You’ve decided to buy and you know exactly what you want.
That is, you think you know what you want.
Let’s hear what a panel of housing industry pros participating in the recent International Builders’ Show in Dallas told an audience of hundreds of builders, developers, architects and manufacturers what they believe home buyers want when they make what is often the biggest investment of their lives.
Whether you’re a Boomer, Gen Xer, senior or empty-nester, first-timer or move-up, single, couple or family, the one thing you want is a home that has your name written all over it–that you will fall madly in love with because it is so you.
But of course.
Though speakers focused on single-family homes or town homes rather than, say, lofts or highrise condos, some of the wants are certainly dreams shared by a lot of people who want their very own place.
According to the panel, this most-wanted home has a flex room–jargon for the extra or bonus room that used to be the den or home office but now might be a media or exercise room, tech center, kids’ playroom, art studio–whatever fits your passion and requires space.
Your love for this home is torn between its kitchen and bathroom–both over-the-top gorgeous, both high on show-off status.
The kitchen has an island, an impressive refrigerator, double ovens, plus some specialized in-your-dreams numbers such as a wine refrigerator or a stove top strictly for your favorite wok.
The kitchen is part of an open floor plan that combines it with family and dining rooms. This airy, window-filled great room is way up there on the want list and, as you already know, the separate living room is not.
The master bath with its multi-jet tub and equally jetted separate shower has vanities for each partner (not merely a vanity with double sinks), a window and, for some, an enclosed toilet.
There are storage rooms galore, a mud room, walk-in pantries and closets everywhere and the third bay of the garage is probably a hobby room, with storage for sports gear.
This two-story dream home, between 1,600 and 2,300 square feet, has 9- and 10-foot ceilings and a couple of fireplaces. The exterior, by the way, looks much like the homes that were built in 1897.
The design of the exterior is secondary to that of the interior unless you’re in the $500,000 and up category and want people to know that. You may want a front porch, you must have front-loading garages (81 percent of you already have them).
Your dream home? Actually, the above wish list is a composite of what the trio of panelists discussed during a “What Today’s Home Buyers Want” seminar at the recent builders’ conclave.
The session’s moderator, builder Randall Lewis, executive vice president of Lewis Operating Corp.in Upland, Calif., told the audience that customizing is so high on buyers’ priority lists that many builders are setting up design centers.
Joan McCloskey, executive building and remodeling editor of Des Moines-based Better Homes and Gardens, combined results of her magazine’s annual home improvement contest (she says the survey revealed that people remodel because “they can’t find what they want in a new home”); industry trends (what builders say buyers should want) and what the magazine’s staff thinks buyers will want.
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Because “Demographics affect what people want,” Gopal Ahluwalia , director of research for the National Association of Home Builders in Washington, D.C., provided graphs and statistics to illustrate trends in home size, ceiling heights, direction of garage doors and more.
The trio generally agreed on these points: The kitchen has priority over all other spaces, followed by the bathrooms, though McCloskey thought this was a close call and gave the bathroom the edge; the extra or flex room is practically standard now, stealing space from the living room, which has disappeared, is disappearing or will disappear, depending on the speaker; an open floor plan–living/dining/family/kitchen–is practically a fait accompli everywhere, at all prices; storage is now next to godliness.
Researcher Ahluwalia said that 65 percent of new homes completed in 1971 had 1,600 square feet or less, but that plummeted to just 26 percent in 1999. Currently, the average new home measures 2,225 square feet, he said, but added that size “cannot keep increasing at that rate.”
The average size, “which reflects what buyers–not builders–want,” will level out at 2,250 to 2,300 square feet, he said. He added that more than half of the new homes completed in 1999 were two-stories with lots averaging 10,000 square feet, expected to decline to 9,000 square feet in this decade.
Calling today’s housing market “very fragmented,” Lewis said two-thirds of prospective buyers want “as big a house as possible but 40 percent will trade off size for other features.”
McCloskey was the major advocate of “personalizing,” though Lewis also reported a tremendous turn toward customizing or giving a home personality. “Size of the home is half of the buyer’s decision, choosing the extras is the other half,” he said.
McCloskey, who noted that 66 percent of Better Homes’ remodeling contestants said they preferred to fix up their homes, rather than buy, “because they wanted to add personal character to their home,” said buyers’ choice of the extra/bonus room exemplified personalizing. Its uses vary widely, the newest is a place that invites you “to exhale….to take a deep breath and relax.”
Local builders asked about the trends identified by the Dallas panel certainly didn’t disagree that the bonus, flex or extra room is a strong priority.
Sue Schwegler, vice president of Batavia-based Jelinek Builders Inc., stressed, as did other local builders, that buyer wants vary a great deal, depending on location and budgets, yet her buyers’ basic priorities are pretty consistent with those cited by the panel –strong on impressive kitchens, storage, bonus rooms, more space than average homes.
