America Needs Small Apartment Buildings. Nobody Builds Them

[mhays]

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

That is the point of the "junior 1 bedroom" which has a vestigial "bedroom", often only partially separated from the living room but almost always able to be closed off from it visually, perhaps with some sort of folding or sliding door, when guests are expected. I believe legally in most places if it doesn't have its own closet, you can't call it a full "bedroom".

e.g.

http://thenashnyc.com/new-york-apartments-floorplans/

Most of these in my area are long and skinny, with the "not bedroom" in the middle and a kitchen/living area by the window. This is because our land use code unintentionally encourages thick buildings. Exterior surface area is limited so units tend to be one room wide.

Your example doesn't look like the best design. It could be a real one-bedoom with almost no effort. Why is the kitchen separate from the living area? It could easily fit above the word "living room". And that hallway to the bathroom could be eliminated entirely to create useful space -- tilt the bathroom 90 degrees and put it in the middle by the closet (with some additional plumbing expense), then put a walk-in closet behind that.

[Via Chicago]

Originally Posted by eschaton

Micros are a massive necessity in expensive cities. It's the only way the market can build units affordable to the low-middle segment. I mean like 120-250 sf. This has always been common in some parts of the world, and works well in US cities when it's allowed. Some people are offended at the idea...do they think people who can only afford $600 or $800 belong in the gutter or a friend's couch instead? But even they think it's ok for hotel rooms and dorms.

say what you will but the VAST majority of people are ever going to be "OK" living in a 120 sq foot closet, and most would likely rather move out of a city entirely rather than be subjected to such an inhumane living space.

maximum security prison cells are more spacious (and despite your claim ive never stayed in a hotel room that small either). get real

the average chicago studio i think it somewhere around 500-600 feet, which is far more reasonable

[ChargerCarl]

Originally Posted by Via Chicago

say what you will but the VAST majority of people are ever going to be "OK" living in a 120 sq foot closet, and most would likely rather move out of a city entirely rather than be subjected to such an inhumane living space.

maximum security prison cells are more spacious (and despite your claim ive never stayed in a hotel room that small either). get real

Well if theres no demand for them developers won't build them.

great thing about markets.

[Via Chicago]

welcome to your new home! you should be thankful to even have breathing space, being its such a luxury these days. bow down to your developer overlords for even bestowing you with a privacy hatch! and it even comes with a complimentary copy of the Fountainhead! a complete steal at 1300 a month. enjoy!

[Steely Dan]

i lived solo in a 450 SF studio in chicago's marina city for about 5 years.

of course, the 175 SF balcony with sweeping views down the river canyon combined with the non-parallel demising walls made it feel bigger than it really was.

it worked fine for me at the time, but i wouldn't want to go much smaller than that.

[Via Chicago]

.

[Via Chicago]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

of course, the 175 SF balcony

people would literally KILL themselves to live on such a spacious balcony! in fact, we could probably even trim 50 sq feet off in the spirit of efficiency! developers cant keep up with the demand!

havent you heard humanity has now retreated within its own mind, and now mostly exists within the matrix? possessions like pots and pans and mattresses...these are now superfluous concerns. everyone just sits around and meditates all day...mostly visualizing what it would feel like to live in a 500 sq ft studio!

[Emprise du Lion]

Originally Posted by mhays

Micros are a massive necessity in expensive cities. It's the only way the market can build units affordable to the low-middle segment. I mean like 120-250 sf. This has always been common in some parts of the world, and works well in US cities when it's allowed. Some people are offended at the idea...do they think people who can only afford $600 or $800 belong in the gutter or a friend's couch instead? But even they think it's ok for hotel rooms and dorms.

See, I feel like Chicago is doing this wrong. We have micro units and small studios in general, but the ones I've personally seen in the past (primarily in Lakeview and Uptown) can be more expensive than other studios and sometimes even one bedrooms in the neighborhood. They keep converting old SROs into them though, so they must be getting rented.

