apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I'd gut it and make lots of changes. But yes, 3 acres in northern CA wine country is not an opportunity I'd pass up.

Mine was a cookie cutter development house with the formal living room and dining room that were NEVER used and absolutely no architectural features. No thank you! (though, thanks to limited creativity in the area/price point, it is possible I could live in a very similar house if I stay in the area...blah)

Yes! A 65 acre farm with ponds, forest, and fields is heaven to me :)

Jusk like 90% of Spaniards my parents live in an apartment, but own some land that I wouldn't say no to. Anyway, I'd happily say yes to their apartment with huge balconies!
I lived with them until one month ago, thinking about moving back in there all my stuff is making me nauseated.

Never, ever, ever - it's an evil suburban tract house with no redeeming values at all and is currently crammed cellar to attic with my mom and dad's assorted collections.

My brother and I have discussed this (having lost one parent and the other on dialysis) and he's more than willing to stay in the house and in our neighborhood/state for the rest of his life (he's moved out ONCE for about two years to a dorm).

I'm moving back to LA, so I don't care.

could I move it 1000 miles east to nyc?

the house itself is lovely, but the area -- well, I've done the area.

In a heart beat. Huge apartment in New York City. No land, but lots and lots of closets.

i DO live where i grew up - came back after 5-6 years away, me and the brother renovated the apartment, and now it's just great. sure, there are some not-so-great associations and behaviors linked to living in your childhood home, but i don't care... i like owning the place more than anything!! but uh, one thing...i would NEVER live with parents, no way no how! i took off when i was a pre-teen, too...i never could live with the parental units.

I loved the Eichler that I grew up in. Sadly, new owners have horribly 're-muddled' it. So no.

I'd rather die.

I'd rather start again. I think change is healthy.

Hell. Yes. I loved the house I grew up in (a great big rambling shore colonial in Connecticut), you can't beat the location (about 200 yards from the Sound), and there's so much you could do with it (amazing bones, big but still cozy).

If only I could afford it.

my parents have lived in 9 houses in my lifetime and I would love to live in 8 of them. they range from a gigantic victorian to a nice ranch to a cute little yellow cottage. the one I wouldn't be interested in is a very boring two story cookie cutter with a really conventional layout. to be honest, given their track record of choosing nice/interesting houses, my guess is they bought the house solely because it had a really nice pool table that came with the house.

My Dad lives in the house my grandfather and great grandfather built by hand. It is in a fairly secluded (but not exclusive) community in the near Northern Virginia suburbs. I love the house, I love the memories, and I wouldn't feel too bad gutting a lot of it, but I don't know if I can leave the city.

My parents have a cute little 1930's craftsman cottage that is cute on paper, but I wouldn't live there. All refurbs have been done cheaply and half assed, the place would have to be gutted to become acceptable. Also, no way I'd move back to F-no.

1800's detached house in the country side in England, now worth over $1million dollars and in the middle of nowhere. hmm, i wouldnt wanna raise kids in the "middle of nowhere" part, i remember riding my bike for 5 miles to get to my friends house, no thanx. but if the house was somewhere else, yes.

No, not unless the house moves itself out of the Snow Belt first.

I grew up in the projects...so, ugh...no thanks. Plus, my mom got relocated to a development for people with disability. So, once again...no thanks :)

Our home until I was 16 was 50 acres outside of Richmond VA. I have so many fond memories of that land and the house my dad designed perched on a hill, and the thought of it one day turning into a subdivision kills me. So yes, I'd take it back in a heartbeat. And then when I have kids they'd be able to play on haybales and find turtles in the stream and dig for arrowheads just like I did. Kind of makes me teary eyed just thinking about it. I was one lucky kid.

My brothers and I have had this conversation - none of us would move back. The house was built in 1818 but in a too-small town in a too cold part of the state with a too depressed economy. And the fact that my parents haven't thrown anything away in 50 years makes the idea even more unappealing.

Wonderful memories continue to make themsleves in my parents house, not to mention that I am designing the interiors, and even better it is on a cul de sac in coastal So Cal so yes, I would move back in a heart beat.

You bet! An 1890s Victorian in a small town full of nice people. Unfortunately there are no jobs in that said small town...

Totally. They had a great condo in Evanston, IL in a great neighborhood, wooden floors, lots of trees. For sure.

