Oh and the renting. It again comes down to the buyer's perspective. Since it is California, I don't think a fireplace will have an effect on renting out your house.If the location is good for them, the fireplace is the last thing on their list.
It is for me...I like them as I didn't have one growing up...I prefer the gas logs as there is no mess...Although, having a wood burning now is kinda cool, but messy to clean up the ash...I've used it about 3 times this winter and love it... Plus I heard the ladies dig it...
My father and I built my house, designed it ourselves, and did not include a fireplace. In Houston nowadays, they're dumb. Resell value be damned, the things are dumb. The only reason it affects your resell value is because your buyer is worried about their resell value. They won't use the fireplace any more often than you will. It seems very strange to me to propagate the existence of a vestigial amenity like a fireplace on a everybody-else-is-doing-it logic. Fight the power. Maybe your friends will see how cool it is to have a house without a fireplace, tell their friends how cool it is, and then it will be a fashion that will sweep the nation. People in New England with quaint 18th century fireplaces will be tearing them out so they can be as hip as you. I also don't understand the mentality of having the structure of your home being determined by the tastes of some unknown future buyer. My old neighbor lived in her house for something like 20 years and then remodeled it before selling it and moving to another state. Wouldn't it have been nice to have been able to remodel earlier and enjoy some of that work? Of course, the day eventually may come when I want to sell my house and no one will want to buy it because it has no fireplace, it has a pier foundation, there are 4 small bedrooms instead of 3 big ones, and the master bath doesn't have a jacuzzi and two sinks. But, in the meantime, I get to live in a house that makes sense for me. If someone else wants a jacuzzi in the bathroom, they can install one as easily as I can.
I am in the process of building a house right now and it is going to have two fireplaces. One in the living and one in the master bedroom. I like fireplaces and think they look great and add value. Here is my beautiful slab <table style="width:auto;"><tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/treymcglaun/NewHouse02/photo#5015144645495329666"><img src="http://lh4.google.com/image/treymcglaun/RZlfe9Pzk4I/AAAAAAAAFPs/tnkMnm4EzGU/s288/New%20House%202006-12%20035.jpg"></a></td></tr><tr><td style="font-family:arial,sans-serif; font-size:66%; text-align:right">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/treymcglaun/NewHouse02">New House</a></td></tr></table>
There are ways to put in a fireplace now without taking up too much space. Most people put in and want the artificial fireboxes anyways. I went into a new house the other day and they actually had the fireplace on the wall in the living room that looked into the back yard. They had it set up surrounded by windows. Apparently you can do that now without a big chimney or anything. It looked really cool and didn't take up an inch of built in space. A lot of people put them in the corner of the family room now and use the wall for big screen built-ins...not putting the fireplace in the middle of the main wall.
When you have the sky as blue as it is shown in this picture, what's there to worry about Houston's air pollution? As to the topic, even in the harshly cold winter of Midwest where heating bills could be huge, fireplace is by no means an energy-efficient heating device. Most families use their fireplaces mainly for decorative purpose. You can get a fake one from stores like Home Depot, which looks pretty nice but at much lower operating cost. IMO if your budget is tight, for all the money spent on fireplace for the sake of improving home resell value, you can easily do it on other things which would achieve similar results, if not better.
When I had my house build two years ago, I did not put in a fire place. I plan to live in this house for a long time (10 year plus). How much will the fireplace add in value? Can you put it in a eletric one later?
That looks like it will turn out to be a beautiful piece of property. It looks like you are in a great wooded area where you will have the chance to see lots of wildlife such as deer and what not. Whenever I get the money to buy a house (currently working part time and school) I want it in an area like that.
That's what I was thinking. When you buy a house, you need to remember what might be attractive to the majority of people, so it will sell easier. Get a fireplace.
Fireplaces ALWAYS take up the best wall for your big screen TV and surround-sound system. They always leave you with NO place good to put that stuff. In Houston, what would you rather have? A fireplace? Or a kick-ass home theater?
I agreed with Juan, people are stereotype, they all have a fireplace even though they won't use it one single time because they heard from their friends that it's a must have in order to sell better, and they pass it to others, and others pass it to others, it's really dumb, but if this is already the case, then I really have no choice but to make a stupid dumb decision myself too. So can you add a wood/gas fireplace later on if you decide to want one? Is it possible to do so?
It's true. I mentioned it earlier in my post. A good friend of mine actually took the facing off a large brick fireplace and covered it so his could stick his 60" display there, instead. Cost him a small fortune to do it. (he also put in a bunch of cabinets and stuff for his audio/visual equipment and books) Of course, he had a fireplace in another large living area of his house. The guy had a large enough disposable income to do that sort of thing. A lot of us like to spend our money traveling, feeding our families, etc. Nice to plan ahead, if you can, and avoid tearing out walls, fireplaces and so on, lol.
