I read a recent article in the paper about how houses in a certain city in my State were getting bigger each year.
I live in the Denver Colorado burbs and the article in question is about the "mansionization" of homes in Boulder County Colorado. Over the past 20 years, the average new-home sizes have grown from about 2700 square feet (which is about average for the country) to MORE THAN 6000 square feet. 6000 square feet average for a new house? Wow!
At first glance, I must admit that I was a little envious. What was I doing wrong so that we could not afford something like this "average" house? I took a deep breath and remembered that the choices we made and continue to make keep us away from things like this and my wife and I are glad we are.
Kudos to you if you own a large home and like it. I think if it works for you, then more power to you.
My wife and I have often discussed this and we decided years ago to live in a more modest home, for these reasons.: when you own a larger home there are thing that go along with it other than just size, all of which affect the environment. It costs more to heat, it takes more time to maintain, it takes LONGER CLEAN (although all of my friends who live in houses like that don't do any of their cleaning themselves), longer to care for the lawn (same thing....most that I know who own houses like this have someone take care of their lawn for them), and of course the big one.....it takes more STUFF to fill it.
All of that takes energy, raw materiels from the environment, and eventually you end up with stuff that just goes into the dumpster to get more stuff.
Now we hardly live as paupers. We have a smallish home in a nice newer neighborhood, great place to raise the kids and such.
However, probably the biggest advantage of us living in a smaller home has been that it has afforded us the lifestyle that we currently live in right now. I could leave my job and switch places with my wife without any real economic downside to it. No huge worries (OK maybe one or two) and she could go back to work and I could work her business she started and take care of the kids.
I guess its all about making different choices, chosing to live with less, having less of an impact on the environment, and enjoying ourselves while we do it.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this?
Monday, May 19, 2008
Go Green by Going Smaller
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4 comments:
My thoughts are like yours. We live in a three bedroom house, just under 2000 square feet. Would it be nice to have a bigger house sometimes? Yes. But, overall the impact it makes on the environment isn't worth it to us. Plus, with my husband having 10 borthers and sisters, it gets us out of hosting duties at Christmas!
OMG! 6000 sq. ft? No thanks. I can barely get myself to clean our home under 1,800. Our home was built nearly 70 years ago, so it's not incredibly large. Where we live, homes are older and anything near 2,000 sq ft and up is usually close to 1 million+ :(
This is a GOOD post. Very important! I'm impressed. Just think of ALL those light bulb burning in a big house. And how much Earth are we going to cover, crowd, push back, cut down all for the sake of McMansion World? Thank you for speaking your mind and writing this. We ALL are going to have to learn to live more simply if want to LIVE...period.
I saw that article too- I live in Boulder Co., and work in the town in question, actually in that neighboorhood the story was about.
The houses are beautiful-no doubt. I usually try to take a short walk on my lunch break, and all these beautiful houses- no one ever seems to be home. I am sure both people living there, are working to support the house.
I also have to laugh, because Boulder is "famous" for the green movement, promoting the green lifestyle, but they have these huge mansions, and it seems like 80% of the people driving around town are driving massive SUV's like Hummers and RangeRovers. Talk about not practicing what you preach.
We also try to live below our means- we are house hunting now, and don't wan't too big of a house for all the reasons you mentioned. :-)
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