I think William Petersen III (Grissom on CSI) is still living there though. I might have to buy him out.

how timely for me....i'm in the process of saying yes or no to this very decision as our family house goes on sale in los angeles. it's a torturous decision for me. i'm thinking about it for the future, renting it now, and then renovating it completely for my husband and me. it's on the west side of los angeles and my parents bought it in 1962. but the sadness at the loss of both my parents, looking out on the garden that my father so adored, the living room where my mom died...i just don't know if i can even with all the renovations. anyone have personal experience with this? i mean, moving in when the memories can make one so sad.

lorettalynn, my mom didn't throw anything away for 80 years...and then some. i've just found photos and papers dating back to 1917. not to mention boxes and boxes of souvenirs from the '30's and '40's -- ticket stubs, concert programs from prague, vienna ca. 1946, train tickets, 1938 and 1964 worlds fair memorabilia, WWII unbelievable papersand photos, etc. etc. oh, and then there are the barbie dolls, the troll dolls, the shirley temple dolls, the 1960 tv star pcis /autographs.......

if only I had a rich, east-coast property owning family...

No. For one thing, my childhood consisted of moving every two or three years (army brat? no. AT&T brat? yes.), and the longest-serving home of them was the last, and therefore the least "childhoodish." I don't feel attached to it as once I may have.

My parents retired twelve years ago and now live in a waterfront townhouse in Florida. I wouldn't move there, either; for one thing, I already lived there by myself for two years while it was a waiting-for-retirement investment property, and for another, you couldn't pay me to leave Virginia for Florida.

My parents often talk about retiring and moving back to their home country. If the option of taking over their $900 mortgage payment and live in a 2-story, 5-bedroom Craftsman-style home in Los Angeles was option, would I do it?

in. a. heartbeat.

I took over my childhood home one year ago in Bellevue, WA and so far have no regrets. Sure there are many horrible changes to the town of my birth (big holes in the ground and cranes in the sky) but I can't argue with a home I never would have been able to afford. It has good bones and was very well maintained. I used to begrudgingly tell people I was from Bellevue, but now the stigma is so extreme (Seattelites can tell you) that I have to make a joke of it. People ask me if I feel weird sleeping in the master bedroom. My answer is no. It's my bedroom now and it has very little resemblance to the old decor. If I were using their old BED, that would be creepy.

BB-My sister purchased my father's home after he died. It was the home I had grown up in and I hated returning for holidays or anything because it was just strange seeing her stuff in our old home. It didn't help knowing that my father died at the house either!

Of course it might be different for you depending on the circumstances. Let's just say that my father didn't die a natural death, so the constant reminder of the tragedy was the really hard part.

BB-One more thing, my sister didn't have any trouble living there and only sold it several years later because she needed more room for her growing family.

like the house, the neighborhood/climate/economy are questionable

Mom's house, no way too big (7 brms, brady bunch family)
Dad's would have kept it for vacations untill this year when he put on a MONSTER addition to his charming foursquare 2brms, bath, living and two car garage and thats just the addition.

Also... rural Mich, shudder.

I love my parents' house---and so did they. It's on land that has been in my mother's family for 110 years, and it's an architectural gem, with a fine pedigree, several interior walls of stone (matching the entire exterior), huge windows, redwood ceilings, endless closets, and more.

would I move back to my parents house? As much as I love my parents' bas ass pad the answer is "hell, to the NO!"

I'd even try to figure out how to make a living in my ass-backwards hometown (the worst place to live in Canada... according to one study). My parents live in a riverfront arts and crafts 3-story marvel. The front yard has >100 varieties of David Austin roses. I spent most of my childhood scraping paint off the the woodwork...

I just spent the weekend dogsitting for my parents. I would live in that house in a heartbeat. Their 1920s house has an awesome backyard, that alone is worth it to me. The layout isn't the best but I've renovated it in my head to make it more useful.

However, there are 800 people in the town my parents live in. It was a great place to grow up but not the place I want to be in my late 20s.

It is a beautiful location. It just goes to show, it does not matter where you live.. everyone has a story.

I'd love to move back into the house I grew up in until age 12, unfortunately my family lives in the house we moved into after that, and while the house is plenty nice and still within San Francisco city limits, I've never had a fondness for it. The old house was smaller and in some ways less unique, but the set up of it always felt endlessly more comfortable, and the location, a short walk from the ocean, where I could hear fog horns from my childhood bed, is perfection.

I tend to think of my childhood home as the ideal house. The living room had very high ceilings and huge windows. The entire house had fantastic light. It was located on a quiet street, well, except for when the train went by. If I could move back, I would, but the houses in that complex go for 1.5 million minimum nowadays.