It's a neighborhood about 5 minutes south of The Woodlands on Kuykendahl called Wimbledon Falls. I'm building with Imperial Homes and the floorplan is the Belmont. If you look at the What's Available link on the Wimbledon Falls website I'm building in the southernmost section. They don't show the plots as being available yet but they are already building there. I'm going to be at the end of the southernmost cul-de-sac. Here is what it will look like on the plot: <table style="width:auto;"><tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/treymcglaun/NewHouse/photo#5015819569541125458"><img src="http://lh5.google.com/image/treymcglaun/RZvFUtPzlVI/AAAAAAAAFTU/7Rl6JFwfVAI/s288/C%3A%5CDocuments%20and%20Settings%5Cad-mcglat%5CDesktop%5CHouse_plot_plan.jpg"></a></td></tr><tr><td style="font-family:arial,sans-serif; font-size:66%; text-align:right">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/treymcglaun/NewHouse">New House</a></td></tr></table> We think it is a fantastic neighborhood. It's attached to an established neighborhood that is really clean and maintained. It feels very homey and I can't wait to move. I would venture to guess that it would be incredibly expensive to add that later. I'm having a custom cut out built above the fireplace for my 46" flat panel LCD and put wiring from behind the TV to the media niche on the right. I'm not getting any of the built in cabinets that is shown in the picture below (sorry the pic sucks, I think she just wanted a pic of the art niches above the fireplace) and I'm going to buy an armoir to fit in there that will hold all of my components, gaming consoles, controllers, and such. It will also be pre wired for surround sound as well. <table style="width:auto;"><tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/treymcglaun/NewHouse/photo#4991716225731133458"><img src="http://lh6.google.com/image/treymcglaun/RUYjdcZCABI/AAAAAAAAEXA/y60c7mGwZyk/s288/New%20House%202006-10%20004.jpg"></a></td></tr><tr><td style="font-family:arial,sans-serif; font-size:66%; text-align:right">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/treymcglaun/NewHouse">New House</a></td></tr></table>
Very, very nice, MB. The furniture and decorative touches shown in the model aren't to our taste (we're into an eclectic mixture... art deco, with a lot of an Asian mixture tossed in, along with some modern pieces. A variety of art on the walls. We really like hand-colored photographic art, and we've collected and inherited a LOT of things from our travels, and from relatives. My wife's uncle was a missionary in Japan for 40 years, and my father worked summers for USAID around the world for a couple of decades... looking at what I just wrote, it sounds more impressive than it probably is, lol!) We would kill for your square footage! We bought our place in a great neighborhood in SW Austin over 10 years ago, which seems to get closer in all the time as Austin grows, but we thought it was going to be a 3 person family. My daughter scotched that! No regrets, of course, except that we didn't buy a larger place before housing prices shot up here. My wife used to get to the Capitol in 15-20 minutes, but no longer. (sigh!) Why sub-divisions stick beautiful homes 3 feet from each other has always been a mystery to me. I know they can build more houses that way, but it's rather nuts when you consider the asthetics, and what homes like that cost. Would kill for your master bath! Your audio/video setup sounds like it'll be sweet. Congratulations! (I hope you don't work downtown. )
Why get a fireplace when you can get a really big plasma TV and just run a video of a fire on the screen? You'll get the ambiance of the fire and the heat radiating from the plasma will warm your house...
Thank you! I don't totally dig the decorating either but it isn't too bad. My GF is an interior designer, has fantastic taste, and I can't wait to be able to see what we do with this house. We both like a classic look but being from Sweden she digs more modern things than I do. We tend to come to a compromise most of the time though. While it is a production neighborhood, there is more space on the lots than most other neighborhoods. I think the standard lots are 65 feet across and for a $3k premium you can get a 70 foot lot and more for even bigger lots. I paid a $15k premium for the lot that I bought and the lots next to me are a shaped kind of weird so I definitely will not have houses right on top of me, which I am very happy about. It is going to be a change going from a 2 bedroom apartment to that house but I have a feeling we will adjust VERY easily. My kids are going to absolutely love all of the room and the neighborhood. I'm as excited for them as I am myself. It will be great having the covered back patio to hang out on while the kids play and our dog is going to freak. He hasn't known anything other than the apartment. I just went perm with Chevron Phillips Chemical here in The Woodlands on Dec 21 and I have another company that I consult for from home through my own corporation so my commute isn't going to suck at all
Fantastic! You're a lucky guy. (be sure to have ceiling fans in your covered patio. Great for blowing the bugs away, besides cooling things off, if it's not screened in)
We use our fire place all the time. I prefer to use it over central heat while we are awake and then layer up the blankets while we sleep.
It's already been said but it seems many buyers would hesitate purchasing a home without a fireplace, but not vice versa. Besides, how will Santa come every year if there's no fireplace? Think of the kids! Sorry for the derail, but I had another question on home improvement. Would putting wood floors (laminate) in the whole house make it harder to sell? Downstairs, upstairs, bedrooms, stairs, everywhere except wet areas (kitchen, bathrooms, etc.) where we would have ceramic tile. My mom says wood downstairs and carpet upstairs, but I think the value of the house would increase much more with wood everywhere. Am I wrong?
