Where we grew up.

[DayDreaming]

The house I grew up in - mom still lives there and I visit every week.

 

[socca]

I grew up in a 4 BR 2.5 BA 2 CG 1/3 acre split-level in a suburb of Columbus, OH. Zillow shows $550k, but this includes improvements made after I left (it is now 5 BR 3.5 BA). Without improvements it would go for ~$450k. Property taxes are 2% of market value eek.

We were probably better off than most, but I didn't perceive myself as such because everyone I knew lived at the same socioeconomic level. We never visited the slums. It was a nice place to grow up.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

I took these photos on a nostalgia trip when I was in the UK on business in 1995.

The Big 5 Bedroom Semi was where I grew up in Sutton Road, West London, Middlesex, UK. Just 11 miles from Piccadilly Circus. My father put that front door on and built the brick wall and installed the black gates.

The little 2 bedroom Bungalow was in Ashford Middlesex, UK. It was the first house I purchased when I was 22, just before I got married. I built the brick wall.

 

[golfnut]

First house was located in the West Englewood part of Chicago. Lived there from 1959 til 1965. Remember my father complaining about selling it for less than what he paid. Back then redlining on the part of realtors was rampant.
Still have alot of happy memories living in the A-frame built in 1910. Now it's in foreclosure and maybe looking at the wrecking ball.

 

[Bestwifeever]

The house I grew up in has now been demolished. We had an outside toilet and a standpipe in the yard, both of which we shared with our next door neighbor.

The wooden hatches in the walls seen in the photo are to coal bunkers. When coal was delivered it was dropped in the street, below the hatch, and we would shovel it in through the hatch.

I don't miss "the good old days".

I so wish you would write a memoir—fascinating.

My family had nine different addresses before I left home fifty years ago—I cannot remember any of them. I have lived in my home now for forty years.

 

[pb4uski]

My parents lived in an apartment when I was born. When I was about 6 months old they moved into a small house in an adjacent town where they had both grown up. When I was about 7 we moved about 100 yards down the street into this house.... which was new at the time. While it was 4 bedrooms, there were 7 of us so it was pretty full and busy. As the only boy, I had a bedroom to myself, while my 4 sisters had to share two bedrooms. Lived here until I left home for college at 17 and then my parents lived there until Dad retired around 1990.

One notable feature of the house was a laundry chute... a cutout in the floor of the hallway closet down to the laundry area... no hamper... just open the closet door and deposit your dirty clothes in the hole.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

Not too long ago, I took a roadtrip with my Dad to the area of NC where he grew up (1927-1944) and he showed me all the places he lived/worked, even the orphanage where he spent several years. In those days, all the kids in the orphanage had jobs to support the farm, including taking coal to the main house, slaughtering animals and tilling very large fields. Many of the buildings were still there (although no more farming or slaughtering) and Dad told some fantastic stories. It was a great trip and having some of the family history "come alive" was one of the memories I will cherish for a long time.

 

[Alan]

I so wish you would write a memoir—fascinating.

My family had nine different addresses before I left home fifty years ago—I cannot remember any of them. I have lived in my home now for forty years.

Maybe I should

We didn't get an inside toilet until I was 14 years old and when me and my brother would complain about it my Dad would do his 4 Yorkshiremen thing and tell me that I was lucky, because when he was a lad the toilet in the yard was a dry toilet and instead of shoveling coal for neighbors like I did for a few pennies he used to go round shoveling out the waste and replacing it with fresh ash. (There used to be an outside hatch at ground level to the side and below the coal hatch which also opened onto the street).

My Dad said that when he complained to his Dad, he told him that he was lucky because when he was growing up in that same pit village they had communal toilets at the bottom of each street with a plank with holes cut in so you were sometimes shoulder to shoulder sitting with your neighbors. (They did have separate toilets for men and women).

There is a big outdoor museum close to where I used to live and only an hour drive from where we live now which creates much of the way of life I knew. Although I grew up in the 1950s it hadn't changed much since early part of the century. It's a wonderful place to visit. We have a couple of good friends from Louisiana visiting in June and I think this is somewhere we might take them. The price of admission includes the use of the buses and trams to move around the place from one area to another.

My brother is over from Australia with his 3 children and 2 grandchildren (ages 10 and 12), and he took them there last week to see what it was like "when he were a lad". In particular the 1900s pit village and colliery is very nostalgic for us. My brother is still a coal miner in Australia and his 3 children all work in the coal industry

Home - Beamish

Not far from Beamish is the city of Durham with fabulous castle and Cathedral and Durham is on the main London to Edinburgh rail line so well worth a visit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durham,_England

 

[gerntz]

My parents got married they each had an old car .

WOW - TWO old cars. Beats us by 2x.

 

[Hermit]

I so wish you would write a memoir—fascinating.

My family had nine different addresses before I left home fifty years ago—I cannot remember any of them. I have lived in my home now for forty years.

Same here. We moved up and the railroad line about every year or two until I was 12. One last move from a rental to the small house my folks had built. Moving was just part of my early life. I had no concept of staying in one place and long time friends.

 

[38Chevy454]

Main house I grew up in was in Livermore, CA (east San Francisco bay area). My parents bought it in 1970 for $35K, current zillow has it worth $972K. Everything around it is at least $800K, most are in the $900K's range.


