McMansions are a poor investment
The massive, gaudy houses lining the streets of America’s upscale suburbs began to look like the epitome of bad taste and poor judgement once the foreclosure crisis hit. The writer behind the blog “McMansion Hell” tells why they’ll eventually be gone for good.
Kate Wagner, a 22-year-old getting her master’s degree in architectural acoustics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, has been researching consumer trends in architecture since she was in high school. Her background knowledge has given her ammunition for “McMansion Hell,” which she started writing this summer. At first, she wrote for a few friends to let off steam about the houses she despises, but the blog quickly gained followers.
There’s literally nothing that would convince me to live in a McMansion,” Wagner said. “I would rather donate it to a fire department to use for controlled burns.”
Wagner marks up real estate listing photos like a merciless English teacher. Her snarky but informative explanations of the problems with McMansions make architecture criticism accessible for people who aren’t experts.
There’s no hard-and-fast definition of a McMansion, but Wagner has a long list of criteria. McMansions are oversized ― more than 3,000 square feet, with five or more bedrooms and a garage for three or more cars ― and typically too large for the size of their lot.
“One of the defining factors of the McMansion is this concept of waste and the proliferation of excess and … pushing this illusion of wealth,” Wagner said.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/the-type-of-house-you-should-never-buy/ar-AAiVgWM?li=BBnbfcN&ocid=edgsp
Illusion of wealth? Who does that bring to mind?
= new reply since forum marked as read
It would give me the creeps at night. All those empty rooms...
I'm happy where I am. 
Who do these people think they are ?
3400 square feet, 5 bedroom 3 bath...Only have a two car garage so I guess mine doesn't make the cut.
Got a little over a quarter acre so maybe she can come help me cut the grass and enjoy the trampoline in the back yard 
Here is a house that is a few blocks away from me...Just Hideous isn't it 
711 Lariat Ln
Wylie, TX 75098 Get Directions
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4 beds 3 full baths 2,921 sq ft0.27 acres lot
$287,500
Which I am in the process of re-doing all in white as wife wants LOL
Oh, and you were talking about energy costs..My electric bill last month was $260 all electric house. My last house was 1400 square feet, built in 1976 and my electric bill would hit over $400 some months during summer. Because it was built like shit. Construction standards have made noticeable differences in energy efficiency over the years. Have high quality double pane windows now unlike the crappy single pane storm windows in last house.
Even the two 50 gallon water heaters are high end efficiency....
Oh, and my counter tops are square FYI
And I'm 5-8 minutes from Lavon and 5-8 minutes to the top of Ray Hubbard ---
Just went fishing couple weekends ago by the Lavon dam
That's a generously-sized house.
Here is the silliness:
Stupid rooms bigger than they need be and misshapen:
(Hysterical captions not mine, from McMansionhell.com)
...my husband (whom I love a lot) hates change anyway. Sometimes he thinks we could move to something bigger, but you have to travel a good 40 miles to find the right price.
I tell you, I DREAM of a 3,000 sf house with bookcases everywhere. Even 2600 sf! Call it a McMansion -- I can work with that! Instead, as I hit my 69th birthday at the end of September, I realized what I'm going to have to do instead is find another home for most of my books, one that does not share the same roof with me.
May you find the home and garden of your dreams.
PS: I think I have actually seen and rejected a bunch of overbuilt monstrosities. There is still such a thing as good taste.
We have a full third floor. Bedroom, bath, unfinished attic space - with shelves. Lots of shelves. Book collection is up there!
My house is a hundred years old though. Custom arts and crafts Tudor. We live in NJ. We looked at McMansions but they don't have brick foundations with cement surrounds, plaster walls, Windows that twist out, etc etc.
My husband is from Southern Italy and the House there (his parents left it to us) was built in the 1600's. His dad said when we bought ours and Skyped him through it prior to renovation and restoration: It's so new! 
But then, we do our own housework.
I've been saying a lot of what she says for years to anyone who will listen. (Faux keystones, pediments and columns are my particular pet peeves.) Now I have a blog link I can send to my friends.
As for new time suck, yep. I spent a half hour out there just now. She has some doozies on that site!
on edit: spelling
We have a lot of very nice neighborhoods here, thank you very much!
First, I don't understand the need for such a large home but that's not something I would fault anybody else for wanting. However, I have a problem with building these monstrosities on lots that are too small for the house. In our neighborhood, most of the lots were huge when the houses were built back in the 60's. And some of the McMansions don't look as ridiculous when they are built with a little setback. Meanwhile, some are built from inch to inch of the lot line, leaving the look you are talking about. THEY ARE IN YOUR FACE! and end up looking like small hotels. I also have a problem with the ones that are built like row houses but with a few feet in between. They took the lots and divided them into strips and built row houses three stories tall with postage stamp front yards and drive under garages. Lego houses that shoot up into the sky.
As for style, yes, we see it all. The ones with every type of finish all on the same house. The turrets. The nubs. The keystones, the metal roof on part, and 14 different roof styles.
by ARLnow.com — October 14, 2016 at 11:30 am
[font size=1]The owner of a huge mansion in Lyon Park is asking for the county’s permission to use it as a bed and breakfast.[/font]
Yogi Dumera, the restaurateur behind Delhi Dhaba and Arlington Rooftop Bar and Grill in Courthouse, recently filed a bed and breakfast use permit application for his 13,700 square foot house at 3120 N. Pershing Drive.
The item is on the Arlington County Board’s agenda for this Saturday, but county staff is recommending it be deferred to December to give Dumera time to discuss the proposal with the Lyon Park community.
The palatial house was controversial when it was built a decade ago, attracting opposition from neighbors, who said its massive size — compared to other homes in the community — was “absurd.” Neighbors at the time also worried about the house being used for commercial purposes.
From a 2005 Washington Post article:
“Its scale is absurd,” said neighbor Alan Tober, who, along with others, worries that the house will be used for commercial purposes — namely weddings.
But property owner Yogi Dumera said he has no such plans. He is only taking advantage of his large lot, he said.
I've commented without reading an article before ... If I am called on it I own it
You just look foolish when you don't
Suburbia is derived from wasteful American car culture, racism (sundown towns and red-lining), and an anti-urban mindset with it's roots in Fascistic romanticism and it's hatred for the "urban decadence" of the great cities (Henry Ford, an unapologetic Fascist, was one noted city-hater). Dense urbanization is better for the environment, better for those like me who can't drive (and so are defacto second class citizens because of that, suburbia is an abuse of the human rights of those who because of disability cannot drive), and is better for society because it encourages a feeling of community rather than the soul-destroying social atomism that Suburbia promotes.
And your poverty argument is a straw man, the only reason living in the inner city is so expensive is because of lack of investment in high density housing.
Nobody needs a 3000 sq. ft. house. The spiraling size of houses is a symptom of the dysfuction of social atomism, people doing things in their own home alone or with family rather than in the community with neighbors. In a dense urban environment you don't really need all that personal space because perfectly functional public spaces are just a short walk, trolley, or subway trip away.
Her commentary and these tacky shit homes has me in stitches!
