When my friend Jon bought a studio loft in downtown DC, I was somewhat disdainful of it — it was so small, just about 800 square feet, just one large room with a separate area for a bed. I knew that I couldn’t live like that, in such a small space, but Jon does well. He is a social person, always out and about, whereas I am a homebody, spending all my time in the house.
But here I am, living in a house that measures 832 square feet. What my place has that Jon’s lacks is extra space beyond the house. A 300 square foot detached garage, and a lot that is just over 3,000 square feet. This means that I can look out from my small house and see a quiet backyard instead of the back of an all-night club; and the partition of my 832 square feet into four different rooms makes it feel larger than if it were one large room.
I’m rapidly becoming a proponent of the small house. Homes these days are becoming larger and larger, with all the maintenance and energy issues that come along with that size. While my house is valued astronomically because of its location, I know that it won’t cost me 3 month’s salary to get it painted, and I won’t be paying to heat huge unused areas in a soaring, two-story high living room. I don’t need a plan to evacuate in case of fire — three of the four rooms have doors to the outside, or I could just step out a window, since it’s one story.
One drawback is due to my own nature: I can’t seem to stop clutter. I keep everything, and I don’t have the skill that Jon has in keeping my surroundings clutter-free. This is a real problem in a small house, and I have to make an effort to bring this under control. I’ve already succumb to the California garage syndrome — there’s now too many boxes in there to fit my car in. (In my own defense — my car barely fits in that garage when it is empty.)
Here’s to living in a smaller footprint. I have slowly begun to fall in love with my little bungalow, expensive as it is.
I have the ‘clutter’ problem too, and my place is abotu the same size as yours, even with 2 bedrooms (the 2nd really isn’t big enough for a bedroom but it makes a nice home office). And I know how nice it looks when I clean up and get rid of the clutter… yet it accumulates. The attic is loaded with junk. Ugh.
My 2 bdrm house was 840 sq feet so I know exactly how it feels, and I thought my house was perfect! A benefit I had that you don’t have is my house sat on top of a 840sq ft garage.
I learned to live with less and at no point cluttered up the garage, I enjoy working on cars and used it as my private auto repair and detail shop.
The only bad thing was, after parking in the garage you had to go outside to go up the stairs and into the house, and in Alaska winter weather means icy snow covered stairs.
But because the house was above the garage the view was that much better and I used my large deck the way you use your back yard, just an outside extention of the house. So much so that in the summer months my dining room table lived on the deck.