Jelinek, builders of custom- and semi-custom homes averaging about $400,000, had a model home about two years ago that featured both ground-level and upstairs family rooms, rather than a two-story family room. Mike and Melody Gane saw the model and thought it was right for them. They bought a home in Naperville’s Stillwater subdivision, where the enjoy the first floor family room for relaxing, listening to music and watching TV while their daughter, Sarah, and her daughter, Amanda, 11, claim the second-floor family room.
Generalizations about size is a dicey matter because of the enormous number of variables in area prospective buyers, price ranges, and locations, emphasized local builders/developers.
For Jim Coughlin, senior vice president of Residential Development Group of Crystal Lake, the Dallas panel’s overall size/wants list is fairly on target.
“The Midwest buyer wants a two-story, four-bedroom home in the 2,600- to 2,700-square-foot range, with both living and dining rooms, a den somewhat separated from everyday traffic flow, full basement, fireplace and a three-car garage for two cars and storage space,” says Coughlin, whose firm primarily builds single-family and town homes in the $230,000 to $300,000 range.
“There’s a certain magic to having a home over 2,000 square feet,” claims John Kamin, founder of New Home Finders of Arlington Heights, a firm that works directly with individual buyers in finding homes to fill their needs. His clients want homes that are 2,000 to 2,300 square feet, not an inch smaller, says Kamin, a former builder.
“All buyers want the most they can get for the money and in the suburbs that translates to square footage (about 2,500 square feet) and amenities while in the city it’s less footage (1,100 square feet) and better location,” says Roger Mankedick, executive vice president of sales and marketing for Concord Homes. The Palatine-based company builds everything from starter to semi-custom suburban single-family and town homes and also rehabs and builds lofts and condos in the city.
“Outside of financial considerations, in the city it’s parking and storage that are priorities, while the size of the lot, the quality of outdoor space are musts in the suburbs,” says Mankedick.
As for customizing, Concord’s Mankedick claims, “If you don’t move walls, reconfigure rooms and do some kind of customizing, you won’t be in business very long.”
Wants, of course, reach higher luxury levels as prices inch or zoom upwards.
For example, 9- and 10-foot ceilings throughout a home are taken for granted in upscale homes, according to sales associate Sara Anderson of Glenview-based Edward R. James Homes. She says buyers of town homes in the upper $200,000s to $400,000s and single-family homes from $600,000 and up want two-story homes with about 3,500 to 5,000 square feet, with “dramatic flair and open space, bay windows, a functional, comfortable design that’s livable but feels grand, gourmet kitchens.”
So far, so good.
Chicago-area spokespersons, though, offered some good Midwestern-flavored feedback to the panel’s ideas on other trends.
For example:
– Living rooms are dead, said the Dallas panel.
Well, not really, say the locals.
“Slowly, slowly they’re getting a little smaller, even in large homes, but they’re not disappearing.” says Coughlin. Personally, “I’d like to get rid of it so there’d be more room for flex space and the first-floor master bedroom,” says Schwegler, “but the problem is the real estate agents who aren’t comfortable with resale possibilities.” Says Mankedick, “It’ll take a couple of generations before it dies.”
– Fireplaces are hot, said the panel. Ahluwalia claims 61 percent of homes built last year have one or more fireplaces, “just for aesthetics.”
His numbers are low, say the locals, calling them a “must” in the city, 70 percent or higher in the suburbs, where seconds are becoming more common.
– Storage is high on the priority list, said the trio.
No kidding, say the locals, agreeing that walk-in closets are pretty standard, no kitchen can have enough cabinets, walk-in and butler’s pantries are hitting wish lists, mud rooms are not as important as the panel thinks.
– Bathrooms are growing in size and numbers, said the panel, with number-cruncher Ahluwalia noting that 53 percent of homes built in ’99 had 2 1/2 to 3 bathrooms, then forecasting “at least” three bathrooms in every new home in the next ten years.
Do they realize how many new homeowners think having 1 1/2 bathrooms is bliss, ask the locals, who say 2 1/2 are fairly standard in certain price ranges, but 3 in every new home in the next ten years is quite a stretch.
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– Buyers want “less ostentatious homes,” they want them “simple and sleek,” with traditional exteriors, said panel members.
That got mixed reviews from the locals.
“They’re looking not as much for drama as they are for space and value,” says Coughlin. “For example, they’ll sacrifice a cathedral ceiling because they’re more interested in square footage than cubic space–they don’t live in that space up there.”
Others say buyers are interested in that first impression, but then they want to put the dollars inside. One added that the money that goes to the interior is “for flourishes, upscale appliances, upgrades.” Another says, traditional is definitely the exterior look, but now more straightforward with fewer peaks and complicated roof lines.
With a “give me a break” sound in her voice, Jelinek’s Schwegler said, “In the executive class, bells and whistles are important. They’re not looking for stripped down or plain. We have more requests than ever for additional items–a heated toilet, for example.”
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Contact Genevieve Buck by mail at baiduhai, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, Il. 60611 or e-mail to [email protected].