This was surprising to me, because I had never thought that the bigger the house the better. I have been in plenty of big, nice, houses, but I never thought of them as something to put yourself into massive debt over. Big houses were what rich people bought. You know, people who could afford them.
You can chalk this up to ignorance on my part, but the point still stands that I think the first thing to consider in house-buying is how much space you can afford versus how much space you really need. If you want more space than you need or can afford, rethinking that mortgage should be in order. But what do I know - I’ve never bought or sold a house. My family has never even owned a house.
To date I have lived in ten different houses, two different apartments, and one college dorm room. That’s thirteen different permanent residences in twenty-one years. Up until age twelve I had to share a room with my brother, after which I either had my own room or shared a room with a non-relative roommate. The apartments being small goes without saying, but none of houses I’ve lived in would be considered “big” by American standards, yet they each had enough space for my family of four.
I cherish these houses because each one reinforced ideas about living quarters that helped me later on in life as I ventured out on my own. Small houses have taught me lessons that big houses may not have, and the result of this is that I am more aware of how I relate to my living quarters. Allow me to share some examples of what I have learned.
Small houses taught me to share spaces. Growing up, I had to share bathrooms, bedrooms, washrooms, and playrooms. Sharing rooms taught me to clean up after myself, to finish what I started, and to resolve conflicts. I couldn’t leave stuff strewn about because other people used that room, too. If I wanted to play with something, I had to do what I wanted to do in the time allotted, and then I had to pack up and move somewhere else. This, coincidentally, also taught me to keep track of my toys.
When I visit big houses, which is not often, I usually see a huge kids playroom with toys scattered about, abandoned after some play session that happened weeks ago. I never had that luxury. I always had to clean everything up, display my LEGO creations for mere days at a time before dismantling them to build something new, and keep my toy bins nice and orderly because I couldn’t afford the floor space to leave everything scattered about.
Small houses also taught me to buy and use functional furniture. I can’t remember a single item of furniture that my parents kept for display purposes only. No china cabinets, no cubbie shelves to hold knick-knacks, no small hallway tables that supported only a lamp, no overstuffed furniture that us kids weren’t allowed to sit on, nothing like that. Everything in our house had a purpose that it dutifully served. Part of that was because of the size of the houses, yes, but part of it was also due to the constant moving. When you move every two years (on average), you really start to question the reason behind keeping useless furniture, and then you start to dump it. I took that lessraon with me.
Speaking of dumping furniture, that was another thing I learned to do - not become too attached to it. My parents did keep a lot of furniture throughout the years, but they also gave a lot away and bought a lot of recycled stuff. My brother and I both had desks that were purchased from recycle shops. Throughout my childhood furniture was stuff that came and went as easily as the clothes I grew into and out of.
Finally, living in small houses taught me to think of the neighbors. Space is a luxury in most of Japan, and neighbors were never far away. My dad stressed the importance of having good relations with the neighbors, and being in a small house limited the noise levels as well as how much buffer space we had between houses. In the suburban American sprawl, I feel that this is often lost. When mowing your yard constitutes a good 40 minutes of exercise, who has time to pack a compass and knapsack and make the trek to meet the neighbors?
So that’s what I learned from living in lots of small houses. And that is why I will most likely choose to live in a flexibly-designed and cozy house filled with second-hand, functional furniture. At the very least I’m prepared to be ahead of the curve for the next economic recession!
_DZ