My husband and I moved into my grandparents' house-- a 1958 ranch with ancient oak trees and a huge backyard-- when they moved to assisted living six months ago. They built the house and were its only owners. It has plenty of "character": a ceiling fan and separate overhead light across the room on the same circuit, so the fan only runs as fast as the light is bright (dim the light and the fan slows down); an oven that plugs in to the wall inside one of our cabinets; a pink tile bathroom. Apartment Therapy has been so helpful as we restore our home!

BB- Sometimes it's best to have your wonderful memories of your parents from afar. It sounds very difficult. Sell their house and use the profits to purchase a place for you and your family. It will feel like a gift from them.

Sadly, my parents sold the home I grew up in to move into a retirement community. They have a smaller home now, with everything they need on one floor. My dad doesn't have to mow the lawn anymore, and this new place is much easier to maintain than the old home, but I miss the home I grew up in.

No way in hell. I have bad memories of the house my parents built in my teens. My folks know this and have already willed it to my daughter, who has better memories.

Speaking of bad memories & deaths that weren't natural ... my aunt was murdered by her husband in the home they'd shared for 40 years. Shortly afterward his (natural, no-prosecution) death (seven years later), their daughter moved in ... and made her office in the room where her mom's body was found.

hmmmm. I commonly refer to my childhood home as 'the morgue', so that would be a 'no, thanks'.

No. Absolutely no way, under no circumstances, Nooo.

In principle, it is a very nice house: It is a large bungalow with some amazing woodwork and built in's. It had an odd remodel/addition before my mom bought it, but with a lot of work I am sure I could make it very nice. I would consider remodeling it for someone else's use, but I would never ever move back into that house. Just visiting it makes me claustrophobic and anxious.

Probably not. The house is nice, but is a fairly typical 4-bedroom ranch, built in the 70's and added onto when I was a kid. The lot is wonderfully large and I would kill for the flowering cherry tree in their front yard, but I could never get a job in my profession in my parent's small town. Besides, my dad is a pastor, and they've told me that whenever they retire, they will not stay in that same small town (for the sake of the new pastor), so it's never something I've considered.

I have thought about this. I know my mother plans to move out and sell eventually. She is doing everything in the meantime, without any input from me, though probably tons from HGTV, to renovate in a direction that's sort of nauseatingly bland to me. I don't exactly want to live in that house, but maybe somewhere near it. It's just so.. conveniently located to a place I wanted to escape so badly, but occasionally feel nostalgic for - upstate New York, and right on the Metro North.

Yes, it's a tract house and the rooms seem all kind of small, but I could do something with it. The neighborhood is still cute and the yard is adequate, and our dog is buried back there. It's just, I feel bad, given how much has been spent, and the drama over the bathroom faucets, etc., and the painting. I'd feel a little sick about her doing all that work for nothing, but she should have asked me.

I don't know what will happen when she leaves, I won't really have a home unless I bought one, not necessarily that one. I've moved a lot since I moved out, but I think it would be weird to live around there in some other neighborhood, especially if my parents moved away, unless I had stayed in the area.

The point is kinda moot since my childhood home was torn down last year. Tiny ranch replaced with 1.5 million dollar faux-stucco mcmansion.

But no, I wouldn't live there again even if it were still standing. Seriously unpleasant childhood. I only revisit that house in my bad dreams.

My husband and I just bought the house that he grew up in...we didn't realize exactly how much the house had been neglected until we moved in and started find things that had been "fixed" (hidden from us). In the last few months we have had to completely gut the kitchen, raise the foundation on one side of the house, replace windows, hang drywall and make frantic calls to an exterminator. Someday we may be finished and the house will be fantastic, but I'm not sure that I can make it through all of this without throttling his mother. It stinks to feel like you got hosed by previous owners when they are family. On the bright side, we are now fairly competent with power tools.

I would do anything to avoid moving back with my parents. I have just put my house up for sale, considering the market conditions this could be crazy.

But I would rather take the risk than go back home. I have a blog about it all if anyone wants to follows my progress

http://www.moneyfacts.co.uk/community/blogs/colins_blog/archive/2008/08/11/moving-house-and-the-credit-crunch.aspx

My parents were smart and bought in one of the hippest areas of Denver long before it was hip and now they've got a charming older home with tons of great amenities around it and its within walking distance of downtown. If I left NY to go back there it's definitely where I'd want to live, but I'm not so crazy about the idea of the upkeep on an older home. I'm more of a condo person myself.

