Do you ever wonder why people, who obviously have money, sometimes build some gosh-awful houses in gosh awful locations?

Money does not equal taste. Money does not automatically mean intelligence either.

Consider the Beverley Hillbillies, for example.

A “gosh-awful ” house is a matter of opinion. Obviously the owners think it’s lovely and perfect.

I’d love to live in a place like that. I’d need some trees, though. I’d live up North in the middle of the woods. No one else around. Or have a lone house surrounding by rolling hills (like Northern, Mi).

I couldn’t stand living in the prairies, though. That, to me, is boring.

@Mama_Cakes Yes, if it had SOME redeeming natural feature, rolling hills, a river, something. But it’s just a giant, fancy house set about 100 yards off of the highway, sitting all by itself, baking in the sun and freezing in the winter. all alone.

Rick and I are planning to build this house. We have 5 acres and a pond The house will be facing the pond. When we are finished, our drive way will run east and west, along the north side of the property, along a tree line. Those from the road will only see the drive way curve into the trees.

Right now there is a big open spot at the west of of the area where we are going to build. People can drive their cars in and out there. That pic was taken last weekend. Our pop up is serving as our screen. The trees you see behind the camper are on the other side of the dirt road. When all is said and done, we will block that view from the road with a couple of weeping willow trees (or something.) You won’t even be able to see the house from the road. It will be our own private wonderland.

Rick and I are on the same page. We have no desire to have strangers viewing our world, even if they are going to exclaim “How wonderful that is!”

When we see those monstrous, million dollar houses sitting there with the only view being of the highway we just glance at each other thinking “What we could do with our land if we had that kind of money!”

I just think about the resale on houses like that. It takes a particular type of buyer to want it. I also think it very well could be their dream home. The land is cheap out there relatively speaking and they can get everything they ever wanted in a home maybe.

How big is the house? Like 10,000 sq ft or something? I just sold a 5,000 sq ft house when I moved from TN and I hated that it was so large.

@Dutchess_III: Just because you and I love the Barrett doesn’t mean that everyone would.

Our house? The Barrett house @JLeslie? It’s about 1600 sq ft. which is plenty for the two of us. It calls for a vaulted ceiling, but I’d rather turn it into a wide open second floor with windows all around, so that when we have family over we can just herd kids up there. Also, would have a guest bedroom up there. I just can’t figure out how to get every room to overlook the pond! :) Adding that second floor would probably give us about…2200 or so?

It sounds better than this or this.

I prefer privacy. I’m sure the owners of those homes plan to add trees at some point.

I was thinking that same as @jonsblond. Maybe they haven’t gotten around to adding trees, yet?

@jonsblond: There are days when those old row houses look very appealing. I am waiting this minute for a contractor to discuss estimates for a huge driveway project. The excessive rains have eroded channels and filled drainage ditches and culverts with mud and weeds, causing the dirt drive to look like a clay factory in spots.

@Dutchess_III: Since most people use bedrooms for sleeping (usually after dark), pick the rooms that make sense esthetically to overlook the pond. Plant a few flowering fruit trees or trees that attract birds for other focal points.

I noticed this morning a lot of fluttering in and out of “large wild sunflowers”: http://www.springcreekforest.org/Rough-Sunflower.jpg I had transplanted several years ago from far away. There were male goldfinches. exactly the egg-yolk color of the flower petals, eating the seeds. Watching was just as nice as looking at a pond.

My partner and I found a piece of land (5 acres) in N. Michigan that was up on top of a hill. No houses around it. From your view, you could see the Bay nice and clear. There was an old barn on the property. The price was great, and unfortunately, someone else jump on it. They converted the barn into a home (with tall windows). Much like this. It’s gorgeous.

Could be they just haven’t added anything yet, but this one house in particular we’ve been passing for 3 years and it’s still barren.

Nice pictures @gailcalled.

I suppose that’s what they wanted and that’s what they got! Everyone has different tastes…

@Mama_Cakes How cool is that!!!

I don’t see anything wrong with living in a big house on a large plot of land with nothing around. Sounds peaceful. Who needs hills or trees? I’d rather have a pool.

Your “gosh-awful location” might be someone else’s paradise. Personally, I’d consider living someplace like Kansas hell in itself, but I’m sure you like it or you wouldn’t live there. I’m sure a lot of people would hate to live in my state, but I like it (mostly). To each their own.

Well, I was raised here. Had my kids here. I wouldn’t mind living in another, more interesting state, but I’m not going to uproot or abandon my family to do it.
Kansas sure isn’t as glamorous as many other states, but it’s what I know. There are wonderful places, they just aren’t in your face. You have to know where to find them.

Actually, now I’m kind of wondering if they got the house I’m thinking of built, then abandoned it for some reason…It’s just so lifeless, they may very well have.

@Dutchess_III With windows all around all the bedrooms up there should have a view I would think? Is the pond out back.

I mean the big house on the prairie. How many square feet is it?

The big house on the prairie is, just guessing, 5000?

The pond will be at the front of the house. :) The house will be facing it.

@Dutchess_III So the loft area you can see out to the pond. That will be nice. You can put a chair or loveseat there and a big picture window.

