LIVING.BRAND — HD#3
The problem with single housing today
Learnings and conclusions
It has been two years since I moved out of my shared apartment in Copenhagen into a single flat in Berlin. Two years of living alone that felt new and different, but all of a sudden I am realizing that most of my friends actually live like that too, now. I am, eventually, not the only guy that decided to get his own place, but actually just one of many that made the decision to move into a flat just for themselves.
Looking at statistics, the amount of single households in Berlin is just below one half of the population at 49% [1]. In New York, the numbers are a little different, as 32,5% [2] of the city’s population live by themselves. It seems like the feeling that most of the people in my frien’ds circle live alone is actually pretty much on point. Moreover, does it seem like living alone is also not only a trend, but a chosen lifestyle as I don’t see a decline in the numbers going forward nor a try to move in with other people again from any of my single-living friends. The question is, why people decide for such a life and based on what incentives everybody seems so interested in having their own flat?
Living by yourself comes with a lot of freedom and independence, as you are just responsible for yourself. You have some sort of unlimited options (besides burning the place down or doing other things that might get you kicked out by your landlord) and you are only responsible for yourself. To me, it feels like this might be the number one reason for choosing a single flat as it was for sure my and most of my friends biggest upside. However, after living by myself for nearly 24 months, I also started to realize that I am missing a lot of the advantages, which I enjoyed while living in a shared apartment with friends or strangers. Before my independent lonely rider single life, it was normal to have social interactions in my home as I had a big kitchen and spacious living areas to invite friends over. Also, it wasn’t such a mission to organize all products that I needed in the household (washing machines, dishwasher, couches, lamps, or even plates and other types of cutlery) as everyone in the apartment would just share what they had so I didn’t need to buy everything myself. Additionally, I could easily sublet my room to other people when I left for a weekend or vacation as rent contracts for multiple tenants usually allow that as opposed to contracts for single households.
I started to realize that the advantages of single living were all based on the main idea of being your own boss without actually improving someone’s life beyond that scope. The disadvantages, however, felt way more fragmented and it now seems like you have to give up on way more qualitative aspects of your life than you gain through a single living situation. Of course, there are some disadvantages like a small kitchen or living room that you can fix by spending more on a bigger apartment, but most of the people cannot afford that and it would only kill the materialistic pain points.
There needs to be a solution that combines the advantage of being your own boss and having your own unique private space while enjoying all the benefits of living with other people. After all, Millennials want to make experiences, while having the options to spend time for themselves if needed, and all of that basically in the blink of an eye. This is the quest to create housing concepts that solve all the pain points of a tenant and bring single housing to the next level by hybridizing truly private rooms with multi-function spaces that provide the customer with the best of both worlds. The next passage will showcase examples of these private spaces and explore the options for the hybridization with other locations for single living 2.0
Truly private spaces
First of all, the most private space you can occupy as a tenant is the studio. It is defined as followed:
A studio apartment, also known as a studio flat, a self-contained apartment, efficiency apartment, bed-sitter or bachelor apartment, is a small apartment, which combines, many times but not always, the living room, bedroom, and kitchen into a single room.
Here are some examples of greatly designed studios in the city, nature and in special communities
These studios are the most private form of single housing as they supply everything a tenant needs. However, these places are so small that a person can basically only fulfil his or her own needs and not much more. In order to really elevate the experience in these studios, it becomes necessary to combine them with other spaces such as bigger kitchens, spacious terraces or special-need locations such as a gym, spa, or meditation rooms. A person needs to be able to enjoy their private rooms, while also benefitting from the other options he would have in a shared flat.
While studios are the most private space you can have, they are also difficult to create due to the fact that most buildings don’t feature them so they need to be created in new developments or by refurbishing existing locations, which is pricey and often complex at the same time. A shortcut to living in private spaces with the advantages of shared apartments are locations, which are optimized for privacy (tenants rent own private rooms with a lock and maybe a private or shared bathroom + mini kitchen) while using shared spaces in the apartment when needed. This way, the tenants don’t live in a classic studio but have all the privacy they want. They can easily make themselves a tea or enjoy a cold beverage but would need to rely on the shared kitchen or terrace when making bigger meals or inviting friends over.
The goal is to not only optimize for privacy, but also space as tenants can live in a small private room and share the rest with others (most of the single people eat out almost every day and usually use their apartment mainly for sleeping). In addition to optimizing the usage of specific spaces, people can also optimize the usage of products. It is, after all, pretty insane to own your own washing machine or dishwasher, when you use it once a week. The sharing economy, which has disrupted so many industries, finally needs to touch spaces and living situations on a broad scale. A normal 4 BR apartment in a city could then be rented out to single people who would have usually lived in their own single apartments. Now, they can enjoy most of the aspects of single living, while also having the chance to indulge in the advantages of bigger shared apartments.
The underlying idea here should be not to pick a side between single housing and shared living, but actually creating a space that maximizes the advantages of living by yourself and minimizes the disadvantages vice versa. After my two years in a single flat, I cannot say that I hate it nor can I say that everything is great. However, with LIVING.BRAND, we want to create a solution that truly benefits my current and other single living people’s situation from all sides.
Please check out our website www.livingbrand.ninja or our IG channel @livingbrand.ninja where we will post all of our content and would love to start discussions about the way we should and will live!
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[2]https://statisticalatlas.com/place/New-York/New-York/Household-Types
