Both our experts confirmed our suspicions. When it comes to your home’s exterior, the front door is the most important element for setting the tone.
“Think of your front door as your headline,” says real estate pro Charlie Lankston. “It’s one of the first details that draws the eye, and sets the stage for the story your home is about to tell.”…
“Far and away, the most important element is the front door of the home,” he says. “It is what every buyer sees first and with which they form their first impressions before even entering.”…
Along with indicating what potential buyers might find inside, Yee says your front door could also signal certain messages around the neighborhood.
Is this like how the eyes are supposedly the windows into the soul? When you enter a house, your eye is going to be drawn to the entryway so you will see the door. You may even have some time to inspect it closely walking up to it and through it.
But what exactly does it tell you? Some sense of the style of the rest of the home? Something about the upkeep? How much the door costs is going to say something about other upgrades?
I have also seen experts claim front doors have a high return on investment. Compared to other house projects, putting money into the door may be worthwhile.
I imagine there have to be at least some examples of an impressive front door leading to squalor elsewhere. Even if the front door is impactful, can it overcome other significant issues?
Homer Glen-based home rehabber Pawel Radzik paid $66,000 last year for the modest, three-bedroom ranch-style brick house on 141st Place, and he gave it a major overhaul, saying last week that “80% of it is new — new flooring, new cabinets, new plumbing, new electrical, new kitchen.” He then listed the home in January for $219,000 before cutting his asking price to $205,000 later that month and then to $199,900 in February…
Upon the naming of the pontiff, Radzik immediately pulled the house from the market and told Elite Street at the time that he was looking into “what is the best option for me,” regarding the home, given its newly discovered provenance and heightened prominence.
Now, Radzik and his listing agent, Steve Budzik of iCandyRealty, have teamed up with auction house Paramount, with a June 18 auction date. The house has a reserve price of $250,000, meaning that Radzik has the right to reject any offers below that amount…
What a new owner would do with the home is unclear — perhaps turning it into a shrine to the new pope, or alternately restoring it to how it might have looked when the pontiff was a boy. No one disputes that the house has no real equal, as Prevost is the first American ever to become pope, and the 141st Place house is the only home Prevost ever lived in while growing up.
Three things strike me from this news:
The house looks like a typical postwar suburban house in the Chicago area: modest in size by today’s standards and was in need of overhauling. And the community it is in has changed.
This house is famous because of someone who once lived there. What happens to such suburban houses? There must be many such houses in the American suburbs – even though no other ones can claim to be the home to such a religious leader – given the number of Americans who have lived in suburbs over the decades.
The increase in value is striking. Even before the announcement about the Pope, the home went from a purchase price of $66,000 last year to a sales price around $200,000 this year to a set minimum of $250,000 later this year. That a significant appreciation in housing value. Does this end up as a successful house flipping project?
I will be curious to see what the home sells for as it combines an aging yet rehabbed and more valuable home in the suburbs connected to a famous religious leader.
“As advertised, your on-site, outdoor, retail business use of Property is strictly prohibited and must immediately cease,” the May 16 letter read. Small, at-home businesses are allowed under the village’s House Occupation Code. The catch is they must operate indoors.
Yamamoto has been appealing for about a year, hoping to work with the village to update the zoning code and allow for the farm. He even submitted three separate proposals. The first aimed to tweak the code so that residents can apply for special use permits for agrotourism. The second changed “agrotourism” to “agricultural experiences” and limited what could be sold and the number of people who were allowed on the property. The last proposed a change in the village’s definition of “agricultural activities” — which are already allowed — to include on-site sales…
“The Village’s Zoning Board of Appeals was particularly concerned that under these various proposals, similar outdoor commercial operations could be allowed to occur on every residential single-family property in the Village,” Paul wrote.
But Little Ducky still has support in the community. Several residents showed up to Yamamoto’s first proposal hearing in August 2024, and many more wrote letters. In all, 133 written comments were submitted, with 129 in support and four in opposition. Of those who spoke in person, 16 supported the farm, while three opposed it…
Yamamoto isn’t giving up. He’s already submitted two more applications and has been waiting for a response since February. In the meantime, he and his wife are picking and delivering tulips themselves.
The catch in this case seems to be that indoor businesses are allowed – imagine something involving a home office or a service that can be provided in a home – versus an outdoor operation. That outdoor business could create noise or be unsightly or disrupt the character of a single-family home neighborhood. Residents might be willing to put up with loud power equipment to keep their landscaping looking good (or not) but an outdoor business is a threat.
It will be interesting to see if support from local residents could shift the outcome. Could a one-time variation in the zoning be granted? Or the zoning guidelines changed to allow clearly-defined agricultural uses?
Giant White Houses are white, with jet-black accents: the shutters, the gutters, the rooves. They are giant—Hulk houses—swollen to the very limits of the legally allowed property setback, and unnaturally tall. They feature a mishmash of architectural features, combining, say, the peaked roof of a farmhouse with squared-off sections reminiscent of city townhomes. They mix horizontal siding, vertical paneling, and painted brick willy-nilly…
After speaking to realtors, architects, critics, and the guy who built the house next door, I’ve learned that the answer is more complicated than I’d imagined. It has to do with Chip and Joanna Gaines, Zillow, the housing crunch, the slim margins of the spec-home industry, and the evolution of minimalism. It has to do, most of all, with what a certain class of homebuyer even believes a house to be—whether they realize it or not.
