What Homes Will Look Like in 2015

The Orlando Sentinel kicks off the International Builders Show with an article predicting the size and shape of homes in 2015. The typical American home will remain at today's average of 2,400 square feet, up from 1,000 square feet fifty years ago. The future home will be more energy efficient and feature more amenities. The bar has been raised for community amenities and floor plans are becoming more open and practical:

Gayle Butler, editor in chief of Better Homes and Gardens magazine, said the "new urbanism" trend of recent years has "reset" expectations. People now look for wide sidewalks, winding streets, community centers and "real front porches," Butler said, all of which allow for a greater sense of openness and interaction among residents.

"A sense of neighborhood," while common in older parts of many towns, is impossible to "retrofit" in more recent subdivisions, she said. Homes of the future will have flexible floor plans but will not be quite as "wide open" as recently constructed models, she predicted. They will have flexible room dividers and "partial walls," more natural lighting, "mud rooms" for storage adjacent to kitchens, and "closet-sized" home offices.

One of the centerpieces of the show is The New American Home 2007, located in the Lake Eola Heights Historic District near downtown Orlando.
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Some homes are, however, getting bigger. In Athens, Georgia (that is), there is concern about in-town, supersized McMansions.

Forbes takes a bullish look at homebuilder stocks Beazer, Pulte and Toll Bros. Housing sectors stocks are up 24% over the past six months.

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A columnist in The Oregonian pits two landowners in downtown Portland against one another. Greg Goodman and his family own 25 prime lots where parking is a more lucrative than mixed-use development: "A city block containing 200 parking spots probably generates a steady income of $500,000 annually, less insurance and property taxes." On the other side, John Russell owns four buildings downtown and has trouble attracting tenants in buildings surrounded by lifeless parking lots. One proposed solution is to raise height limits on downtown buildings. Otherwise, Goodman contends, the Portland Development Corp. has to offer subsidies the employers and businesses it recruits.