Yeah! I’m gonna love that upstairs area! I was in a house once. When you walked into the dining room there were these very wide, curving stairs to the upstairs. The risers were a little lower than standard risers. The stairs weren’t exposed, they just flowed into the wall and gently flowed out of sight. I asked if I could please go up them, they said, “Sure.” It led into one big open room. I loved it. I’m going to have stairs like that leading up to my second floor.

I understand your frustration. I too wonder why some people build the houses they do in the settings they do. Nothing like a big McMansion sticking out like a sore thumb smack in the middle of an open, rolling pasture. Don’t they even bother to look at the surroundings and try to envision what would fit in and become part of the landscape?

Probably not. I have noticed that most people cannot picture what a house looks like even when they are in the framed stage. If it doesn’t have sheetrock on the walls, they can’t picture even a single room let alone the entire house.

It isn’t their fault trees don’t naturally grow there. I am assumingbthey did not cut down tons of trees to get a bare lot. I’m actually annoyed that the trees here are out of control on many lots where I am house hunting. I love a wooded area, but here the trees are practically against houses and every time a storm comes through I would worry about a branch falling.

I was recently looking through an article about celebrity houses on the market, complete with pictures and I was really surprised at them. Mostly big, ugly, in weird surroundings.

Unfortunately, most people just want what the Jones have and that leads to cookie-cutter houses.
Prior to the 80’s builders used to provide many different styles and shapes to the homes they built. Go look in any older neighborhood and you will see what I mean; varied rooflines, exterior finishes, interiors, you name it, you could find it. But beginning in the 80’s you began to see uniformity in the products. It began by being market-driven in that everyone wanted what their neighbors had and that led the builders to begin building repetitively. They soon discovered that, not only would people buy them, but subcontractors sometimes gave you a better price because their crews were faster because of the familiarity with the floor-plan. By the beginning of the new century not only did all the houses look the same but every 4th one even had the same floor-plan. Sometimes they would flip it, sometimes it only had a hip roof where the other had a gable. Regardless, it was the same. Entire neighborhoods would be only the same four plans. Colors, all neutral, brick on the exterior, quoins on the corners (usually front only on tract homes) 12/12 pitch on the roof (nothing less than 8/12 certainly) arched window in the living room, All the same. Even regional distinctions disappeared. I bet I could send a catalog of new homes to anyone here in the US and regardless of where you live and if you compared it to one of your local ones you could not tell which came from where.

But, this is no different than what we see occurring nationally in all areas of our lives. A retail center in Portland looks just like the one in St. Louis, Houston, Philadelphia, Chicago or Phoenix. Same storefronts, same retail stores, same goods, same ol’ same ol’.
But, that is what the people wanted so that is what they got.

@Mama_Cakes Wow, that barn is gorgeous!

No, they didn’t cut down trees. It’s just pasture land, @JLeslie. but you can plant trees and they’ll do OK. At our land I just learned that we have a TON of trees that aren’t even native to Kansas. Some of them aren’t even native to America! Someone, probably the homesteaders back in the late 1800’s planted them.

I don’t like the endless miles of McMansions that have sprung up around every conurbation in the United States. What a waste of good land and the houses have nothing going for them but their enormous size. They seem soulless to me and the neighbourhoods look dead and without any amenities whatever.

Souless….exactly. You wonder what the personalities of the people who live in them are.

The Queen of Versailles

Haha..funny, as a friend and I were just discussing this issue the other day.
There is a very affluent community about 15 miles down the hill from me called “El Dorado Hills” which is an icon for the wealthy and while there are some amazing homes people will buy the ugliest lots on barren hillsides and build huge, multi-million dollar homes just to have the EDH address. Some of these monolithic places are sitting on the ugliest and most barren landscapes ever.

If I could afford to build a luxury, status symbol home it would be in the middle of 20 acres of beautiful land, not sitting on barren grasslands next to a freeway.

Pffft…fools and their money.

Cetainly agree @Coloma Just look back on how important it was to maintain the “estate” not just the house a couple of hundred years ago, or even into the early 1900’s.

The Neuvo Riche have a lot to learn about walking the walk.

( and spelling the spell. Nouveau riche)

Old money can be just as vulgar and ostentatious as new; they simply hide it better.

@Coloma ”… these monolithic places are sitting on the ugliest and most barren landscapes ever.” You painted the best picture regarding my question. What a waste, especially when they have so many other options. I guess they think everyone will just be in awe of their house, and not notice the surroundings. Not.

Watched “Driving Miss Daisy” yesterday. Man, I wish I had a need for a beautiful, huge house like that! I so love the arched doorways that lead to other rooms. I got some other ideas for our new house too. I’m gonna have me a mini-estate mansion!

@Dutchess_III It’s all about “prestige” and in the community I speak of just having the address is what counts for those that truly believe who they are ( read: ego ) is what they HAVE!

Right. I enjoy beauty but I have no desire to flaunt it to the world show how great I am.

There’s a huge and I mean huge beach house down the way from my partner’s. Windows from floor to ceiling and you can see beautiful pieces of art hanging on the walls. The coolest part about this house, it’s shaped like the Star of David. :)

If it was dumped in the middle of the prairies without trees and whatnot, it wouldn’t look right, so I see what you’re saying.

IMO the surroundings are as important as the house. MORE important than the house to me since I spend a lot of time outside looking around.

@Dutchess_III Me too…I love aesthetic surroundings but because it is MY thing, not to score status points.