What would you like your dream home to be?

[TheHighwayMan3561]

A lakefront home in Duluth or in Grand Marais, MN. That's my only requirement.

[SectorZ]

What noise do they make?

I'd rent before living under an HOA.

My neighbors from hell finally moved out (got evicted at the end of the moratorium, thank goodness) but they would spend just about every night blasting music from their house or car. The bass-boosted kind that seeps through walls.

I've had to call the police to enforce the noise ordinance dozens of times and heard nothing back from them, so I suspect they were being let go because of their friends in the pigpen.

Pigpen? Can you be any more freaking offensive?

WTF is with this forum and dumb politics of late?

[Rothman]

What noise do they make?

I'd rent before living under an HOA.

My neighbors from hell finally moved out (got evicted at the end of the moratorium, thank goodness) but they would spend just about every night blasting music from their house or car. The bass-boosted kind that seeps through walls.

I've had to call the police to enforce the noise ordinance dozens of times and heard nothing back from them, so I suspect they were being let go because of their friends in the pigpen.

Pigpen? Can you be any more freaking offensive?

WTF is with this forum and dumb politics of late?

I think there are a lot more offensive terms than that for a police force, so I am sure he could.

[andrepoiy]

I want a huge ass garage. Everything else I don't care that much about except location - can't be too far away from civilization.

[yanksfan6129]

right now it would be great to just have an off-street parking space for my motor vehicle, as parking can be tough on Friday and Saturday nights in my neighborhood.

long term, I could see myself occupying a full rowhouse in DC to myself as opposed to just one of the units in one that has been subdivided into three apartments.

being in this dense neighborhood is nice. I like walking 2 minutes to the grocery store, 5 minutes to the metro station, restaurants right there, etc. etc. etc. But obviously I also like my car so private parking would be nice.

[achilles765]

I think I have three possibilities for my dream house:
(If I ever were to become wealthy enough, I would have either two or three of these)

Home 1. (practical and hopefully in the future actually obtained)
-- A decent sized older bungalow
-- In the East End/Second Ward or Spring Branch area of Houston
-- 2 or 3 bedroom, 2 or 2.5 bath
-- decent sized, fenced yard for the dog to play in
-- all gas appliances
-- honestly, window units in the bedrooms and living room, and fans. 
-- gas tankless water heater
-- either a small 1 or 2 car garage or drive way with a little gate
-- if a 2 bedroom, then also would want a den or small extra room to use as my "library/the dogs room". if a 3 bedroom, bedroom 3 would be the study/dog's room
-- large kitchen with decent counter space, a large pantry, large fridge/freezer
-- two sided sink with a hose and a disposal
-- a spot for my husband to have a little garden

Now for the dream/fantasy homes:
Fantasy Number 1:
-- New build, either just outside the city or in an area where there is a lot of empty space. Or, out in the middle of nowhere in like Colorado or Utah--somewhere it gets cold...close to an interstate but otherwise away from everything
-- Large three car garage
-- Guest house that is split into three apartments for friends/family
-- Two story with a basement
-- Large kitchen with a restaurant sized gas burning stove/grill and a dual oven. 
-- Large counters made out of carving board material
-- Large commercial walk in cooler and freezer
-- Several acres of land for a yard...fenced in.  High fence and deeply dug in as well so my dog can run around and not escape.
-- A separate little barn house and fenced in area for rescue dogs to live happily in their own little refuge
-- A large living room on the first and second floors.
-- a jacuzzi room
-- poolhouse with pool and hot tubs and sauna
-- large master bedroom as a loft/third floor with a wraparound balcony that overlooks everything
-- four bedrooms on the second floor, each with its own bathroom ]
-- walk-in closets
-- a formal dining room
-- a library/study filled with my books, vinyl record collection, vinyl player of the best quality, and old timey roll top desk
-- a game room for my PS4, PS5, MacBook, big screen TV, and that kind of thing.
-- a room for my dog, with a tv and stuff so I can hang out in there with him
-- every room would have a cabinet for dog toys and stuff so that Rocko could go anywhere and be happy because he can be near his humans

Fantasy 2: Penthouse
-- a penthouse on the top floor of a building in Downtown Houston.  I would LOVE to live on a floor higher than 50..if it needed to be somewhere other than Houston, I may be ok with that.  Or in this fantasy, I could buy out the higher floors in a tower here for use as a residence.  This would likely not be my primary residence since my husband is terrified of heights, but it''d be like a secondary home for when I need to work (as a writer) or after he dies, it could be my new "widower's pad"

[bing101]

Living overseas such as living in New Zealand and in the Wellington area home overseeing downtown



Location 2 live in the Netherlands in an apartment in the Hague.

[1995hoo]

Since this is probably the closest thing on the forum to a home improvement thread, I'll ask here: Anyone have a tankless water heater? If so, any comments? It's coming time to replace our water heater; right now we have a conventional 50-gallon gas heater and I assume we will most likely do the same again (opting for one that gets us the tax credit, if possible), but I'm mildly interested in tankless to free up space in the HVAC closet and because the idea of not having a 50-gallon tank of water that could decide to spring a leak seems rather sensible. But I know tankless heaters cost a good bit more and might require some work on the wall to reinforce the mounting point. If it matters, it's just the two of us in the house and we don't normally run multiple appliances using hot water at the same time (sometimes one of us might shower while the laundry is running, but not often, and the laundry may not be using warm water at the time either way).

Thanks in advance for any useful advice.