First I have to say that I'm finding this to be the single most interesting thread on AT in at least a couple of years, and that's saying something, because I'm basically addicted.

Anyway... my folks live in a different state from the one that we lived in while I was growing up. I live in a studio co-op that I own in Manhattan, and I think it would be easier to have a limb amputated than for me to move out of this city. It would be easier to have two limbs amputated than to move to their town.

They own their current house, but they never owned anything we ever lived in while I was growing up, because whatever congregation my father served at the time always owned the parsonage. One of the houses we lived in was in the Lower 9th Ward in New Orleans -- 1001 Lizardi on the corner of Rampart Street, and although the previous preacher's wife found a dead body on her back porch one day, we got along beautifully with the actual neighbors there.

The house I grew up in is cute, big, has a great backyard full of fruit trees and a huge pool - but it's my hometown (Chico, CA) that you couldn't pay me to move back to (sorry Chico, you're cute but hell to the no!). My Grandparents' gorgeous two-story corner lot house in the Glenview district of Oakland, on the other hand, is another story. It's essentially been untouched, with gorgeous hardwood floors covered w/ big oriental rugs, for the past 50 years. SO MUCH potential. I would move back there in a heartbeat if I could get enough money together for all the needed upgrades & renovations (rewiring, new pipes etc).

No. Dark house with few windows and dark panelling in the living areas from the early 80's. Big, which is nice, but in a soul-less suburb of Houston. (Great place to grow up, but I wouldn't go back there!) I do love the scores of pinetrees in the yard, though and the neighborhood has an interesting mix of large early 80's houses with unique features.

My mother recently retired and is starting to finally update it a bit (even the carpet is original, 24 years old!). The plan is to sell it eventually, but the house hasn't appreciated in value at all in 24 years, sadly. People in the area want bland brand new houses with no trees.

No - but I might use it as a vacation home. It's on a cattle farm, and the home itself is about 150 years old. However, it was last renovated in 1980, and it shows. It would have to be completely gutted.

What house that which parent lived in at what time? (We moved around a lot, largely between cheap rentals, and my parents divorced when I was young.) Kind of a moot point actually, since the answer is "no, no, no" in all cases.

My life didn't BEGIN until I got the heck out of the town where I spent the majority of my childhood. No way in h-e-double-hocky-sticks would I move back there of my own volition. My mom's actually very unhappy to still be there, but feels like she's kind of stuck until she meets her full retirement age in a couple of years, when she will most certainly pack up and leave, if she stays there that long.

Somehow, this place made Money.com's list of the "Top Places in the U.S. to Raise Kids" about a year ago. I don't think anyone working on that list ever actually attempted to be a kid there, or talk to anyone who was. It's a pretty miserable place to grow up if you don't fit in perfectly, and it's a pretty hard place to fit in. But it looks pretty on a post-card, so I guess that makes everything allright.

(OK, I will grant them, it had decent school districts and low rate of violent crime. Both important factors when choosing a place to raise kids. But they didn't bother to take into account the cruelty of the elementary and jr-high kids there, nor the lack of social options if you don't fit in perfectly right from the get-go. Also, their criteria didn't include teen suicide rates. I have no idea what the rate in that town was-- whether it was higher, lower, or the same as the rest of the country-- but how in the world can you claim to be compiling a list of the best places to raise kids if you don't even check the freakin' suicide rates?)

My mom moved down the block from my childhood home because her new house had a huge pool (irony that she doesn't swim) so don't really have a choice. I loved my childhood house though. When I could affoed it I would definetely buy it though but never move in with my mom again. I like my privacy and even though I'm an adult she still nags me.

afford

Woah I was thinking about just this on my way to work this morning!

60s split level with the kitchen in the (semi) basement. I loved the layout, the windows, the living room, the space, the solarium... Oh man. but the suburbs!? Really? I love waliking to work too much, and don't know how to drive.

Maybe in 20 years (or 10!)

My parents live in a 55 and better(!) community, so it's essentially not allowed. It's also in a state I don't want to live in, and they live next to someone whose email is something along the lines of ConservativeJohn@blahblahblah.com. So...yeah. Not happening. But the house itself is pretty awesome and nice, even though it's new construction.

I'd happily take the house I grew up in: a beautiful, but deeply neglected Craftsman/psuedo-tudor in a great neighborhood in Vancouver. If the house is left to me, I'll happily renovate and rent it out, or sell it once the messy correction is past.

I'd *never* move back in with my folks, though. Love them deeply, will not live with them. And my work isn't portable.