Bringing a Human-Centric Pulse to Housing
“Access to affordable housing is not just about putting people in buildings. The current crisis in affordable housing and the ongoing deficit of dwelling units in cities and suburbs highlights the need to re-evaluate the use of private spaces.”
Ileana Schinder, Washington D.C. area architect and author of the book “Housing For Humans.”
The U.S. is currently mired in a housing crisis that’s crying out for solutions. With soaring housing prices, higher mortgage interest rates, and inadequate housing availability the norm, finding an affordable home is more challenging than it’s been in decades.
As a result there has been growing debate centered around reducing barriers to housing construction by way of a process called upzoning. In addition to providing developers with greater freedom to boost housing density, particularly near transportation options, upzoning would allow homeowners greater flexibility in terms of adding home additions for older relatives, kids returning to live with their parents after college, and rental income from travelers.
Washington D.C. area architect Ileana Schinder believes that building momentum around addressing today’s housing crisis can occur through an array of innovative residential and urban design solutions. This she highlights in her book “Housing For Humans: A Book to Imagine, Create, and Design a New Housing Model in America.” It offers a deep look into the history and causes of America’s housing crisis while challenging homeowners, policymakers and housing designers to re-imagine the future roadmap for housing in today’s ever-evolving landscape.
In her book, Schinder delivers a profoundly important case for the design and implementation of additional dwelling units (ADUs) as a solution for an aging population, boomerang kids, and needs for rental income to defray mortgage or rental housing costs. She is a huge advocate of repurposing existing spaces, like basements and garages that once housed “stuff” into livable abodes.
She adds:
“With family dynamics having evolved, society has reframed the role of cities. As a result ongoing urban realities demand the creation of new housing opportunities for all, from first-time homeowners to retirees.”
By advocating for solutions that address the new realities around affordable housing, Schinder hopes to ignite much-needed dialogue and discussion around sustainable options for America’s prevailing, prohibitively expensive housing market
As an architect with a housing design flair, Schinder’s passion is bringing housing spaces to life through creative space planning, construction, and design. As a self-described “house whisperer” with a penchant for addressing the unique needs of each client, she had worked on a wide swath of building types, from tiny galley kitchens to whole house renovations.
She says that the genesis of her early passion for architecture dates back to age 4 when she enjoyed toying with LEGO bricks as a youth. Reflecting back on her journey to where she is today, Schinder shared this:
“I went to architecture school back in Argentina. I moved to the U.S. in 2000 and worked in the architecture field for companies. My son was born in 2012. I then decided to open my own firm in 2014 to run my own business and see if I could do housing.”
Schinder points to the rising demand for architecture design solutions in D.C. at the residential level as a primary reason for her growing practice:
“One thing I immediately began noticing is that because of the density and the cost of housing in D.C, I started receiving a high number of requests for turning converted basements, garages, and other spaces into housing.”
All of this she believes was the consequence of a couple of factors. For starters, the D.C. area in recent years formalized an update to its zoning code that allowed for additional residential dwelling units. As a result, says Shinder, homeowners now have the right to convert a portion of there house into a separate livable unit or accessory space.
“This was a very good thing given that the housing stock in D.C. is already built up along with the high demand for housing. It is very expensive here. So a lot of people started to realize that they could, through creative means, subdivide and rent out a portion of their house.”
Schinder says that as an architect, she immediately became excited about the opportunity to serve this type of clientele instead of those seeking traditional luxury architecture:
“Sure budgets for these spaces were always smaller than what a traditional architect would work with. But I started seeing greater demand for this work with more and more families deciding that they wanted these. Sorts of alternative housing options.”
A number of her clients she notes are single adults living in oversized houses where they want to shrink their footprint. This trend, she says, reflects a groundswell of interest in recent years around single-parent and multi-generational housing, particularly among immigrants who have a different cultural idea around the utility of living spaces.
“For so long, a part of American culture is this thing around not wanting to share housing. We seem to be so into our privacy. So these additional units are solving problems that already exist. An example of this are clients of mine who have adult siblings or adult relatives that have special needs and they simply can’t live independently.”
Then, says Schinder, there’s the trend of college grads, because of the high cost of housing, returning to live with their parents.
“They come back because they want to live in an area that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford on their own. So whether it’s single family home or condo, there are space design options available among the current housing mix.”
The demand for accessory housing options, she adds, is another trend that has picked up a lot of momentum in the past 12-18 months.
“Say you have a backyard. One option is to create a secondary home back there. In other words, instead of having to go to the suburbs or the exurbs to find an empty lot and build a new house, you can develop an additional housing unit on the lot you already have. So instead of having just a single family home and one house on a lot, you can have two or more depending on the zoning of where you are.”
According to Schinder, while the accessory dwelling concept has existed for centuries, it’s only in recent history that alternatives to the “one lot, one house” philosophy have gained traction in the U.S.
“If you think about it, everywhere in the world you have shops below and houses on top; you have houses where you enter a door and there are separate spaces and units. So it’s a simple idea, the fact that neighborhoods can accommodate more than one house per lot.”
She says that the pandemic sparked a much greater openness to innovation in the residential architecture field.
“It’s clear to me that growing numbers of people want to bring a different set of uses to their houses by making their property and space more flexible. So instead of having a bedroom and a guest bedroom for single-use, we now have different possibilities for the use of those spaces throughout time and seasons.”
Continues Schinder:
“I am finding that a lot of people want to rightsize their existing home spaces rather than add more new space. They are also less likely to want to have their cars take up extra space, particularly in an urban area like Washington D.C. where the finances are never on your side in terms of having a garage. There has been a huge reality check in terms of the space one needs versus the space one wants to pay for.”
Another trend that’s continuing to advance in the housing world is the world of Airbnb’s where homeowners are choosing to cordon off a section of their house or build a separate unit for short-term guests that may be visiting their area. Here, the homeowner return -on-investment can be significant in terms of Airbnb profits being used to mitigate the cost of a mortgage.
Schinder says that this is a development that’s happening a lot in high demand cities where housing costs are high and there is an influx of short-term renters . She adds:
“For a homeowner it can be very valuable to offer these short rentals because it allows for more consistent income streams that can help mitigate some of the housing costs they may be facing.”
That being said, Schinder notes that people who live in the city often don’t care to be near tourist destinations. What they do care about, she says, are good schools, public safety, and all that kind of stuff.
Weighing in with a final thought, Schinder had this to share
“It’s clear to me that more and more people are seeking alternative housing options that are not of a cookie variety. People looking to live the life that they want in a city and are seeking housing that will satisfy that. The good news is that cities are beginning to recognize that unless they identify and support housing solutions that truly speak to the needs of their demographics, they will not be able to demographically compete with other states and regions for residents.”