Stickers on the back windows of cars can signal all sorts of things. The number of family members. A favorite vacation spot. A beloved car brand or sports team.
What would a house sticker in the back window mean?
I recently saw a SUV with a two-story house sticker. The sticker looks similar to a drawing a child might make of a house. The picture below has such an image; this sticker had much cleaner lines but had a similar shape.
A McMansion is a large, highly ornate house often found in planned communities. This term is sometimes used as a criticism of mass-produced homes that don’t follow strict architectural styles.
They are large homes on small plots of land and can be more prevalent in states like California, New York and Texas. McMansions provide a way for upper-middle-class Americans to inflate their economic status.
McMansions are often generic and made from low-quality materials, so they don’t hold up well over time.
McMansions get a bad rap and are often referred to in a disapproving manner, but there are advantages to purchasing one. It can be a good way to buy a larger home, and you may be able to live in a nicer neighborhood. However, these houses may also come with high property taxes and can be expensive to maintain, especially if they’re built with low-quality materials.
For a company interested in providing mortgages, does this encourage people to pursue McMansions or not? I suppose providing information is helpful. I imagine all the major mortgage companies have underwritten lots of McMansion mortgages and would like to do more.
If a Quicken Loans customer does not like a McMansion but wants a bigger home that is not a mansion, what kind of home should they go after instead?
It’s a “good’ neighborhood now. And the land that Transfiguration once occupied will be turned into about a dozen single-family homes, where, in an area that was zoned for and still is largely home to two- and three-flats, the starting price of a new house is $1.35 million. Talk to me about the zoning on that one.
This week is the one I dreaded: the physical building, Transfiguration of Our Lord, is being torn down. I held out hope that the building that had welcomed and taken care of so many would be preserved. At the very least, I hoped that the land that nourished thousands of families would house a few more of them in the middle of a nationwide affordable housing crisis. But why build homes for two or three families when you can get rich selling a house to just one?
So the fences have gone up, and the building is coming down.
Processing the closing of a long-time religious congregation can be difficult.
But, there is also a suggestion above that these are two very different uses of land. According to this member, the church nourished families and the community. The church welcomed immigrants. Its school educated kids. The church was a gathering place. Churches in the United States do not pay property taxes, but they can provide services for the neighborhood.
In contrast, the buildings that will replace the church will be expensive single-family homes. These will provide private space for households within a desirable neighborhood. There is money to be made in the developing and selling of the buildings.
This could lead to a question: is land better used for organizations that serve the community or for single-family homes? If people care more about money, creating more real estate is the answer. If people want to emphasize community, there might be room for religious congregations and other neighborhood organizations, but they may need to sustain themselves. Americans value single-family homes and like making money. When congregations close, it is a relatively easy step in many communities to redevelop this land or reuse the buildings in ways that generate money and revenue.
Buying a house in the suburbs isn’t just a little easier on the wallet for city dwellers. In some parts of the country, bedroom communities offer an entirely different real estate market. Over 600 of the 777 suburbs within 30 miles of the country’s 20 most expensive cities are more affordable in terms of price per square foot — up to 65% cheaper in some places.
The East Coast offers the most suburban alternatives to main cities: 95 of the top 100 suburbs with the biggest price differences are near New York, Washington D.C., Boston, and Miami…
These are the top 10 cities with the most relatively affordable suburbs for home buyers, ranked by the percentage of suburbs with a lower cost per square foot compared to the main city.
Salt Lake City, Utah (100%)
New York, New York (98%)
Washington, D.C. (97%)
Boston, Massachusetts (93%)
Honolulu, Hawaii (90%)
Austin, Texas (89%)
Seattle, Washington (83%)
Boise, Idaho (80%)
Denver, Colorado (80%)
Riverside, California (79%)
A few thoughts in response:
Do people always seek out the cheapest housing and move to the suburbs? Some will move to the suburbs because of lower price points. Others might stay in the city or go to the suburbs for other reasons.
Is 30 miles out from an expensive city a large enough radius? It might be for some of these cities and not for others. Additionally, many commutes are suburb to suburb to being 40 miles out and commuting to a suburb 25 miles from the city is a different comparison than city versus suburban settings.
One reason the expensive cities are so pricey is that they are desirable. If more people move to a region, does this then decrease the affordability of suburbs as well?
Is it safe to assume then that there are metro areas where city and suburb prices do not have much difference?
