Tired of a house after living there for six months

[Cooler]

I was watching RESTORED on HGTV recently.  I find Brett Waterman, the show's host, to be annoying but very knowledgeable. 

He was restoring a 120-year-old home in Redlands, California.  He asked a local historian to research the history of the house.  She reported that in the 120 year history the house had 23 different owners. 

From that information, Waterman decided that there was something fundamentally wrong with the design of the house.  He proceeded to redesign the interior layout of the home.

About 6 months ago a new pre-fab home was installed near my house.  From the roadway, it resembles a shipping container made from glass.  My suspicion is that there is something fundamentally wrong with the home.  I would probably go with "living-in-a-fishbowl-too-close-to-neighbors-and-the-roadway as the problem.

I think that much glass is OK if you live 300 yards from your neighbor or have tall trees blocking their view into the fishbowl. 

The local real estate market is hot.  So I will watch it and see if it sells. 

I went on Zillow and it is not listed.  It is probably for sale by owner.

[EatenByLimestone]

A new owner every 6 years and they couldn't ask anybody why they moved?   

Or maybe they didnt care.  They had their story.


Maybe it was haunted, lol.

[Cooler]

A new owner every 6 years sounds like an excessive number.  Waterman pointed out some fairly serious flow issues within the house and corrected them.  But maybe it is sitting over a source of natural gas and it will explode tomorrow.

I am curious about the house near mine.  No listing online, but a sign out front saying "For Sale".  It is definitely less than a year old.  It us up on a steep hill and maybe they could not get their car up that hill.  That might account for some dissatisfaction.  

I would not want to try to walk up that hill with snow on the ground and walking down it seems just as risky.  If I had to guess, it is either the excessive glass (floor to ceiling walls) or the steep driveway that is the issue.

[Cooler]

Found the listing at $600,000.00.  

It was trucked in, but is listed as "custom contemporary".

What you cannot see from the photo is the steep driveway. 

[EatenByLimestone]

Might be real hard to heat with all that glass too.  What direction does that wall face?   It might be double fun in summer.

[Cooler]

Might be real hard to heat with all that glass too.  What direction does that wall face?   It might be double fun in summer.

The glass is facing east, but it is also facing the tallest hill in the town which is about 150 feet above that house.  The reason they built all the houses at the base of the hill on slabs is because the water run off would flood basements.

It also means that the sun does not reach those front windows until late morning.  So not much radiant heat.  There is probably (in the winter) 2 hours daily (10 a.m. to noon) where there is direct sunlight on those windows.

I live at the peak of that hill and I have the opposite issue.  The rear of my house is all floor-to-ceiling glass.  I back up to a nature preserve, so it is 100% private.  But the sun hits the glass at 6:00 in the morning in the summer and pretty much I get some direct sun all morning.

It is a new house, so I would imagine they used high E-glass and probably double or triple glazing.   But I would hate to have a neighbor looking in my back yard with all the glass I have.  I would hate to have that much visibility from the roadway like that house has.

And a flat roof has its own set of problems.

[Snipe Hunter]

I love old houses and carved a nice niche in the home inspector business as somewhat specializing in old houses. Most of the houses I do were built around 1900 and a few from the mid 1700's.

I would never own one.

[nodima]

I love old houses and carved a nice niche in the home inspector business as somewhat specializing in old houses. Most of the houses I do were built around 1900 and a few from the mid 1700's.

I would never own one.

THAT - (points up) is very telling.

[Stwood_]

Maybe it has a hot water heated driveway. Yeah....theres a few of those at some of the lake houses here.
They build on steep lots by the water that cows can't stand up on.....

[R Clark]

I love old houses and carved a nice niche in the home inspector business as somewhat specializing in old houses. Most of the houses I do were built around 1900 and a few from the mid 1700's.

I would never own one.

When we moved out of the 'burbs, LOML was on the hunt for an old farmhouse with nice lines.  I like that style, too, but I told her that if we bought an old house, that very likely the first thing that would happen is a complete down-to-the-studs demo followed by all new mechnicals.

I didn't want to grow old in a house with mechanical systems twice my age.  We ended up by a rural acreage with home and shop building built in 2004.