In 1998 I bought a house, a tiny shack in Felony Flats built in 1906, but with a couple craftsmen-gothic additions. It had crooked floors, virtually no insulation, and the nastiest carpets in the universe. It was, however, surrounded by a sizable yard; the house itself took up a small fraction of the 4800 square-foot lot.
I grew up in the suburbs with hay fever, so naturally I developed an aversion to yard work. When I bought the house I was in my 20s, barely prepared for adulthood, much less the responsibility of home ownership and leaf raking. I hosted some legendary parties with no need to worry about a security deposit, but other than that there was nothing I particularly liked about “home ownership” (If you’re paying a mortgage you don’t actually own your home; the bank has the deed after all). I longed for the freedom to travel, relocate, and in general make plans for the future that didn’t require coming up with a mortgage payment every month for the next 30 years. And of course the yard became a jungle. I sold the house a few years later, before the ownership society real-estate bubble really took off, so the profit was just enough to pay off my student loans and a credit card; i.e. get back to zero.
I’ve been renting ever since. The rents I’ve paid have all been well under what a mortgage would cost for the same property. I’ve saved a fortune on utilities by living in apartments and condos. I moved to Hawaii and back. I’ve contemplated moving to Canada or Ireland. I’ve traveled. I’ve changed careers four times. I’ve lived in 5 different places, each with its own charms, in five different neighborhoods in three of Portland’s five “quadrants.” I’ve been able to do all the things I couldn’t do when I had the albatross of a mortgage to worry about.
But now I’m in my thirties and contemplating a yard brings on not just sneezing fits and eye irritation, but also cravings for garden-ripened tomatoes, strawberries, and sweet peas.
If I had a yard now I would plant a garden, and maybe even look into the whole chicken thing. I used to live a few blocks from Pistils Nursery on Mississippi, where bantams range freely amongst the ornamentals and edibles out back. Inside new arrivals chirp and stumble in the wood chips under heat lamps.
Chicks on Mississippi from Dave Knows on Vimeo – Filmed by Heather of Mile73.com.
Don’t they look delicious cute?
Cute little chicks grow up to be ugly chickens. Oh so tasty. If I had a house, I would also totally have the 3 chickens allowed without a permit. We down eggs like crazy snakes at my house.
Can you have a rooftop garden in your new place?
It all sounds really nice in the make-believe world of fantasy, but reality isn’t the same. If you only want a house so you can have a garden, I’m sure there are plenty of places you can garden on a commitment-free basis. (i.e.: community gardens, garden co-ops, balcony gardens) And chickens? Please. I’d love to own goats, but my rational self knows that’s insane. You know you can NEVER leave them, right? No vacations. Chickens need you every freakin’ day. I grew up on a farm and there is much that lingers in my mind as being idyllic and wonderful about country life, but there is way more that I remember as just plain uncivilized and confining. Unless I somehow get a big pile of money that will allow me to buy a house outright (with no mortgage) and allow me to hire people to renovate it to my specifications and maintain it to my specifications and clean it to my specifications; I’m renting. I like to move. I like to live in new places and purge my stuff every few years. There are a lot of places I still want to live. When I get to the point where I just want to hunker down and wait to die, then I’ll buy a house…. I’m just sayin’
devlyn – I think I’d want to try out urban chicken farming first, before committing to the venture. But fresh eggs are delicious!
Diane – I doubt it 🙁
XUP – There are community gardens nearby, which I could look into (except I’m lazy).
As for chickens, I’m not sure if I’d be up for the responsibility, but if I had a yard I might look into it.
I’m with you on the house thing. First I’m waiting for housing prices to get back to historic standards; i.e. average house costs about 3 times the average salary. We’ve got a long way to go still. Then I’d want to have a huge down payment. And then it’d have to be some place I’d want to live in for many many years. I’m probably more likely to buy a vacation home, which I could rent out most of the year, than a home for myself.