Amid all the gloom and doom about real estate and housing, there’s one ray of good news: Homeowners and home buyers want—and will pay for—well-designed outdoor spaces.
CUSTOM HOME’s Web editor, Stephani Miller, attended an NAHB forecast conference at the International Builders’ Show in Orlando, Fla., in February that addressed the outlook for the remodeling market. Here’s the good news she heard there: While the NAHB expects that consumers will hold back on seriously remodeling their houses until they feel better about the economy and home valuations, it saw demand for outdoor living spaces continuing to grow, especially among high-end homeowners. The NAHB sees this as a nationwide trend, and not one tied solely to Sunbelt markets.
Reporting on a survey of architects, designers, marketers, and builders, NAHB vice president of research Gopal Ahluwalia said that while decks, patios, and porches were the most common outdoor additions homeowners have made to their homes in the last 10 years, in the coming decade the big demand will be for outdoor kitchens, lighting, pools, spas, and outdoor A/V.
This says to me that if you are designing and building custom homes that encompass outdoor spaces as well as indoor ones, you are standing in one of the few bright spots in the housing market today. And maybe you should get out your shades, because that spot should get brighter in the years to come.
