Owning a home of your own – it’s still part of the American dream. In the dream the path is simple. You begin your adult life as a renter in an apartment. You work hard, you save up, gather a down payment, and then secure a mortgage and buy a starter house. After building up some equity you buy the home-sweet-home of your dreams, where you and the family live happily ever after.
If you drive through certain neighborhoods in Princeton (driving because most of these neighborhoods are not walkable), you will see the physical embodiment of this great American dream. Houses that represent mid-20th century America sit on neatly trimmed lawns (blown clear of leaves), replete with asphalt driveways and multi-car garages.
It turns out, however, that most of us have awakened from that dream to discover a very different reality. In 2023, what we mean by an apartment, a starter house, the happily ever after house, and even the family referenced in the first paragraph above are all quite different from how they were viewed 40 or 50 years ago. That nuclear family (the beneficiary of all that suburban zoning) actually hit its high point in around 1970. Today in Princeton the average household size is under 3.
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