[MikieTimT]

Since this is probably the closest thing on the forum to a home improvement thread, I'll ask here: Anyone have a tankless water heater? If so, any comments? It's coming time to replace our water heater; right now we have a conventional 50-gallon gas heater and I assume we will most likely do the same again (opting for one that gets us the tax credit, if possible), but I'm mildly interested in tankless to free up space in the HVAC closet and because the idea of not having a 50-gallon tank of water that could decide to spring a leak seems rather sensible. But I know tankless heaters cost a good bit more and might require some work on the wall to reinforce the mounting point. If it matters, it's just the two of us in the house and we don't normally run multiple appliances using hot water at the same time (sometimes one of us might shower while the laundry is running, but not often, and the laundry may not be using warm water at the time either way).

Thanks in advance for any useful advice.

In the house we remodeled into an AirBnB, we went with a Navien tankless hot water heater when replacing the 20+ year old gas hot water heater that was there before.  It still worked, but since the house was going to be empty at least half the time with no one to report any leakages, we figured it was time to go with something more efficient, especially since it was a tax deduction anyway.  It was reasonably priced, with a large chunk of the cost going into putting an electrical outlet in the hot water heater closet to run the electronics and igniter and removal of the old asbestos-infused vent pipe.  It takes a few more seconds to get hot water to the shower than the tank did, but after that, it's just available for as long a shower as you want to take.  Since we have a house that will commonly host groups of mountain bikers, we wanted to have hotel-like hot water availability, which isn't possible with a tank, and we like having furniture that sweaty, dirty, and sometimes bloody mountain bikers don't have to wait on for a tank to recharge.

When they installed the tankless hot water heater, they put what looks like a small sink below it since there's plenty of space in the closet without a huge tank.  It serves as a leak drain in case of freezing or other plumbing issues, preventing it from ruining the hardwood flooring.  We also sprung for the leak detector, which looks like a strip of paper with electrodes on it that is hooked up to an electrically actuated shutoff valve on the water inlet of the heater.  In the event water gets into the catchment basin, that strip will get wet and then trigger a shutoff of the water supply, preventing a flood from occurring.  Really handy for locations that aren't constantly occupied.

[Rothman]

*wonders about condensation causing false alarms with the leak detector*

[snowc]

Since this is probably the closest thing on the forum to a home improvement thread, I'll ask here: Anyone have a tankless water heater? If so, any comments? It's coming time to replace our water heater; right now we have a conventional 50-gallon gas heater and I assume we will most likely do the same again (opting for one that gets us the tax credit, if possible), but I'm mildly interested in tankless to free up space in the HVAC closet and because the idea of not having a 50-gallon tank of water that could decide to spring a leak seems rather sensible. But I know tankless heaters cost a good bit more and might require some work on the wall to reinforce the mounting point. If it matters, it's just the two of us in the house and we don't normally run multiple appliances using hot water at the same time (sometimes one of us might shower while the laundry is running, but not often, and the laundry may not be using warm water at the time either way).

Thanks in advance for any useful advice.

We JUST got our Hot water heater replaced in 2020. Our old 2004 Bradford White HWT went after a windstorm knocked out the power. Anybody heard of Rheem? We also got our HVAC unit replaced in 2014.
And also, when our powers out, we got hot water if anybody needs to take a shower!
But why? We got our heat via gas (Piedmont NG, owned by Duke) and our electric via the SAME company  our heat  is provided! (Sorry for the double spacing, Windows 11 is pretty bad right now. )

[snowc]

What noise do they make?

I'd rent before living under an HOA.

My neighbors from hell finally moved out (got evicted at the end of the moratorium, thank goodness) but they would spend just about every night blasting music from their house or car. The bass-boosted kind that seeps through walls.

I've had to call the police to enforce the noise ordinance dozens of times and heard nothing back from them, so I suspect they were being let go because of their friends in the pigpen.

But I have new neighbors with obnoxiously loud (and probably modified) engines/exhaust that I can hear early in the morning. I haven't had a full week of uninterrupted sleep since 2019, and my health has taken a turn for the worse because of it.

Hey neighbor! 
Same here with our next door neighbors.
We got to deal with an arrested family who (in fact) was caught on our security camera slapping s on his wife! We JUST had to call the cops with our landlord involved (we rent) and the person didnt even know what to do!
And now, we have to move out to possibly NY (Thanks @Rothman for the PSA earlier) if N Syracuse doesnt drag their feet with my father's references!
Thats all because of the kids NOT knowing their boundaries with ours! And even the WHOLE entire neighborhood has their lights on because of them!
Sorry for the rant.

[MikieTimT]

*wonders about condensation causing false alarms with the leak detector*

Hasn't so far, but we'll see with winter coming.  Most of the lines in and out were done with blue and red PEX, so shouldn't be as prone to condensation.

[zachary_amaryllis]

I'm fine with what I have currently, but if I were to upgrade, I would want more room and a computer setup that's not 10 years old and on the verge of breaking.

i live in a cabin the size of your bathroom in my mother's back yard, and i'm actually ok with that. only thing i would change would be offload some of the computer equipment into a different outbuilding, the stuff i don't have to be right in front of. there's an outhouse that's long been 'capped' that has electricity to it. perhaps that can become the server room.

i'm ok with having to go inside to do #2 (or #3), cook, shower etc. plus, i have random neighborhood cats that come to visit. many times during the summer i will wake up to a cat on the bed that i do not belong to.

[jlam]

My only requirement is that is located in or within one hundred feet of the I-70 Park'N'Ride in Baltimore.

[Ned Weasel]

My dream home:

A two-room suite in a 1960s/1970s Holiday Inn "Glasswall"/"U2" building, such as the one pictured here:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/gograffer/2771354677/in/photolist-6TcM7w-5dTUzk-5dTVcc

Half of it would be a living/workout room and kitchen, and the other half would be a normal bedroom and bathroom.

Preferably, the main entry light switch would be on the thin metal post between the front door and window.  I'm not sure if anyone here remembers those, but I always found them to be a delightful touch.