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Also 50 years ago if you were building new housing, if your work was sub-standard you did not get paid. There would be a clerk of works checking it was up to

Also 50 years ago if you were building new housing, if your work was sub-standard you did not get paid. There would be a clerk of works checking it was up to scratch. Now it is a race to the bottom

dragonwriter 4y ago
> Also 50 years ago if you were building new housing, if your work was sub-standard you did not get paid. There would be a clerk of works checking it was up to scratch. Now it is a race to the bottom I’m old enough that one of my earliest memories of advice being given on house buying (not to me, I was still to young for that) was of people advising against buying anything from around the time you were praising (which at the time of the advice, wasn't brand new but still newish), making exactly the same comparison of that time to the time a few decades before (though I thing then it was usually 20-30 and not 50 years before held up as a model) as you make of now to then.
- nicoburns 4y ago
  I suspect they’re both correct. House building standards seem to have been trending downwards for at least 100 years if not more. Some things have gotten better of course (fire safety, insulation, etc), but the construction itself tends to be optimised for cost over quality these days.
  - maccard 4y ago
    Remember that there's a survivorshio bias in the 100 year old buildings you see still standing today. In many cases they are impractical for modern standards too - my home has 2ft thick external sandstone walls, and all the internal walls are brick. It's massively overengineered for the use of the building. At the same time there is nowhere to put any insulation on external walls meaning that during the winter were leaking huge amounts of heat and during the summer we live in an oven. Compare that to my friends modern new build in the same city (Edinburgh) their internal temperature is mostly stable. There's also things like "you can't run any extra cabling"- adding ethernet to my existing cabling isn't happening without replastering my entire home. And lets not start with modern 5GHz WiFi not passing through my internal walls. Needs have changed, materials are more consistent and easier to get, efficiency standards have changed. All of these things have had a huge impact on materials and costs. It's unfair to just say that buildings are built worse without considering anything else.
    - nikita2206 4y ago
      In my experience I like living with stone walls a lot more than in a cardboard. It’s true though that doing any changes to the stone wall is a lot harder than with drywall, but it kind of proves the point that current construction techniques are optimized for cost (I like to say they optimized for the builder a lot more than for the ones living in that building). I think this is very much subjective in the end though. Also because current building techniques still make use of stone, bricks and concrete which all have the same downsides. But as you said they can be an overkill for some people who don’t mind the walls being quite soft for instance.
      - maccard 4y ago
        > but it kind of proves the point that current construction techniques are optimized for cost I don't think that's a fair takeaway - drywall lets you do things like insulate, run cabling, provide moisture barriers, easily change room layouts. These are all things that people want to do in their homes today that are straightforward (mostly) with drywall, and borderline impossible for a DIY'er in an older building.
      - treis 4y ago
        Stone is unsuitable for most climates since it is a poor insulator. You have to build walls on the inside to insulate it. In effect building another house inside the stone exterior walls
  - bluGill 4y ago
    Standards have been trending up. Modern houses are much more likely yo survive a hurricane, and have much better insulation. Most people have no idea what makes a house good and so are impressed by things that don't matter. A lot of this is because the important parts are hidden inside the walls where you can't see them.
    - nikita2206 4y ago
      As other person said it’s a survivor bias as well. From 100 years ago most of the houses that you see are either stone/brick houses, or timber-framed houses (thick post and beam, not what people in the UK call timber framing today). Those houses are always impressive compared to todays 2”x4” frames
    - r3trohack3r 4y ago
      I’m starting to appreciate this more as I age. Quite by accident - I purchased a new-ish (2004) house made by an incredible builder (T. W. Lewis). Compared to friends living in houses built around the same time, maintenance on this property is lower. Things are just “built better.” My in laws just built a new home with an average builder. I got to watch the house go up - know what’s in the walls, etc. Their house is higher quality than mine. New construction seems to be better than buying old homes on average, and prices reflect that - new costs more and you get less. This lead me to a somewhat startling revelation: houses do not appreciate in value. The house looses value but is offset by the dollar losing buying power in the housing market.
retcon 4y ago
75 year ago in the race to rehouse the UK the government paid for new builds cost plus. My father wrote(and sold for broadcast) a eponymous radio play on the phenomenon of everyone adding five points to the BOM and labor and getting paid automatically by the Ministry of Works. It was D noted. Edit: My memory was wobbly the title was simply"Money". This (carte blanche for lousy work) created the next housing crisis that's created the currently forty years old UK housing crisis. My father ran the largest mortgage book of that era so saw the disaster up close and filthy.