[ChargerCarl]

Originally Posted by Via Chicago

welcome to your new home! you should be thankful to even have breathing space, being its such a luxury these days. bow down to your developer overlords for even bestowing you with a privacy hatch! and it even comes with a complimentary copy of the Fountainhead! a complete steal at 1300 a month. enjoy!

Capsule hotels should be legal.

[Via Chicago]

You're welcome to my top dresser drawer next time you're in town. Ill shift out the socks and underwear before you arrive. We can work out the rate later but I can't guarantee there wont be surge charges if you don't reserve now.

[ChargerCarl]

Originally Posted by Via Chicago

You're welcome to my top dresser drawer next time you're in town. Ill shift out the socks and underwear before you arrive. We can work out the rate later but I can't guarantee there wont be surge charges if you don't reserve now.

I mean I know people that pay $1300 to share tiny bedrooms in SF. I'm pretty sure they'd much rather live in micro apartments.

Density restrictions don't stop the density from coming, it just leads to overcrowding.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by mhays

Your example doesn't look like the best design. It could be a real one-bedoom with almost no effort. Why is the kitchen separate from the living area?

I didn't design it so I don't know except that the size and shape apparently fit the other units in the building (plumbing in such buildings can't be put just anywhere--generally you want to minimize long "runs" and have, for example, rooms with spiggots and sinks back to back) . The "bedroom" is only a bit over 96 sq ft. A king-sized bed is about 42 sq ft. You would have trouble squeezing a dresser or nightstand (or certainly an armoir to make up for the lack of a closet) in there and still be able to walk around the bed to change the linen. There's no separate closet (which, as I said, rules out calling it a "bedroom" in many jurisdictions) and it shares a window with the "living room". I suggest it would take quite a bit of effort to overcome these issues and most of them would sacrifice the size of the "living room". The most difficult to overcome might be the window. You'd have to put it in one room or the other--almost certainly the bedroom or what remains of that room would be too tiny to fit a bed. That would leave a windowless living room. Or you'd have to redesign the window arrangement of the entire building.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by Via Chicago

welcome to your new home! you should be thankful to even have breathing space, being its such a luxury these days.

San Francisco man lives in a box (for only $400 a month)
By Amy Graff, SFGATE Updated 9:46 am, Wednesday, March 30, 2016

Peter Berkowitz could afford to pay more in rent. He's a successful illustrator who has been busy with freelance work ever since one of his cartoons made it into the New Yorker.

The thing is that the 25-year-old doesn't want to pour all of his money into high-priced San Francisco rent—and so he's living in a plywood box parked in his friend's living room for $400 a month.

This is an unbelievable bargain in a city where the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment is currently $3,590 . . . .

http://www.sfgate.com/realestate/art...tz-7215269.php

My question is why his "friend" considers it worth $400/month to have this ugly box parked in his living room. I sooner let him sleep on the couch or the floor in a sleeping bag for free.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

^^^that's exactly my point. the single person has a minimum square footage expectancy and think they deserve enough room for all of their stuff. last I checked, most urban center are getting pretty expensive but developers keep cranking out the 1 bedrooms and then everybody cries about affordability problems. we need to reconfigure the studio market share. not micro apartments though. that's still a tough sell. bring the price point down for 400 sq feet and you will probably rent them like hot cakes.

Reducing the size of units in new builds is more likely to become a race to the bottom for developers to cram in as many apartments and sell them for as high as possible, than it is for the savings that come from building a smaller unit to be passed along to the consumer.

In Toronto for example, we've seen average condo sizes gradually decrease while prices have increased. Now, there's an argument to be made that they'd be even more expensive if not for the size, but more likely I think is that it's just become accepted as the new normal.

Average new home sizes in North America are still pretty crazy, but it's not those in the market for already tight urban apartments who should be making the sacrifice. Either way, I'm for all for increasing housing diversity, which includes micro units, but that has to come with some level of oversight and control or developers will just build as small as possible.

Originally Posted by eschaton

More recently, with the widespread use of computers, the internet, and mobile devices, one can argue conceptual space has rotated again. The commons are retreating into cyberspace, which can (to a certain extent) replace former needs. Hence younger people both seem to go out less and have less need for space than their immediate predecessors.

