look back in history, the painter whined when the roller was introduced and said that the quality was low. Then, they whined when the sprayer was introduced. They whined about latex. They whined about prefinished products. Carpenters whined about power saws. They whined about nail guns. Plumbers whined about pvc. Electricians whined about all the other trades (oops...they still do that).
The point is that the whiners will whine, no matter what.
My suggestion is: if the McMansions are so detestable to you, go back to the innercitys and live in the wonderfully built ramshackled houses that are falling down. They don't have any of the inferior modern products and many of them took more than a year to build. God bless you all. If you hate the city, go out into the country. You'll find thousands of old farmhouses that don't have any osb on them. Bring an arctic sleeping bag though because you cant keep heat in them in the winter. Oh, by the way, they also took more than a year to build and don't have any modern day materials on them.
Your third option is to hire artisans from Europe. I'm sure you'll all enjoy your 3 million dollar, 1000 sf shacks with the hand carved siding.
blue
heh heh I knew that'd get the banter going again.
Very interesting thread.
'Nemo me impune lacesset'No one will provoke me with impunity
I'm sorry, you're full of it. 2x4's and fiberglass with "lowest that meets code" practices are hardly "modern quality" techniques. Time savers is fine. cheaping out on insulation, sealing, windows.. that's not some modern advancement at work. That's bottom line money grubbing.If you build good houses that happen to be large.. more power to you. I wonder how you work it, since the appraisals won't help you, but maybe you just work your concience. Fact is, if money is the only motivator, then you have no reason whatsoever to anything except code minimum on anything that the owner won't see and show off to their friends. That's not your fault as a builder and it does make it hard if your buyer has no principles. But it does suck, and I refuse to give any respect to an owner that makes decisions based on shallow, self absorbed pricinciples with no regard to their impact on the rest of us. You build as large as you can afford to build right. Going over that just screws everyone. We have to buy energy too, you know.I do the load calcs on many of those homes, and I'll tell you... most of them should be criminal. I learned a long time ago the bigger the house, the more conservative to judge the fudge factors, because the construction quality goes down as the size goes up on most homes. And I learned it the hard way.-------------------------------------
-=Northeast Radiant Technology=-
Radiant Design, Consultation, Parts Supply
http://www.NRTradiant.com
Yeah, they support that poor energy industry well too. Good for them, eh?I don't consider my home a McMansion but it is 8,000 sq ft of conditioned space and although cold weather has a few more days here in Va, my heating cost will be under $400 for the season. I have friends living in shoe box condos paying over $200/mo.Last year ac cost me about $350.Size has little to do with energy consumption. They are still waiting on the windmill that produces more energy than was consumed in it's manufacture
That's why we're not talking about size alone, we're talking about size at the expense of quality. You apparently didn't trade good building practice for more square footage; good for you (and us, thanks)!-------------------------------------
-=Northeast Radiant Technology=-
Radiant Design, Consultation, Parts Supply
http://www.NRTradiant.com
Interesting......As a home owner lurking here, I never thought the "McMansion" label was in reference to size as much as quality. The "Mc" referring to the quick, fast, and cheaply made homes that pop up over night. I have toured a few and have been more impressed with a well made double wide...I like big houses, just make them quality. Cheap is cheap no mater what size.
I never thought the "McMansion" label was in reference to size as much as quality. The "Mc" referring to the quick, fast, and cheaply made homes that pop up over night.
That's the way I've always used the term too, but also including large houses with absolutely no style. I really like the big old Queen Anne style or even second empire, for example, and there's no way to call one of those a "McMansion." They're mansions.
"A job well done is its own reward. Now would you prefer to make the final payment by cash, check or Master Card?"
In the past, I've asked for what is generally meant by the term, McMansion. I was led to believe (well, not led to the conclusion in this thread) it was quality as a function of size that could no longer be supported. As such, those cheap, large homes. But then I got to thinking about how the term was liberally being thrown around in local society in my area, with individuals screaming bloody murder at the infill activities.
There is an infill activity in several counties around me in which small reasonably-priced homes are altered or replaced with much, much larger properties. These are all custom-jobs and the quality is usually in them--a far, far cry from what could be said about 90% of new construction, because most residential construction around Atlanta is tract, not custom, and almost all tract is poor quality.
Yet, the term is still used because it is trendy and no one that I know of has published the official definition--its highly personal for all derogatory usage.
Nuke
I think Capnmac gave a good definition of what a Mcmansion is. 71701.12
In Austin, TX where I do most of my work the city council has been debating what to do about the Mcmansion craze in the neighborhoods that have 20 year old nice quality home that are now being rebuilt into grandiose "mcmansions", all on somewhat average size lots.
I certainly don't want to see the work stop, hell that's where most of my income comes from and I sure as hell don't want to see that dry up. I do understand what the neighborhood people are concerned about but........
I just recently finished a job in what I'd call a Mcmansion, 4500 sq ft home, not a whole lot of quality in it, appeared to me to be everything I've seen in tract homes back home. This house was/is two years old and already they are sinking another 150K into it. I like that, and I like it even more that one of the neighbors is looking at doing something to his place with me in mind as the cabinetmaker!
I do think the term Mcmansion is over used, like capn said, there are a lot of 9000 sq ft homes that are anything but a mcmansion.
I'm not all that concerned about the overbuilding of them, like blue always says, do you want to go back to building tract homes? I don't, don't think I could do that crap anymore. And who the hell am I to tell someone what they should do with their money.
Doug
I didn't mean to suggest his definition was misrepresented, but rather how others have used it, both on FHB and on other forums. Even the name implies different things to different people. McMansion could just mean a tracted development of 5-8K SqFt homes, all could be cheaply-built or with the highest quality and still represent the McDonalds approach to Mansions.
Now, I do admit that I have not stepped onto the development sites, yet, for homes in the +$800K arena. Both myself and my neighbors (in the surrounding planned communities) thought the $400-500K developments were the 'peak', but then one mansion owner took some of his land, tracted it out and is building $800K homes and above. I guess I'd need to walk that site and any finished interiors to determine if it was cheaply built or not. I wouldn't want to assume its McMansion.
BTW, if quality has an equal amount to do with it being classified, or not, as a McMansion, a lot of these commercial renovations seems to put them well ahead in the quality department when compared to 90% of the homes around me at any price level. I'm guessing that would not make it a McMansion. :)
Yeah, they support that poor energy industry well too. Good for them, eh?
Doesn't matter I guess, as long as you get a paycheck, right?
Actually, the utility company makes out like a bandit because that much space means a lot more money than had it stayed commercial. Residential customers are billed at a higher energy rate than commercial. And the assessed value of the property is certainly going to mean that one 'resident' is paying a lot more of property taxes than most. So, the county makes out like a bandit, too.
As to the amount of energy they are paying to heat/cool it was not mentioned. Considering how much money I spend on average for heating cooling my 2650 SqFt, I'm not seeing it winning any energy awards either. And for one 33K SqFt renovated building is probably not as damaging to energy consuption as the 109 award losing homes in my community. :)
Hope you don't own anything more than a extemely fuel-efficient automobile. I'hate to think you were a hypocrite.
Residential customers are billed at a higher energy rate than commercial.
Opposite around here central NJ. Commercial meters have a "peak load" indicator that has to be reset each month after reading. That peak # is a multiplier on top of the standard KWT rate. They claim it's because offices etc use all of their power during "peak" or daytime hours.
1,500 sf office uses about 1200 KWH and pays $200 to $300/mo for elec.
At my home, 1200 KWH is about $140.
Oh great, another McMansion bloodbath........