Good point. Also note that a 4-family home is going to be generally much more energy efficient than 4 single-family homes, since there are fewer walls that leak heat to the exterior. So the author's recommendation to build more multi-family dwellings is on point in that respect.
That's fine when you live in a house. Not so relevant when you live 20 storeys up. I feel like way too much time and effort goes into improving single family houses, as opposed to larger multi-family buildings. They could be built to be much more efficient and just as comfortable. But alas.
When you say 'multi-family home' do you mean a single house with lots of families sharing a kitchen and things?
Or do you mean like a terrace home? Like a town-house? Those are super common in many places and it doesn't cause any of the problems you're imagining in my experience.
My house shares one wall with another family. Not sure how you'd tell or what impact you think it'd have. I still have power tools in my garage.
We have one wall the adds separation between a family room and the dining place, and we're in the process of adding a hole in it (though the reason is increased light.)
In general: we love it.
The article is right about the enormous energy inefficiency of it all. We have no way to separate living room/dining room/kitchen/family room from each other, so we're heating the whole thing in the winter.
It's also true that sounds travels everywhere, but in our case, with only 1 kid, that's not a problem.
What if you change the narrative from "single family" home (or multi-family dwellings) to "cater to couples and/or singles that can handle needed compromises"
This is a really good point. I don't understand the obsession with single family homes.
We own a single family home and it kind of make me feel bad. We rarely use our yard, it is just maintenance for no good reason. Inside the house, we have also so much useless space, just costing money to heat or cool it.
> *I could divide my house into 2 units with a few walls and electrical work. Lots of houses have unused or underused attic/garage/conditioned space that can be converted relatively cheaply.
A few walls, some electrical work, an entirely new kitchen, and a new master bath unless you happen to have a house with two full bathrooms.
Even assuming that people started having four children "for the human race to survive" (a wacky thought in itself) what would prevent a family from having a compound of two or three tiny homes? At some point you would need so many tiny homes you wouldn't have much cost savings. But seems totally doable to have pair of homes or trio of homes, with, e.g., kids sleeping in one and parents in another, connected by common deck/porch.
> Even if you have 4 people in your family, do they all need separate rooms
“Need” is a flexible term; it's clearly possible for people to survive without any rooms. But, yes, there's plenty of reason to believe that there are benefits to having a private space.
But most likely a four-person family with a 4-bedroom house has two adults sharing the master bedroom, two children with their own rooms, and a guest room and/or office.
> and what is the probability that they all need to pee at the exact same time?
Hopefully, close to zero, since your hypothetical still has fewer bathrooms than people. But multiple restrooms.
But, it's actually quite likely that multiple people will be using bathrooms for either elimination or bathing at the same time, particularly in the mornings.
(It's also somewhat likely when entertaining, which is one of the reasons people want large houses.)
I think you forget how people make choices. One of the big issues is that if people are given the choice between an extra 3rd or 4th bathroom (that they use twice a year) and good insulation, most people will choose the 4th bathroom. That is because the bathrooms are considered status symbols while insulation is not.
Now the rational thing to do when building a house, is to choose the most energy efficient solution over any other options (e.g. a better kitchen), because more energy efficiency will allow you to afford the other upgrades sooner. However, few people make their choices like that.
> but that seems like an odd standard to base your home purchase around
My wife and I made several house (and furniture) purchase decisions based off this. Big families like to have big parties in family settings - it's an important feature of the house for us.
We've made do in ~300 square feet in the past, and just didn't enjoy the compromises on comfort and the constant extra effort to keep the space livable.
Even if, for purposes of argument, you stipulate that there are families that would make effective use of a very large house, the design for a family with a lot of kids and/or an older parent living with them is going to look very different from that for a couple or small family that throws large parties on a regular basis.
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