s/o Living in a small home

[Anonymous]

We are moving from 3500 sq ft to 2000. Family of three including a toddler. Tell me about the joys of living in a smaller house and what tricks you have to maximize space. I think my biggest concern is giving my child privacy and space to play as time goes on. Now it will be fine but what about the elementary and middle school years? I pass a small house on my runs that just looks like they've done it right. I can see the entryway with a coat tree and baskets. They often have the shades open and what I can see always looks so put together. I know - stalker! I really want to knock on the door and introduce myself but I am not that insane.

[Anonymous]

I live in 1100 sq ft with an elementary school child. Before that I lived in 500 sq ft (no kid, though -- me and spouse).

The major joy of living in a small house is that it is very easy to clean. It takes two hours to clean our apartment thoroughly. In our case it also means very short commutes.

We have lots of furniture that does double duty as storage. Our bed has drawers underneath. Our couch is a futon sofa-bed that also has drawers underneath. My son has a loft bed and we store toys underneath.

CHeck out Apartment Therapy for lots of good ideas. Organized storage is key, I think.

[Anonymous]

2000 square feet is a small house? Man, coming to DCUM makes me feel like a pleb.

I clicked on this thread because I live in a 900 sq. ft. house. Heck, growing up, my family of 7 didn't even have 2000 square feet!

Anyway, there are tons of interesting "small home" websites out there to browse.

[Anonymous]

Umm, we are a family of three in 800sf, so I think you are still living in a palace

vertical storage, closet organizers, and purge relentlessly. Try to limit the large plastic unitasker toys. Spend lots of time outside (yard, playground, etc).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Umm, we are a family of three in 800sf, so I think you are still living in a palace

vertical storage, closet organizers, and purge relentlessly. Try to limit the large plastic unitasker toys. Spend lots of time outside (yard, playground, etc).

We have a grand 900 square feet. That would be a palace to us too.

[Anonymous]

1125 sq ft with two kids, 8 and 6. We have plenty of space, the only thing that seems to be overtaking our house are books, so i got Kindles for everyone last Christmas. We'll see if that helps any.

[Anonymous]

Where do you live that you think 2000 is small, Texas?

[Anonymous]

WTF, I can't even read this thread. In what universe is 2000 sq feet small? I hope to afford that in a few years!

[Anonymous]

1300 sq ft here, with one child and two dogs. A few things are key for me: a coat closet, a trunk in the dining room/entry way (they are combined) for shoes, backpack, and purse, separation of functions, and ruthless clutter purging. For the separation of functions, this means that kid toys are removed from the living room every night and banished to his bedroom. The dining room table is for homework and eating, and is not a shelf for clutter. Ruthless clutter purging is hard for me because my DH is a bit of a hoarder and he hates to throw things away. What I end up doing is having a basket that I can throw junk into every day, and it it goes unclaimed for a couple of weeks I secretly toss it.

[Anonymous]

Ok to be fair to OP, 3500 sq ft to 2000 sq ft is an adjustment but I agree it's by no means small.

I will echo what others said - purge, furniture with storage, vertical storage.

[Anonymous]

We are four in 850SF - 2000 seems huge!

Don't buy tons of things. Use the library. Purge stuff that doesn't fit or doesn't get played with. Make your kids clean up each day. It's not so hard - and easier to keep clean!

[Anonymous]

OP here. I didn't mean to offend and thanks for not getting mean about it. Yeah, I grew up in a big (though far from luxurious house) and currently live in a large house. 2000 sq ft will be small for me but I know it isn't tiny. I appreciate the helpful ideas. Keep 'em coming.

[Anonymous]

Family of 4 (soon to be 5) living in 1300 square feet.

For us, living in a smaller home means a shorter commute, walkability, and the ability to renovate for a much smaller amount of money. For instance, we had our two baths redone for around $7k each. We will redo the kitchen floors soon and can pick really high-end stuff, but since it is so small it won't be a huge investment.

[Anonymous]

LOL! I, too, live with two kids, DH, and an au pair in a 1000 sq ft house. Also like PPs, because we wanted to have an ultra-short commute and great schools.

OP, I think you just need some advice on weeding out unnecessary stuff, not on living in a small house. 2000 sq ft is plenty of space for three people!

[Anonymous]

We also moved from 3500 sf to about 2000. But we have 3 kids! We have really downsized the amount of stuff and especially toys we have. I can still get rid of a ton more. We are renting and will be buying in the next few months and are planning to stick with around 2000-2500sf due to budget as well as, I just don't want to keep such a big house clean. So I haven't done much to our rental to make it what would work best since it's not my house and was short-term, but we've made it work. I think the one aggravation is that with a smaller house, everything has a place and if even a few things are out of place, the house looks like a pigsty. That's where I think we need to still simplify what we have. There are still plenty of toys that no one plays with. I have bins of clothes for my oldest to hand down to my youngest that take up space. Etc.