Tract housing: C/D?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tract_housing

Spouse and I might become first-time homeowners in the next year or so. We'll be looking in the Greater Toronto Area, which is awash with these housing developments. My feeling is very definitely DUD, but spouse feels they might offer practical benefits that older neighbourhoods do not.

Is it in a new development (last 1-10 years) or a slightly aged development? What are the benefits spouse sees in these kinds of neighbourhoods?

I'm curious. My initial reaction is definitely dud.

are they built on indian burial ground?
http://www.seeing-stars.com/Images/Places/PoltergeistHouse.JPG

Define older neighborhood. Affordable homes post-WWII are as likely to be 'tract' homes as anything built in 2007.

Older than that? Workmanship was probably superior and some detail features as well. But unless it's been remodeled, you're going to have a house that's not terribly energy efficient, has old wiring/too few outlets for modern life, etc..

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51oV8azDBJL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

i get kind of fascinated by the different choices developers have made about street patterns, lot sizes, house spacing, etc. to appeal to people. like you end up with cul-de-sacs meandering through the trees in the piedmont, but big houses on relatively small lots in las vegas.

Is it in a new development (last 1-10 years) or a slightly aged development? What are the benefits spouse sees in these kinds of neighbourhoods?

There's not one neighbourhood in particular. Most of them, though, are really new. It just seems to be the norm here that people, including my darling future husband, see NEW HOME as the only way to go and wouldn't even consider a home older than 10 years or so. The benefits he sees are larger homes/room sizes, guaranteed attached garages and off-street parking, everything BRICK, everything NEW, little need for redecorating/renovating, and especially resale value.

That first pic in the Wikipedia link is pretty much what I'm talking about. Huge houses, tiny lots, zero walkability. The type of neighbourhood where you have to take a highway to the mall in order to buy milk.

I can see how one might be attracted to many of those benefits, but the majority of these type of developments built in the last decade or so (depending on the area) are built with the cheapest possible methods and materials. From what I've observed in houses I've visited - paper-thin walls, sloppy landscaping, basements prone to flooding at the slightest water event, etc. At the very least I'd hire a building inspector to go through the house with a fine-tooth comb.

Okay, then I'll change my answer to definite, 100% dud - I've never lived or been to Toronto/area (although I've seen its sprawl from many airplanes!), but if their new developments are anything like those in Calgary or Edmonton and their surrounding towns, they can be pretty atrocious.

I'm not sure about the benefits of larger houses, really. A lot of them look big, but all the ones I've seen have pretty unimpressive room sizes (for bedrooms anyway). The houses are big, definitely, but sometimes a lot of their inner space is put to poor use (like by making the foyers really open with high ceilings or having angled staircases take up more room than necessary). And with bigger houses come much higher bills and travel costs. Resale value is all well and good, but when it's cancelled out by bills and travel costs what's the point? If you're wanting resale value it's probably better to research an up-and-coming area to invest in rather than just go for something because it's new (esp because, who knows how buying habits will change in the next 5-10 years given fluctuations in energy/fuel costs). And yeah, as mentioned in the above post, the rate these new communities go up is questionable, so a good bulding inspector is A+ advice.

If kids are in the picture I think these kinds of developments may have a different appeal, but a lot of new developments fail to plan for schools/good parks/activities for kids and tend to lack a sense of 'community' for quite a while — hence why I asked the age of the development. I think after a couple generations some of these kinds of communities can become viable and worth making a move to, but it's hard to create communities from scratch (y'know, if 'community' is something you feel is relevant).

If there's no swaying him to consider an older development (ie, maybe 70s-/80s-ish ones, which after a few decades are often quite nice and well-established), it might be worth looking into areas that aren't totally brand new but have maybe passed their first 10-15 years of existence. There won't be much difference in the house sizes/garages, but (in my Albertan experience, at least) a lot of these communities have become a bit more connected to amenities/retail hubs/transport links.

Sorry for the rambling. I can get overly excited when it comes to housing/communities/etc.

I can see how one might be attracted to many of those benefits, but the majority of these type of developments built in the last decade or so (depending on the area) are built with the cheapest possible methods and materials. From what I've observed in houses I've visited - paper-thin walls, sloppy landscaping, basements prone to flooding at the slightest water event, etc.

If anyone has any articles, etc, relating to the above I'd be very grateful. I am suspicious of the quality of these homes too, but need a more solid argument than general suspicion to make my case.

And salsa shark, I get overly excited too. The thought of living in one of these places makes me want to weep, to be honest.

Resale value is a BITCH with those things, because they're surrounded by hundreds of similar (if not nearly identical) homes of the same age with the same features...there's very little to distinguish among them for a buyer. I've seen multiple of those Home Network shows in which people get screwed trying to sell tract- or town-houses in residential developments where they're competing with houses of the same age as theirs that are STILL EMPTY and never got bought and lived in...so then your house isn't "new" anymore and there's an empty one just the same, down the street.

Seems like bad news all around.

I have friends that work in construction that complain about the cheap methods/materials of newer tract homes, single family and condo townhomes. Basically, with the cheaper models, the developers and contractors are looking to meet the requirements - design and codes - as simply and cheaply as possible. Which brings me to one point in favor: with an older home you are more likely to have to make major repairs, because plenty of older houses aren't really built to last either.

I'd focus more on finding a house in a location you'd like to live. If you'd be unhappy having to get on the freeway to go to the mall to buy milk, then I wouldn't consider getting a house - no matter how nice - in an area where you'd have to do so.

My mom has accepted the fact that I'm not going to ever have kids, so whatever "You should be having kids now" anxiety she had has been shifted to "You should be a homeowner now" anxiety. After a conversation that she began with "I saw a cheap house listed as for sale on X street," I ended up convincing her for now that I'd probably be better off renting because these cheap houses are in neighborhoods I wouldn't want to live, and she wouldn't want me to live, plus it makes her ridiculously happy that I live near a fancy supermarket.

I think the quality of the houses might depend on the developer in charge of the general area.

http://corp.jdpower.com/jdpcc/global/canada/content/ratings/homebuilders/gta.jsp

I don't really care what they say about quality, it's never as good as a nice plaster wall circa 1903.

Resale value is bad for tract housing - if the appeal of it is that it's new, each new development that springs up is going to reduce the value of yours. There's a finite stock of older homes, though.

xp Laurel: on the other hand, it's a lot easier to fix drywall than plaster. That said, the texturizing found on modern walls always baffles me. It just looks unattractive.