New respect for the ranch house?

My next home will be a ranch.  The reason:  So much easier to control the heating and cooling in them.  No stairs is nice but I do not mind stairs.. I HATE that it is so HOT upstairs in my townhouse in the summer. (old bad insulation I know) 

We had a two story house in our previous city but when a relocation occurred we choose to purchase a ranch. My husband and I are in our early 50's and decided this was a great opportunity to downsize from a 2800 sq. ft. 2 story to an 1800 sq. ft. ranch that we can retire in.

I've lived in both two story and ranch homes. There are good and bad points to both, but I much prefer my one-story ranch built in the early 90's.

We built this home when we were in our early 40's. We wanted something we could be empty nesters in, and something we could comfortably navigate when we got older. I am glad we did.

I've seen my mother-in-law go through torture with arthritic knees trying to negotiate the nightmare layout of a tri-level home. I swore I'd never have one of those beasts as long as I lived.

It may not be the trendiest style out there, but I love the layout, three bedrooms with two baths. A little on the smallish side, but perfect for the two of us now.

and loving it.  I grew up in ranch style homes in LA, WV and OH.  The best one was the OH home with an eat in kitchen that had huge cupboards and an attached laundry room, a huge living/dining room combo, three large bedrooms (one with double closets) and one small bathroom.  While I would have appreciated another bath, it was fine for our family of four.

 

After 25 years in a raised ranch, we intentionally bought a 2000 sq. ft. ranch and are remodeling it.

It has 3 small bathrooms, 4 bedrooms (2 small and 2 large), a family room, laundry room, living room, and a huge kitchen/dining room at the front entrance of the house.  Since we find ourselves doing most of our living in the kitchen, this is an ideal layout for us.  I can't wait to move in.

Yes I would...the first house we owned was a 5 room ranch with one bathroom...and 4 kids w/two adults in it. We did add on a t.v. room off the kitchen, but no cathedral ceilings, just normal height ceiling. After losing my first husband to a stroke..and remarrying in later years...we NOW live in a 9 room colonial...the rooms are spacious, we have 5 bdrms and 2 full baths...PROGRESS SOME WOULD SAY.  I SAY this house is wonderful for storage space, and "get away from each other space" with 2 tv;s...BUT...in later years who needs all  this space TO MAINTAIN AND CLEAN?  I would GLADLY consider a ranch house again...WITH 2 BATHROOMS...and all on one floor. Stairs are a nuisance as you get older, and 3 bdrms would  be most adequate for us now., MAYBE 4 to have a guest room the few times one is needed. The modern concept of LARGE LIVING SPACES, and spectacular Master bathwooms is wonderful...IF you can afford a cleaning lady or crew every couple of weeks. MOST people do not have cleaning personnel coming in...BUT an open floor plan CAN give you the "spacious " look you want without having 2 or 3 stories to maintain. Ranch houses ARE convenient, (with only one floor to take care of) and can be as lavishly set out as larger houses are...you just have to have the "right touch" to make it LOOK luxurious as you want it to, or as family friendly to those coming in.

We grew up in a Cliff May pre fab house on a lot Dad bought in 1950 for $500 within a short walking distance of schools, K-12 plus jr. college two blocks away.  We moved in Jan. '54 and it was great overlooking a huge field and a stand of eucalyptus trees.  May was a 6th generation Californian so he knew about housing, starting in San Diego.  . 

It wouldn't be my first choice. I grew up in a very plain,boxy one and all I ever wanted was a two-story house. I've always liked the idea of the upstairs bedroom area being separate from the public area downstairs, and I just think a two-story is more attractive. That said, now that I'm almost 50, the one floorplan has merit.

There are more styles of 1-story home than just the ranch.  We have the last of the bungalows - built in 1947.  What we found is that the ranch is basically a floorplan optimized to mid-century living.  Most homes are similarly optimized to the lifestyles that were common at the time they were created, but the ranch, a product of mass-builder/develop​er systems, began a trend that persists still today - a perfected floorplan that cannot be easily modified to add more space or updated to meet more modern lifestyles.  What I mean by this is that the ranch, with its living/dining area abutted by the kitchen, separated by the sleeping areas and bathrooms by a long narrow hall, is designed to remain that way and any type of remodeling that adds space or removes walls affects traffic flow or room dimensions in very drastic or negative ways.  Everyone has been in a ranch where the garage was made into a living space, and/or the back porch was walled in to create a "family room" or worse, bedroom.  This all sounds like successful additions, except for one big fault: to get TO these new rooms, you must leave the "private" areas to go through the living/dining area in order to get to the other "private" area: the family room or bedroom addition.  The other option is to dart through the kitchen to get to the back room that was created when the sliding glass door was removed, but the kitchen should NEVER be a through-traffic area!  The more preferred way to update a home is to add extra "private" rooms in the private wing, but a ranch, with a dead-end hallway that is surrounded by bedrooms, doesn't afford this option. Basically, a modified ranch is a traffic-pattern nightmare!  I have put much thought into how to modernize a 4-wall ranch in order to allow it to flow in a way that modern families need it to and have come up with only 3 options: 1. Build another traditional "living room" on the front of the house, making the existing "public" living/dining/kitche​n area into the desired combined family room, with the kitchen in its existing corner, but all walls removed, and an island separating it from the common area. 2. build a new kitchen and dining room BEHIND the existing kitchen/dining area, and tearing down the kitchen walls in order to make a large common room out of the space left. or 3. Gut the main bathroom, (or laundry if that home has one btw. the kitchen and main bath) making it a hallway to a new wing behind the house that houses any additional bedrooms, master suites, offices or family rooms.  Each option is a live-in-during-remod​el nightmare, as each affects the rooms imperative to maintaining daily routines: the kitchen and bathroom.  Ranch homes are fine if you have no need to expand or change the layout at all, but all too many of them were built with tiny rooms that modern Americans would prefer to be larger.  The spaces are extremey difficult to enlarge or modify, too.  Borrowing from an unused room creates long, narrow "bowling-alley" spaces of the new rooms created.  All in all, they are fine as time machines, but largely impractical for today's family demands.