The Bewitched update would focus on Tabitha Stevens, the 13-year-old daughter of witch Samantha and human Darrin. She juggles two lives attending middle school while also being secretly enrolled in a magical academy run by her grandmother, Endora — D’Ambrosia describes the premise as “Hannah Montana meets Harry Potter.”
Will the new Bewitched also include any of suburbia or will it primarily focus on schools? Interestingly, the two comparison TV shows mentioned above also include suburban settings. Hannah Montana was primarily set in Malibu, California while Harry Potter included scenes in and around the Dursley’s house on Privet Drive.
If the new version does include the suburbs, there is an opportunity for the suburbia depicted to look quite different than that of the 1960s. The suburbia often depicted on television then often portrayed nuclear family life in single-family homes on quiet streets. The suburbs today are more complex, diverse, and varied. There is an opportunity here to depict not only updated characters and storylines but also settings.
The McCaskey family is in love with Arlington Heights? Well, me, too. I pay every nickel in property taxes I owe and am quite happy with the services I receive in return. I suggest Da Bears be required to do the same. In addition, they can build the infrastructure required at their own expense. With the full oversight and approval of the village of Arlington Heights, of course. If this is unacceptable, then please, by all means, head to Naperville. Best of luck to all…
The McCaskey family will plop a 70,000-seat domed stadium, plus sportsbook (that’s a casino, folks) on a portion of the property and sell off pieces to the highest bidders who will quickly turn the place into a national party destination. And it won’t just be eight Sundays a year. I’m quite certain they envision March Madness, Super Bowls and Taylor Swift concerts. Trains will back up through downtown; Euclid Avenue, Wilke Road and Northwest Highway will be jammed; and our perfect little town will be overrun.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I can hear them say. “All stadium traffic will be routed to the expressways.” Uh-huh. Ever been to Wrigley Field? I have. What a cool place. What a legendary sports destination. But I don’t want to live anywhere near it. Nor do I want to live next door to the Airbnb rental on the weekend the Packers are in town.
What if the Bears back out? What will we do with a 326-acre lot? Here are some ideas: walking, running and biking paths. Lakes and paddleboats. Horseback riding would be a nice touch. Skate parks for the skateboarders in the summer, a wandering ice-skating path in the winter with a warming house. A nine-hole golf course — walking only, kids-only.
I’m sure the numbers are daunting, but why not be creative? Not every use of land has to be about growth, development and profitability. We are rushing into the arms of the first suitor that has presented us with a ring. I suggest we get it appraised. It feels like cubic zirconium to me.
On one hand, this is a specific response to a particular proposed land use. A major stadium plus surrounding development is a big deal. In mature suburbs where big pieces of land become available only rarely, decisions about this land can be very consequential. Additionally, residents of suburbs often feel they should have a say in how land in their community is used. This is one of the reasons they like living in suburbs: they are closer to local government officials and processes. After all, they pay taxes, they live in the community, and they will be affected by the new development.
On the other hand, the sentiment of “not wanting to live anywhere near it” is a common one across suburbs. This could refer to affordable housing or waste transfer stations or drug treatment facilities or religious buildings or other uses suburbanites feel will threaten their way of life. Residents may not like the idea that growth is good yet this part of the appeal of many suburbs where growth signals continued residential and business demand.
The Chicago Bears will end up somewhere and there will likely be some residents who do not like the decision to have a stadium near them. Given the billions of dollars and status at stake here, they might not be able to do much about it.
I recently had a reason to drive by the nearest roadway named after Secretariat:
This is a short roadway. True to being a “court,” it is a cul-de-sac with roughly seven houses along it. According to Google Maps, it is about 250 feet long.
When I wrote about this one month ago, I had this road in mind. Did the name transform the surroundings and/or elevate the late 1980s suburban neighborhood due to the prestigious athlete? Not particularly. Is it a unique name? Yes, but one shared by over 200 other locations in the United States.
Perhaps the biggest difference between this specific street and those nearby is that it is a recognizable or more unique name. For example, here are some of the more anonymous streets within a mile or so in sprawling suburbia: George Street, Jeffrey Court, Hamilton Drive, Rose Court, and Christina Circle. These might be named after specific people but it is hard to know decades later.
Secretariat lives on in this suburb in a way that LeBron James or Tom Brady or other people in the running for the best in their sports probably never will.
