Average cost of an American home in the decade you were born, from 1940s to present day (msn.com)
They compare home prices across the decades – without mentioning that home sizes today are about 3x larger than they were in the past (1950 to 2014), and contain many upgrades not present in the past – like R-19 wall insulation, R-60 ceiling insulation, and triple-paned windows, plus granite counter tops, automated heating, cooling and water systems. The home my mother grew up in was heated by coal, shoveled into basement storage, by her Dad. Compare that to today’s natural gas or electric heating. My wife’s Dad grew up in a farmhouse that did not have running water inside until the 1960s; and the bathroom was an outhouse outside the door. And they lived in Canada – in the winter.
- 920: 1,048 square feet
- 1930: 1,129
- 1940: 1,177
- 1950: 983
- 1960: 1,289
- 1970: 1,500
- 1980: 1,740
- 1990: 2,080
- 2000: 2,266
- 2010: 2,392
- 2014: 2,657
Average Size of US Homes, Decade by Decade (newser.com)
More crazy – as home prices got higher, and square footage larger, the number of persons per home went down – by a lot. So each person living in the home, on average, has a lot more space than in past decades.
- In 1950, there was about 300 sq ft per person; in 2014, there was over 1,000 square feet per person.
If journalists were competent (they are not), they would have least made their price comparisons by square footage, over time, rather than “homes” over time.
