What’s an appropriately-sized home?

How much space do you need to be comfortable? That’s a hot topic among our HUTS clients and in our design studio.

Over the last 100 years, the American Home Size Index has tracked the average size of newly-construction houses, both by gross floor area and square footage per person. The trend is clear, and accelerating. Homes are getting larger and less people are inhabiting them. Today, the average individual has more space to themselves than the average family in 1950.

Why does that matter?

Lots of reasons.

Larger homes have much higher average price tags. They tend to be built more cheaply by developers aiming to maximize margin, replacing size with quality. They are more expensive to heat and cool. They require more maintenance. And, all that extra construction material and dead-air space comes at a major environmental cost.

At HUTS, we develop home designs that are more in line with mid-20th century space usage techniques. We focus more on smart planning and flexibile spaces, instead of raw square footage.