Why We're Downsizing

Why we're moving to a house that's 30% smaller

People keep asking if I’m going to miss our home It’s such a special house, but I feel ready to move on.

When we first saw this house, I felt something but hesitated. It was a lot more space than we wanted or needed, plus, it was at the top of our budget and needed a lot of work. But there was something about this house. It felt too special to pass up, so we stretched into a bigger and more expensive home, and felt stretched pretty thin the last few years. I was ready to list the house last year, but we had some projects to finish up before we could do that.

We never needed more than 5,000 square feet of living space, and downsizing was something we knew we wanted to do. A smaller home means less rooms to fill and less space to clean. Our new house is 30% smaller and feels like a much better size for our family right now. The property is about 80% smaller. It’s still a great size, and less yard to maintain.

There are sidewalks, parks within walking distance, and neighbors, too. Our current basement has a lot of storage and not as much living space, compared to the new basement which is mostly living space and a better play space for the kids. The kids’ rooms are right down the hall instead of across the house, too.

When it comes down to it, we just wanted things to feel easier. Simpler. There is nothing wrong with formal living and dining rooms, but I prefer having rooms we actually use. We are opening the dining room into the kitchen and our new living room is going to be a lot more cozy and casual, so we’ll actually use it. Using each space in our home feels more aligned with what we want right now. I've already ordered some new furniture for the space — you can see some of the pieces I ordered here.

I am nervous about a few things, but they feel like a good tradeoff. Living through a kitchen renovation with three kids is not going to be fun, but we demoed our bathroom when our third baby was ten days old, so we can do this? Or that’s what I’m telling myself. I’ve never had a brand new kitchen. I’ve also never lived through 3-4 months of construction with three kids. 😬

The one real downside of the new house is our bedroom and closet. Our current bedroom was way too big (like the size of my first apartment) and never felt like home to me. If I could, I would add a few feet onto our bedroom. It’s small, but I’m going to wallpaper and am confident I’ll end up liking it more than our current bedroom.

The closet is probably the “room” I’m most worried about. It’s about half the size of what I have now, but we’re adding an off-season clothing closet to the basement, which I actually think will be really nice, since it will give me a chance to see what I actually wear before putting something away at the start of a new season.

Our new house needs a lot of work, but we’re starting at a lower price point, and made money on our current home, which puts us in a very different financial situation than we were in with this home. We can afford to do everything we want to do and not feel spread thin.

Will I miss the huge laundry room with two washers and two dryers? Yes. Gorgeous patio? Yup. But will I miss having spaces we don’t use or not having neighbors? Not really.

The new house is more affordable, comes with less financial stress, less maintenance, and we will use all the rooms and space. Smaller doesn’t mean less. For us, it actually means so much more.