To buy or not to buy, that is the question!

Recently I was questioning the benefits of apartment living v. homeownership. It is a question that has plagued people looking for a quality long-tem investment, and as the past several years have come to show how precarious even that market can be, I have come to believe that you can only purchase a house because you want it to be your HOME, your HAVEN, a space that is a sanctuary, place of safety and protection against the outside world. If you purchase because you think you will make money on the deal, think carefully, or think again.

This prompted me to look into the history of apartment dwellings in the 18th Century. At that time, only a small minority of the population lived in any idea of luxury, or individual homes as we understand them today. In England, the leading architect of the day was Robert Adams (1728 - 1792), who created the Neo-Classic style, designing many country houses for the gentry. Think of the manor houses on acreage of land in the English countryside on sprawling, rolling greens. But the poor folk, and they were the majority, lived in just one room.

The apartment concept goes way back, to Ancient Rome, with the "insulae" or apartment-type space where lower and middle class Romans, or plebs, dwelled. Insulae means island, becuase these units took up a whole city block. The ground floor was usually used for commercial space, with lodgings above. Think of today's mixed use developments that urban architects taut as the way of the future. Living and working in the same general space.

The relationship between landlord and tenant was established, but it was not until the Landlord and Tenant Act of 1709 was enacted, that put some fairness into the equation. Most generally, leases were mainly used for agricultural purposes (land for farming deals), but by the 18th Century, and migration to cities for employment, did the concept of leasing living space really come into its own, and both landlord and tenant needed some kind of binding contract. (By the way, and interestingly enough, the Code of Hammurabi, a well-preserved Babylonian law code (at right), was the first expression of contractual law, dating back to 1772BC!!!)

People who visited 18th Century London were impressed with the crowds of people and services available, but the city itself was neither charming or clean with most people living in terrible conditions. After the Great Fire of 1666, the town was hastily rebuilt, and then came an enormous surge in population looking for work. Urban planners slapped up houses and tenements, with little attention to safety or the codes we require today. These buildings, if they exist today, and many still do, look charming and quaint, but they were full-on danger zones. And the neighborhoods were also unsafe, with undesireables lurking everywhere in unlit or barely lit streets and alleyways. Many people lived in these dwelling BELOW grade, which is still common to see in London. Wrought-iron gates at street level give way to stairwells leading down to apartment units with small windows to let the light in. This type of dwelling is even prevalent in better neighborhoods, in the Georgian row houses.

As always, apartment living does have its drawbacks, though rules and regulations of Fair Housing entitle the tenant to enjoy their space in relative peace and tranquility. When we study the housing alternatives and housing conditions of the past, it can be said that we take a lot for granted today. We assume that architectural and engineering drawings are in order, that plans that are signed off to begin construction are correct, that we only have to decide if we like a house's style, or its location, or its layout. And, of course, if we like the price to purchase, or rent! Under today's economic conditions, we can "pick up" a house on the cheap, a foreclosure or short-sale, but we don't always know what "as-is" entails.

I am reminded of the age old Latin expression, Caveat Emptor! Let the Buyer beware!