Recently The New York Times affirmed what we had all guessed regarding the housing market. For the 1st time since 1950, the Times reported, the median price of a U.S. home is expected to fall, between 1 and 2 percent. Because of reports like this, some people, even here in relatively unaffected Boston, are in a panic… their portfolio is not doing as well as they’d like.
It seems that in the last dozen years the American home has become less associated with the dream and more associated with strategic investment. Cocktail party chatter went from the occasional mention of a price on a neighbor’s home to suddenly everyone’s home being a commodity. And, like the rise of “day trading” in stocks in the 90s, so too houses and condos were bought and sold like pork bellies.
I have to wonder: Am I the only one to notice that this happened during the same era in which money killed professional baseball? Back in the 60s and 70s, baseball was about clear summer days and smacking one out of the park. Suddenly it became solely about outrageous multi-million dollar contracts and zillion-dollar stadium deals. With this change of focus, baseball has all but lost its soul.
Perhaps this downturn, this cooling of the market will remind people what a house truly is… a home. The Times article stated, “In recent years many families used their homes as a kind of piggy bank, borrowing against their equity and increasing their spending more rapidly than their income was rising.” Using their house not as a home but as a sort of financial cushion. Well, it seems no one wanted to hear the truth or believe in gravity when it came to housing prices, but now we know.
Houses are not ATM machines for bigger cars and exotic vacations; rather they are places that should be full of warm memories and odd scents. Quirky rooms with sometimes ill-fitting doors where the walls are filled with decades of family history, having soaked up years of conversations. Rooms where your babies were raised, the kitchen where 100 strawberry-rhubarb pies were made.
So maybe, in a way, this is a good thing. Maybe this was perfectly timed, to bring people back to earth to realize what a home truly is: not a commodity, but a place to live your life.
John T. O’Connor
About the Author:
John O’Connor received his Master’s degree from Harvard University Graduate School of Design. He is co-author of Philip Johnson: The
Architect in His Own Words and Unseen Warhol, both published by Rizzoli Intl. He co-founded HOME Miami and HOME Fort Lauderdale
magazines to which he still contributes.
