Downsizing, Rightsizing or Staying Put?

Is this a conversation you are having in your house?

Boy, this is definitely on my mind these days. You have seen pictures of some of the work we have done recently - I really don’t plan to leave any time soon. I would like to enjoy our work for a while. We have been here since 1993 and have almost renovated the entire house and property. It was definitely a fixer upper, with no yard to speak of.

I have a guest room, a front walk and a sunroom/office left. And those projects may never happen. But if they do, we will have completely redone the entire house and re-landscaped the property twice. (The deer destroyed the original work.) And I’m now reworking things done 15 and 20 years ago, that need some help. I would really like to refresh the guest rooms, and the guest bath upstairs, to turn an unused screened porch into a sunroom/garden room type of office/project space for me (my projects are scattered all over the house), and put a hardscape fire pit area snugged up to the gardens in my back yard. I can stay here and do those things, to make the house live better for us, or I can just pick up and move. What if I end up in a place that checks all the boxes, but is a completely soul-crushing, shell of a place, away from my friends and family.

So what is one to do?

You can stay in the house in which you’ve raised your family, the one you’ve been in for years. But what about the upkeep? Is the yard a huge chore to maintain? Do you have a first floor bedroom that would enable you to stay there longer? Is it still in good shape, or do you have large upgrades to make in order to stay? Our yard is gigantic and we do not have a first floor master. (I probably do 20 sets of steps a day.)

You can downsize - moving to a smaller property and house than you have now. If you are an empty nester, or have gone through a divorce and have a large house, you don’t need all that space and might want to get rid of some “stuff”. Why pay to heat, cool and clean all that space, unless you have lots of regular company? Since we were a small family of three, we never needed a big house, so that’s not an issue for us. We don’t really need to downsize the house, we need to downsize the yard and keep the house size similar. Which is really hard! In many instances we would be upsizing! When we find smaller lots, with less landscaped yard, the house is usually bigger than our current house!

You can do what my husband calls “rightsizing.” Which is either making your current home fit your needs at this stage, or going to one that does. It’s a broader concept. In many cases, making your current home fit those needs is not an option. Sometimes it involves a larger house with a better floor plan and space dedicated to different uses.

Here is a list of things to consider whether it’s time to make a move…

Do you have enough space for your daily life? How much of your space is being used?
How much of your home is used for storage? Is it filled to the brim with stuff? Or do you not have enough room for storage? Maybe your home would live better if you just sold items you no longer want and got rid of all the clutter.
Can you do what you like to do in your current home? What are you missing by staying there? What are you missing by moving?

Here is a list of things to consider when thinking about where to go (I practically know it by heart)…

Where are your friends and family going to be? You don’t want to be isolated, especially as you get older.
Do you want to travel, therefore needing a more maintenance free place?
Do you have a second home, so you just want a local “home base”?
Are you worried about burdening your family with being your caregiver or the caretaker of your property? (No option here.) 70% of people over 65 will need some form of long term care.

It’s hard to be honest with yourself and look at the facts, keeping your emotions at bay.

For me, that is really hard. This is the last place that Whitten lived with us, and looked into these mirrors, and opened the refrigerator and took pictures of these trees. When we leave this house, wherever we end up will have no relation to him at all. Some people wouldn’t mind that at all, might even welcome that, but for me that’s a hard pill to swallow.

What is your game plan?

Have you already done your thing or are you still contemplating? I fantasize about us and our friends all moving on one street of smallish houses with smallish yards. (Not McMansions plopped on postage stamp lots.) I know the neighborhood, I just need 10 houses to sell at the same time. 🤔