I found at least a few of these houses among the 349 teardowns I examined in suburban Naperville, Illinois. I did not classify them as such but they were among the many homes with prominent triangular gables (and usually multiple ones on the front facade). They sometimes had porches. The primarily white exterior is unique compared to teardowns that mix brick, stone, siding (vertical or horizontal), and shingles.
At least in Naperville, these homes emerged in a particular context: a wealthy built-out suburb that was in demand, numerous older and smaller single-family homes located near the vibrant suburban downtown, and local regulations that allowed relatively large teardowns.
How many years until this particular style is no longer built in large numbers and is perceived to be from a particular era? This happens with different residential home styles. This was not the predominant style in the teardowns I looked at between 2008-2017. Does this have an even shorter shelf life if it is linked to the reach of Chip and Joanna Gaines (and perhaps is more prominent in communities where people watch HGTV)?
The more vulnerable sectors include hobbies and crafts retailers, as well as middle-market apparel sellers, said Brandon Svec, head of U.S. retail analytics at CoStar Group. Home goods stores also face challenges, Svec said, because a sluggish housing market decreases consumer demand for refrigerators, couches and large TVs. And high interest rates are dissuading lower-income consumers from making big-ticket purchases on their credit cards, Cohen said.
This can help explain some of the encouragement businesses offered for homeownership throughout the twentieth century. There is money to be made in the development and sale of houses but there is also money to be made in all the goods people think the house should have. Residents need to have particular items in their kitchens, living rooms, dining rooms (maybe not as much now), bedrooms, yards, and so on. If fewer houses are sold, fewer people will buy items for their new spaces.
On the homebuyer side, this sometimes shows up in advice about financing a purchase. Yes, there is money to be delivered at purchase in the down payment and regular mortgage and tax payments. But do people also budget for changes they want to make? This could include certain consumer goods or broader renovation projects.
I wonder how much of these particular items listed – refrigerators, couches, and large TVs – are purchased because of moving. All of these items could break at some point. Or a person might want to upgrade what they have. How many consumer goods are bought just due to moving?
Ordinary buyers and investors have different priorities when sizing up a house purchase. An owner-occupier will focus on whether they can afford the monthly mortgage payment, rather than obsessing over cap rates. They might be willing to overpay if the house is in a good location and is the right long-term fit for them or their family.
It can be frustrating for institutional investors when house hunters bid prices up to irrational levels in tight markets, as is happening today. But sky-high valuations have a silver lining for landlords. Oddly, family homes have turned out to be a great hedge against higher interest rates, as the lock-in effect of ultralow in-place mortgages has protected valuations. And now is a great time for landlords to prune their portfolios and sell properties at near-record prices.
As the existing housing stock is so unaffordable, investors need to find other ways to grow their portfolios. Large players such as American Homes 4 Rent are building houses themselves, or buying newly constructed units directly from builders. This should be helpful for the undersupplied U.S. housing market.
There is also a small pool of properties that can be picked up at prices that make sense to investors. According to real-estate investor Amherst, around $12 billion of two-to-four-bedroom homes are currently listed for sale at a 5.75% cap rate. These properties are cheaper because they need work. But it might be more lucrative to patch them up than to build new ones, given it currently costs $200 a square foot on average to build a house compared to $20 to $30 a square foot to renovate.
In the end, both sets of owners want to gain financially from their purpose. Investors want a return on their investment as do homeowners as they tend to expect the value of their property to increase in their time as owners.
But how they get to that return seems to differ. The homeowner will often live in the property in the meantime. As mentioned above, the financial return is not the only factor involved. For the big investor (the primary focus in the article as opposed to smaller investors), a property might be more of a data point among many other properties.
In both situations, it is worth asking how this emphasis on financial investment changes (1) the experiences of those living there and (2) communities. Owning a single-family home has long been part of the American Dream but the move to treating it more like a financial commodity does change matters.
But the reality of many millennials is starting to more closely mirror their parents’. They’re catching up on earnings and wealth, and while they’re still behind on homeownership, they’re not screwed. It may have taken them awhile to settle down, but they’re getting around to it and heading to the suburbs. In short, millennials are looking increasingly boomer-esque, and in some areas, they’re doing better than their parents.
The primary argument here involves wealth and homeownership. Are millennials at similar levels? Can they find the same kind of American Dream consisting of making it to the suburbs and owning their own house?
But it strikes me that there is a larger argument to make: these are longstanding cultural patterns, not just questions about economic resources. A later passage in the article hints at this:
In other words, it may not be that all the millennials headed to the suburbs want to be there, but in some cases, they feel like they have no choice but to exit urban centers and swallow a longer commute in the process.
“The plurality are moving to the suburbs, but that’s where the housing stock is,” Lautz said. Some of it has to do with having school-age kids, for example, but a lot has to do with affordability and availability.