I like the rest of your post and I'm just nitpicking here, but I don't see any evidence of young people (or any group of people) going out less, especially when the bar & restaurant business is booming in most places. I mean, all these kids aren't paying big money to move to little apartments in the city so they can sit in there on their computers all day.

[Crawford]

While I wish Americans would prefer smaller apartments, I don't think it's realistic. This country has had large spacious living spaces for many generations, and aren't going to revert to Hong Kong-type living arrangements.

People don't want to live like this. Hong Kongers move to the U.S. and live in spacious suburban homes in Orange County, CA or Long Island, NY. Even they don't like these tiny spaces; they have no other choice.

Now moderately smaller living spaces, yeah I can see this. More one bedrooms and studios are a possibility in high cost markets. But I don't think microunits have huge appeal. Even here in NYC, I think most younger folks prefer apartment shares over micros. Tons of postcollegiates live 3 or 4 in a two or three bedroom (there's a whole temporary room partition industry here in NYC, which chops up living spaces for more people than legally allowed).

I think 250 sq. ft. is the minimum studio size for adults with real jobs. Below that not much of a market, unless there's a cultural change.

[JManc]

I don't understand why a single person living in a modest 600 s/f apartment is even an issue here. So we can cram in more units thus more people and create super dense cities and be like Tokyo or Manhattan?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by JManc

I don't understand why a single person living in a modest 600 s/f apartment is even an issue here. So we can cram in more units thus more people and create super dense cities and be like Tokyo or Manhattan?

It's important we create more such housing, because it's in massive demand in certain global cities, and the market isn't producing enough such housing. This creates inefficiencies and especially lost wealth/productivity.

I don't think anyone is arguing for more 600 s/f one bedrooms for high earning professionals in Tulsa. The market isn't demanding such housing. But in NYC, possibly SF, maybe Toronto (?), yeah. Outside of North America, such housing is very common.

[Gordo]

Originally Posted by JManc

I don't understand why a single person living in a modest 600 s/f apartment is even an issue here. So we can cram in more units thus more people and create super dense cities and be like Tokyo or Manhattan?

I don't understand why we would make something that a lot of people want illegal. What are we "protecting" them from?

[Gordo]

Originally Posted by Crawford

It's important we create more such housing, because it's in massive demand in certain global cities, and the market isn't producing enough such housing. This creates inefficiencies and especially lost wealth/productivity.

I don't think anyone is arguing for more 600 s/f one bedrooms for high earning professionals in Tulsa. The market isn't demanding such housing. But in NYC, possibly SF, maybe Toronto (?), yeah. Outside of North America, such housing is very common.

It's very, very much in demand in SF, Seattle, LA, dozens of smaller cities, and likely many east coast cities as well if it were legal. Even a place like Chicago would probably be building this type of housing in certain locations if it were legal - a lot of people would trade housing next to transit and without roommates over housing further from transit and/or with roommates, even if it were less room in a square footage sense. Time and privacy are valuable to people.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by Crawford

It's important we create more such housing, because it's in massive demand in certain global cities, and the market isn't producing enough such housing. This creates inefficiencies and especially lost wealth/productivity.

I don't think anyone is arguing for more 600 s/f one bedrooms for high earning professionals in Tulsa. The market isn't demanding such housing. But in NYC, possibly SF, maybe Toronto (?), yeah. Outside of North America, such housing is very common.

600 sqft one bedrooms are entirely reasonable, large even (I've seen 2 bedrooms in less than that). As of 2012/2013, the average one bedroom condo in Toronto was 560 sqft, while the average for all condos was 740 sqft - lower now.

However, we have some here who seem to be arguing more 100-250 sqft units is the solution to the affordability problem in some cities. These are fine in limited quantities (or for specialized purposes, like student accommodations or housing for the homeless), but given free reign to developers, I'd maintain that we're only going to see less livable spaces before we see more affordable prices.