That's approx a 27x increase in value over the 49 years timeframe.

 

[REWahoo]

We didn't get an inside toilet until I was 14 years old and when me and my brother would complain about it my Dad would do his 4 Yorkshiremen thing and tell me that I was lucky, because when he was a lad the toilet in the yard was a dry toilet and instead of shoveling coal for neighbors like I did for a few pennies he used to go round shoveling out the waste and replacing it with fresh ash. (There used to be an outside hatch at ground level to the side and below the coal hatch which also opened onto the street).

My Dad said that when he complained to his Dad, he told him that he was lucky because when he was growing up in that same pit village they had communal toilets at the bottom of each street with a plank with holes cut in so you were sometimes shoulder to shoulder sitting with your neighbors.

And we're off...

 

[savory]

A Detroit suburb - a single family home that contains 978 sq ft. It contains 3 bedrooms and 1.5 bathrooms. This home last sold for $60,000 in October 1995. The Zestimate for this house is $116,691. My folks sold it in the early 80s for $20,000 about what they paid in the mid/late 50s.

It was small and even smaller when our grandmother moved in. But a wonderful community and while small, a great house, at least for a kid.

 

[ncbill]

Grew up (age 10 until I left for college) in a large (over 5,000 sqft.) home built around WWI.

Last sale was ~$1.5 million, IIRC.

Loved it since I didn't have to pay to maintain it...watched mom nearly go broke trying to keep up with it after her divorce.

So now I live as cheaply as possible in a townhouse around half the size.

 

[HFWR]

“Little [-]pink[/-] white houses for you and me...”

Lived here from ages 1-5, at which time we moved to “the country”, one acre with a split-level, which, after 2-3 remodels, is virtually unrecognizable now.

 

[Accidental Retiree]

Main house I grew up in was in Livermore, CA (east San Francisco bay area). My parents bought it in 1970 for $35K, current zillow has it worth $972K. Everything around it is at least $800K, most are in the $900K's range.


That's approx a 27x increase in value over the 49 years timeframe.

Yep. My parents bought in Orange County, CA, in 1969, for $34,500, and that house is now about $1.1 million on Redfin. Two doors down from our former home recently closed for over $1.1m.

Amazing.

 

[jollystomper]

The house - actually apartment building - I grew up in through age 11 was in a neighborhood so bad that it and maybe 8-9 blocks around it were razed it the mid-90s and some type of state facility was built on the grounds. The "good" news is that, since the address no longer exists, variations on it can make excellent passwords.

 

[kcowan]

My parents bought their house for $4000 in 1938 and it was finally sold in 2009 when my brother passed away for $550k. After that I lost interest but according to this link, the rebuild is now worth $2.5 million.

https://toronto.listing.ca/369-brookdale-ave.htm

 

[Col. Klink]

My parents home in Naperville, IL. was a 3 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath split level built in 1960. It was bulldozed down last year an replaced by a McMansion.

 

[Rianne]

I grew up in Champaign (home of University of Illinois). I could ride my bike, walk, take the bus, enjoy restaurants, movie theaters, talk to friendly people (strangers) without care, half the time I didn't lock my car. Our home was built in 1872 with a wrap around porch. Friends flowed freely through our house. Then DH/me moved to Palatine (suburb of Chicago). Traffic, tolls, high prices, long lines, somewhat rude people threw me into panic attacks. LOL live and learn.

I think it would work the other way too. If you grew up in a major city, cosmopolitan, busy lifestyle...a small town might be upsetting.

 

[tmm99]

My parents' home when I was a kid. The first image is from Zillow, and the second (black and white) photo is one I took when I was a kid. Twenty-seven rooms on 3/4 acre, and they bought it in 1943 for less than $3K. They sold it in the mid 1960's when we moved to Hawaii. We didn't spend much time there, since my father was a nearly compulsive traveler. We were always somewhere overseas.

What?? There were 27 rooms in your house??

 

[nhcycling]

House I grew up in - 3 BR 1 BA. 5 kids and Nana lived down the street. Just outside Boston. Zillow estimate $629k. One of my brothers lives there now. Lots of great memories.

 

[Pointby2]

I enjoy looking up all our old houses too. I enjoyed it even more when I saw the house we sold in Coon Rapids, MN for $147,000 in 2000 is now worth $195,000 a nice gain of 48,000.


But we moved to Anaheim, and the house we bought there for $424,000 which we thought was outrageous and a potential budget killer is now worth more than $950,000. Net gain, if sold, of $526,000. So a $500,000 swing, pretty much by accident. Or, I guess we're financial geniuses?

 

[Gumby]

I never lived in a house until I was a senior in high school, and it was only for about 8 months, as I left home to join the Navy right after graduating. Zillow says it was 1056 sqft. There were only 3 bedrooms and 3 kids. I didn't want to share with my brother, so I slept down in the basement.

For the first 17-1/2 years of my life, we lived in a variety of trailer parks and cheap apartments. One of them was over a car dealership in a small town in Appalachia. Occasionally we lived in the Navy base housing, which were also apartments. For a couple of months one summer, we lived in a tent. Altogether, we lived in about 20 different places and I went to 10 different schools.

 

[powerplay]

My Dad still lives in the house where I grew up. He will turn 93 soon!