If millennials do indeed end up in the suburbs at similar rates to previous generations of Americans, they may do so because this is what Americans have been doing for decades. There are economic imperatives for doing this – owning a suburban home is a primary vehicle for acquiring wealth – but also established patterns where they like driving, they are used to the ins-and-outs of sprawl, and they enjoy their private dwellings.
In real life, the home of the fictional South Bend Shovel Slayer — aka OId Man Marley — from the 1990 John Hughes-written holiday classic “Home Alone” is located at 681 Lincoln Avenue in north-shore Winnetka…
It’s right next door to the more famous “Home Alone” house at 671 Lincoln Ave. in Winnetka, which was shown extensively in the film as the home of the McAllisters. That home was listed for sale in May at $5.25 million and, according to its Zillow listing, has a sale pending…
As it turns out, Old Man Marley — played by the late character actor Roberts Blossom — is a kindly neighbor who helps Kevin overcome his fears of going into the basement. Kevin, in turn, helps Old Man Marley reconnect with his estranged son…
According to the Zillow listing, the home was built in 1898 and was a creation of Benjamin Marshall, a major influence on the architecture of modern Chicago. The home sits on two-thirds of an acre in Winnetka and features six bedrooms, six full bathrooms, one half-bathroom, a balcony, a library, a putting green, a large in-ground pool, a half basketball court, and plenty more.
Popular movie + expensive suburban house = story people will click on? Americans like single-family homes and may even like looking at interesting single-family homes more than they like their own.
A 2021 Northwest Municipal Conference survey of its members identified 14 suburbs permitting group homes for particular populations, largely those with disabilities.
However, the conversion of homes into assisted living centers for seniors is becoming increasingly prevalent. Schaumburg has seen two proposals in the past year alone. There are also online seminars offered to entrepreneurs looking to flip homes and turn them into assisted living centers, aimed at the nation’s aging population.
Regulations vary in towns that allow such conversions. Some require approval from a village board or city council, while other towns don’t require such approval because these uses are already allowed in its residential code. But all enforce rules against external changes to the houses that would identify them as group homes…
“You’ll be driving down a neighborhood and never know we’re there apart from a van picking people up or dropping them off,” said Little City Foundation CEO Rich Bobby…
While the intention of the homes is to blend in, a degree of engagement with neighbors is sought in advance to paint an accurate picture of those who are going to live there.
A common suburban story regarding proposed changes to houses might go like this: neighbors get wind of a possible change in a subdivision or residential area. They express concerns about such changes altering the character of the community. Perhaps there might be increased traffic, noise, and lights? They share that they moved into this location because it was a quiet, residential space. Changes to that format threaten their day-to-day experiences and their property values.
But what if the changes to that house or residence were minimal in nature? Or, as the regulations above suggest, the exterior of the home does not look any different and there is not a noticeable change in day-to-day life around the home? Would this allay all the concerns?
From this article, it sounds like concerns have been at a minimum thus far. The number of conversions is small. Perhaps there is a tipping point where multiple proposals in the same neighborhood or on the same straight might draw more attention. But if neighbors do not see significant changes on the outside, they might not have many issues.
Given the needs of the suburban population, I suspect more suburbs will face this particular issue in the coming years. Building large facilities can be difficult and costly. If converting homes to group homes can help serve residents and neighbors are okay with it, perhaps this will happen in a lot of places.
(This reminds of a 2013 book looking at affordable housing built in New Jersey where one of the goals was to design the multi-family housing units in a way that people passing by would not identify them as affordable housing. With some design work, this was largely accomplished and relatively few neighbors opposed the project.)
More than one-third (36%) of Gen Zers and millennials who plan to buy a home soon expect to receive a cash gift from family to help fund their down payment…
Young homebuyers are also receiving help from family members in other ways. Roughly one in six (16%) Gen Zers and millennials say they’ll use an inheritance to help fund their down payment, and 13% plan to live with their parents or other family members.
Working to earn money is the most common way for young buyers to fund down payments: 60% report they’ll save directly from paychecks, and 39% are likely to work a second job, the most common responses to this question…
Just 18% of millennials used a cash gift from family to help fund their down payment in 2019, according to a Redfin survey from that time, and the share had only increased to 23% by 2023. Note that the 2019 and 2023 survey results noted here are for millennials only, while the 2024 results in this report are for millennials combined with Gen Zers.
This is one way that wealth is passed from one generation to another. As the parents have resources (including possibly through the increase in value of their own residence), they can pass them along to their children at key moments to improve their prospects. And if parents do not have these resources, it would then take longer to amass a down payment.
One twist here is the suggestion that more parents are providing funds for down payments than in the past. The comparison is between 2019 and 2024. Were the numbers ever higher at some point in the past or perhaps higher among certain segments of the population?
What would it take for third parties to get in on this? Imagine a lending company says we will provide a large percentage of the down payment and you then owe us X amount of dollars when you sell the home at fair market value. I remember receiving some solicitations in the mail with a similar scheme for home equity loans; why not for down payments with bigger returns for the investors down the road?
Legally Sociable 