all throughout the American suburbs you
will find entire neighborhoods filled
with nearly identical houses but why
does this happen hi everyone Ken here
welcome to this house today we are
exploring the phenomena known as cookie
cutter housing make sure to hit that
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exciting episode of this house before we
explore why so many homes look nearly
identical we need to define the
components of a cookie cutter house
these homes are built quickly in large
tracks by the same developer who only
offers a handful of house plans
by limiting the ability of the home
buyer to customize their new house the
developer is able to build entire
neighborhoods at an alarming rate they
use the same materials from the same
suppliers on every new house they build
ensuring that the quality is always
exactly the same oftentimes because of
this method of mass production and
housing this leads to lower costs for
the home buyer but the trade-off is
living on a street without character
almost like every house was cut from a
baking sheet using a cookie cutter this
is where we get the name cookie cutter
housing now that we know what we're
talking about how did this happen
certainly things weren't always this way
right in the mid to late 1800s the U.S
saw its first population boom with
cities rapidly developing across the
country this led to small rows of
similar houses being built by developers
though each one was able to be
extensively customized but by the turn
of the century this trend had mostly
died down in favor of Custom Homes
filling residential streets with
charming and unique houses which allowed
each suburb to really encapsulate its
own aesthetic but this highly customized
way of living saw its downturn during
the Great Depression when new
construction slowed to a halt now the
majority of new homes being built were
being finished out with fewer details
and more economical design choices just
as the economy started to turn around
World War II broke out this led to men
being pulled out of the traditionally
male-dominated Workforce in most of the
nation's resources being devoted to the
war effort when World War II came to an
end Victorious veterans returned home
and began starting families suddenly
there was a housing crisis with fewer
homes being built in the decades prior
the cities were becoming too crowded so
a handful of developers Across the
Nation sought to capitalize on this
problem of limited housing Supply and
excessive demand for new homes the most
famous of these developers was William J
Levitt with his Construction Company
Levitt and Sons he founded the all-white
private neighborhood of Levittown on
Long Island New York where he introduced
a new way of building houses he took an
approach known as an assembly line where
each worker was trained to do one thing
before passing off the product in this
case a house to the next worker each
house took 27 steps to complete and
required 36 workers for its process each
team of 36 workers could erect one house
per day this New Concept became a
sensation families who were living in
crowded Apartments could purchase a lot
and in some cases move into a new home
the next day instantly satisfying their
housing needs within the first three
hours of opening up their sales office
Levitt and son sold over 1400 new homes
and over the next couple years they
built 17 000 single-family houses with
more than eighty four thousand residents
calling the neighborhood's home though
it was a financial success the
neighborhood was the center of
controversy because of the bylaws and
the homeowners association for bidding
FHA Loans to people of color for new
construction which created one of the
largest segregated communities in the
northern United States other developers
across the country took notice of
William Levitt's success and further
simplified the process of Home Building
in Crestwood Missouri developer Burton
denke were tanned in hand with architect
Ralph Fournier to create some of if not
the first modular single-family houses
walls and entire roof sections were
built separately then assembled on site
they were primarily designed in the
mid-century modern style with clean
lines and accommodations for technology
that did not yet exist part of
fournier's philosophy was to create
homes that could be easily adapted to
new technology allowing them to stand
the test of time he predicted that
televisions would become larger that
open concept living would become more
popular in that technology that was yet
to be invented would end up filling up
our homes people around the country
loved this idea of building a house that
could adapt to the ever-changing social
landscape with minimal updates so while
Levitt and Sons had been successful in
New York Ralph Fournier saw worldwide
sex success with his homes being built
in 195 cities around the world this
caused other developers to take notice
with low cost quick turnaround time and
high demand for housing the market was
ripe from massive low quality
developments to fill the void in housing
Demand by the 1990s American suburbs
from coast to coast looked nearly
indistinguishable from one another with
most middle-class neighborhoods offering
an average of eight variations of the
same 150 house plans even upper middle
class and lower upper class
neighborhoods began to spring up using
the same low quality materials and
budget-friendly construction methods
creating super cookie cutter homes also
known as mcmansions people who could
afford Custom Homes were now building
large low-quality houses falling into
the same trap as their middle class
counterparts with well-to-do streets
repeating the same house over and over
again in the U.S the only state to
require an architect to design a house
is the state of New York in the 49 other
states most of these homes were designed
by General Contractors without
background knowledge on classical
architectural orders nor cohesiveness of
styles which has led to a couple of
problems first these homes tend to be
amalgamations lacking alignments with
random window placement non-functional
shutters fake Juliet balconies and
turrets for no apparent reason of course
beauty is in the eye of the beholder but
speaking to the mathematically based
theories of architectural composition
these features appear to be random
almost mocking the profession the second
problem with homes being designed
without the consultation of an architect
is longevity in the past homes were
built to last to house generations of
families for hundreds of years but most
of the homes in the United States built
since 1990 have a life expectancy of
only 50 years some buyers paid extra for
Quality materials but the vast bulk of
buyers went with cheap Builder's grade
materials including particle board and
substandard weatherproofing between the
walls given that Suburban housing
accounts for on average 57 of cities
Metropolitan Area Housing stock that
means that by the year 2040 most of
these low quality homes regardless of
their price tags are expected to fail or
be demolished it isn't a question of if
this happens it's a question of when
when this happens when the suburbs are
torn down what will replace them will
metropolitan areas become ghost towns
will they be abandoned like the once
affluent suburbs of the Rust Belt orbit
millions of families take individual
measures to maintain their cookie
cutters let me know your thoughts Down
Below in the comments section and while
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