Also 50 years ago if you were building new housing, if your work was sub-standard you did not get paid. There would be a clerk of works checking it was up to scratch. Now it is a race to the bottom

dragonwriter 4y ago

> Also 50 years ago if you were building new housing, if your work was sub-standard you did not get paid. There would be a clerk of works checking it was up to scratch. Now it is a race to the bottom I’m old enough that one of my earliest memories of advice being given on house buying (not to me, I was still to young for that) was of people advising against buying anything from around the time you were praising (which at the time of the advice, wasn't brand new but still newish), making exactly the same comparison of that time to the time a few decades before (though I thing then it was usually 20-30 and not 50 years before held up as a model) as you make of now to then.

nicoburns 4y ago
I suspect they’re both correct. House building standards seem to have been trending downwards for at least 100 years if not more. Some things have gotten better of course (fire safety, insulation, etc), but the construction itself tends to be optimised for cost over quality these days.
- maccard 4y ago
  Remember that there's a survivorshio bias in the 100 year old buildings you see still standing today. In many cases they are impractical for modern standards too - my home has 2ft thick external sandstone walls, and all the internal walls are brick. It's massively overengineered for the use of the building. At the same time there is nowhere to put any insulation on external walls meaning that during the winter were leaking huge amounts of heat and during the summer we live in an oven. Compare that to my friends modern new build in the same city (Edinburgh) their internal temperature is mostly stable. There's also things like "you can't run any extra cabling"- adding ethernet to my existing cabling isn't happening without replastering my entire home. And lets not start with modern 5GHz WiFi not passing through my internal walls. Needs have changed, materials are more consistent and easier to get, efficiency standards have changed. All of these things have had a huge impact on materials and costs. It's unfair to just say that buildings are built worse without considering anything else.
  - nikita2206 4y ago
    In my experience I like living with stone walls a lot more than in a cardboard. It’s true though that doing any changes to the stone wall is a lot harder than with drywall, but it kind of proves the point that current construction techniques are optimized for cost (I like to say they optimized for the builder a lot more than for the ones living in that building). I think this is very much subjective in the end though. Also because current building techniques still make use of stone, bricks and concrete which all have the same downsides. But as you said they can be an overkill for some people who don’t mind the walls being quite soft for instance.
    - maccard 4y ago
      > but it kind of proves the point that current construction techniques are optimized for cost I don't think that's a fair takeaway - drywall lets you do things like insulate, run cabling, provide moisture barriers, easily change room layouts. These are all things that people want to do in their homes today that are straightforward (mostly) with drywall, and borderline impossible for a DIY'er in an older building.
    - treis 4y ago
      Stone is unsuitable for most climates since it is a poor insulator. You have to build walls on the inside to insulate it. In effect building another house inside the stone exterior walls
- bluGill 4y ago
  Standards have been trending up. Modern houses are much more likely yo survive a hurricane, and have much better insulation. Most people have no idea what makes a house good and so are impressed by things that don't matter. A lot of this is because the important parts are hidden inside the walls where you can't see them.
  - nikita2206 4y ago
    As other person said it’s a survivor bias as well. From 100 years ago most of the houses that you see are either stone/brick houses, or timber-framed houses (thick post and beam, not what people in the UK call timber framing today). Those houses are always impressive compared to todays 2”x4” frames
  - r3trohack3r 4y ago
    I’m starting to appreciate this more as I age. Quite by accident - I purchased a new-ish (2004) house made by an incredible builder (T. W. Lewis). Compared to friends living in houses built around the same time, maintenance on this property is lower. Things are just “built better.” My in laws just built a new home with an average builder. I got to watch the house go up - know what’s in the walls, etc. Their house is higher quality than mine. New construction seems to be better than buying old homes on average, and prices reflect that - new costs more and you get less. This lead me to a somewhat startling revelation: houses do not appreciate in value. The house looses value but is offset by the dollar losing buying power in the housing market.

retcon 4y ago

75 year ago in the race to rehouse the UK the government paid for new builds cost plus. My father wrote(and sold for broadcast) a eponymous radio play on the phenomenon of everyone adding five points to the BOM and labor and getting paid automatically by the Ministry of Works. It was D noted. Edit: My memory was wobbly the title was simply"Money". This (carte blanche for lousy work) created the next housing crisis that's created the currently forty years old UK housing crisis. My father ran the largest mortgage book of that era so saw the disaster up close and filthy.