The top six cities on the list are Midwest cities (including Buffalo on the western edge of New York). In this list, the first city in the West is San Jose at #7, the first city in the South is Macon, Georgia at #13, and the first Northeast city is Danbury, Connecticut at #14.
I do not know if these differences are statistically significant but it is interesting to consider why Midwest metropolitan areas might lean toward AM radio. A few possibilities:
-A long history of important AM stations.
-Is the Midwest less dense compared to some other parts of the country or Midwest people do further drives and AM’s longer signal keeps them connected?
-Radio stations on FM or AM in different areas provide different content. Is this linked to more or less interest in music, news, sports, talk, or other content?
-Are there are other lifestyle markers of Midwesterners that are somehow linked to AM radio?
Of the top 20 radio markets in the country, I think only the Washington, D.C. area is not on this list with at least 20% of listeners tuning into AM radio. What are people in DC listening to?
With talk of empty urban office buildings leading to a decline in property values, how might this affect tax revenues collected by cities? Here is one estimate:
Municipal governments have even more to worry about. Property taxes underpin city budgets. In New York City, such taxes generate approximately 40 percent of revenue. Commercial property—mostly offices—contributes about 40 percent of these taxes, or 16 percent of the city’s total tax revenue. In San Francisco, property taxes contribute a lower share, but offices and retail appear to be in an even worse state.
These are not huge numbers but they do contribute to the overall local budget picture. Office or commercial buildings in cities that are not being used or are being turned over to lenders or are prospects for building conversions will not generate as much tax revenue as they might when demand for such properties is higher.
How will cities address this? It will be interesting to see different approaches that could be affected by local real estate markets, housing needs, and budget specifics. If there are a few cities that are able to limit the revenue damage, they might serve as models for others.
(This is also a problem for suburbs with large amounts of office and commercial space.)
Specifically, it has everything to do with LKFS, which stands for “Loudness, K-weighted, relative to full scale” and which, for the sake of simplicity, is a unit for measuring loudness. Traditionally it’s been anchored to the dialogue. For years, going back to the golden age of broadcast television and into the pay-cable era, audio engineers had to deliver sound levels within an industry-standard LKFS, or their work would get kicked back to them. That all changed when streaming companies seized control of the industry, a period of time that rather neatly matches Game of Thrones’ run on HBO. According to Blank, Game of Thrones sounded fantastic for years, and she’s got the Emmys to prove it. Then, in 2018, just prior to the show’s final season, AT&T bought HBO’s parent company and overlaid its own uniform loudness spec, which was flatter and simpler to scale across a large library of content. But it was also, crucially, un-anchored to the dialogue.
“So instead of this algorithm analyzing the loudness of the dialogue coming out of people’s mouths,” Blank explained to me, “it analyzes the whole show as loudness. So if you have a loud music cue, that’s gonna be your loud point. And then, when the dialogue comes, you can’t hear it.” Blank remembers noticing the difference from the moment AT&T took the reins at Time Warner; overnight, she said, HBO’s sound went from best-in-class to worst. During the last season of Game of Thrones, she said, “we had to beg [AT&T] to keep our old spec every single time we delivered an episode.” (Because AT&T spun off HBO’s parent company in 2022, a spokesperson for AT&T said they weren’t able to comment on the matter.)
Netflix still uses a dialogue-anchor spec, she said, which is why shows on Netflix sound (to her) noticeably crisper and clearer: “If you watch a Netflix show now and then immediately you turn on an HBO show, you’re gonna have to raise your volume.” Amazon Prime Video’s spec, meanwhile, “is pretty gnarly.” But what really galls her about Amazon is its new “dialogue boost” function, which viewers can select to “increase the volume of dialogue relative to background music and effects.” In other words, she said, it purports to fix a problem of Amazon’s own creation. Instead, she suggested, “why don’t you just air it the way we mixed it?”
This change in how television audio works contributes to needing subtitles to understand what is being said.
I wonder if the bigger question is whether this significantly changes how people consume and are affected by television. If we are reading more dialogue and descriptions, does this focus our attention on certain aspects of shows and not others? Could this be good for reading overall? Does it limit the ability of viewers to multitask if they need to keep up with the words on the screen? Do subtitles help engage the attention of viewers? Do I understand new things I did notice before in the world with fewer subtitles? Does a story or scene stick with me longer because I was reading the dialogue?
Does this also mean that as Americans have been able to buy bigger and bigger TVs for cheaper prices, they are getting a worse audio experience?
Legally Sociable 