Today’s Tribune has a round-up story on new construction trends in ceiling heights.
In every economic downturn I’ve seen, builders have built smaller, lower-ceiling, more energy-efficient homes and cited consumer preferences rather than economic conditions as the reason for doing so. When you have lemons, make lemonade.
The long-term trend, as some quoted in the story note, has been an increase in ceiling heights. Buyers looking at new homes today and concerned about resale values should be aware that today’s lemonade may be tomorrow’s lemons when the resale market picks up.
In the early 90s I was convinced that ceiling heights in the city were inversely correlated with the height of the developer – tall developer, lower ceilings; short developer, higher ceilings. For obvious reasons I won’t name names.