Dec. 23, 2005: Despite condo trend, the single-family home is still king in the Greater Phoenix real estate market
The Enlightenment, the 18th-century philosophical movement, was rooted in the idea that every king was in fact a man - not a god or a demigod, just an ordinary person, identical in rights to everyone else.
This was bad news for the kings, of course, but it was not necessarily obvious good news for the lowliest of the kings' subjects. It remained for an American politician, Gov. Huey Long of Louisiana, to pervert the Enlightenment ideal in a form sweet to the tongue of the common man: "Every man a king!"
What does this have to do with real estate?
The American dream home is not really an American dream. It is the European castle writ small, an isolated redoubt surrounded by grounds, complete with all the king's luxuries: dog, fireplace, pool and fountain. The Enlightenment, as expressed in the behavior of the people, became less a rebellion against the indulgences of the king and more a miniature mimicry of them.
Instead, the children of democracy rebelled against the Old World poverty they were able to throw off in the New World: the tiny apartments inherited from ancient Rome, the shared sanitary facilities (if any), the crowding and the concomitant loss of privacy.
The Valley of the Sun is the spiritual capital of this New World. This is why the single-family house is and always has been pre-eminent here. This is why wave after wave of immigrants come here, and why they will keep coming. Because Phoenix is the home of the home, home of the castle, "Every man a king!"
Just now, cities like Phoenix and Glendale are re-urbanizing with new condominium towers. These are exciting trends, but they are very small trends.
We'll see more multifamily construction as time goes on, more for economic reasons than as a luxury lifestyle option.
But the single-family home has always dominated the Valley, and as long as there is land and that Americanized dream of "every man a king," the single-family home will always lead the Valley's real-estate market.
Greg Swann is the designated broker for BloodhoundRealty.com, a full-service Metropolitan Phoenix real estate brokerage. This article originally appeared in the West Valley regional sections of the Arizona Republic.
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