The High-Rise Cost of High-Rise Living
The city of Austin is the 3rd fastest growing city in the United States, with 273,662 new residents migrating to the area since 2010 (Stebbins, 2018). As the city of Austin is only 271 square miles, it doesn’t leave much room for growth within its urban setting. Austin has plenty of wonderful qualities that make people want to move to the area. Boarding a beautiful Hill Country region, Austin is the live-music capital of the world, and home to the University of Texas at Austin. It also offers beautiful parks, trails and rivers that run through the city for all to enjoy. The population density of Austin roughly comes out to 3,438 people per square mile (Widner, 2017). So, to combat the mass amounts of people migrating to the city every day, a new solution has started to take rise, literally. Old buildings and homes are beginning to be knocked down and high-rise apartments are taking over. The popularity of condominium living is in response to the need to increase densities and diversity, along with changing lifestyle requirements (fisher, 2014).
A high-rise building is usually one that spans 7 stories or more and requires an elevator to get residents from floor to floor. Now that there is another option for housing, it brings people to question which option is better: a house or an apartment? Residents of high-rise apartments need to feel like they are getting their ‘bang for their buck’, as the saying goes. Meaning, do they enjoy their quality of life? Are they happy where they live? Is living in a high-dense urban setting worth it? In this article I will take a closer look at the differences between high-rise living, and single-family homes, in an attempt to find the better option.
Without much question, living in an apartment requires you to be much closer to your neighbors than traditional stand-alone homes. You can go from having anywhere from 10 feet to a couple of acres between your neighbors’ front door steps and your own. A person’s well-being is dependent on the quality of relationships with other and in the community in which they live (Prilleltensky, 2005). Living in a house allows you to be almost completely segregated from social interaction. If an individual works from home, it gives little opportunities for interaction if they chose to not leave their home. Living in an apartment allows you to have social interaction the moment you walk in the front door, ride the elevator, or pass the units of your neighbors. The high-rise complex often offers a sense of community, that a traditional house does not. Apartments management often takes steps to encourage interaction among residents. Some examples can be monthly apartment parties, free yoga and salsa classes, door decorating contests and many other opportunities. It was found that people were more willing to spend higher amounts to live in apartments that offered opportunities to foster social interaction (Hanson, 2018).
In addition to benefiting from communities within high-rise apartments, the residents can also enjoy included perks that traditional are not offered in single-family homes. For example, living in an apartment requires a lot less maintenance work than houses do. Typically, if something is broken, a maintenance employee will come and fix the issue for you, with no out of pocket cost. While if you live in a single-family house, almost all of the repair work will be on the shoulders of the owners to fix with their own money, unless they are renting. In addition, apartments offer amenities that will not cause the owner to lose any of their homes space. For example, if a home has four bedrooms and a family of 5 needs four bedrooms, this leaves no room for their gym equipment, a movie room, or an office without the loss of their homes space.
Apartments, on the other hand offer larger gyms, study areas, meeting rooms, and rooftop decks. Home owners are also very concerned with safety when looking to invest in a home. Apartments offer more safety than traditional homes. Usually in high-rise apartments you need keys and access cards to enter into elevators and hallways, and there are usually security cameras in use. In stand-alone homes, all security measures would come from the owner’s time and expense. Home owners would also not benefit from the close proximity of neighbors. If a break-in Is occurring, a neighbor down the hall is at a greater chance of hearing the crime, than a neighbor 40 yards away.
On the other side of things there can be many problems with living in high-rise apartments. Living in apartment poses constraints on personal freedom and demands a need for cooperation (Yip, 2002). Most high-rise apartments are strictly managed by management and offer little freedom when it comes to personal choices regarding your home. Most of the time you cannot add or remove anything like paint or appliances without the approval of management. This may come as a problem to home-owners who wish to create a personal style of change by simply painting a room or adding a better refrigerator. Another downside to high-rise complexes, is that they are usually never built with families with young children in mind. In context of global competition, cities should be advised to pay higher attention to family needs in the urban planning (Karsten, 2015). You will mainly see high-rise apartments occupied by young singles or couples, retirees and people with children. What do these apartment complexes offer for families with young children? This is usually why high-rise living has begun to become undesirable for families with children. There are usually no areas for kids to play freely, as a traditional house offers a yard or extra rooms for play areas. Tall buildings are not good living environments because residents feel imprisoned and isolated from people and other things, or because children are deprived of direct contact with nature (Moser, 1981). Apartments have smaller green spaces, which are usually cared for by the complex staff. Although most individuals move to high-rise apartments solely for the fact that they no longer have to do yard work, humans still need the outdoors for a healthy lifestyle. It was observed that more time spent in green spaces could give policy makers the measures to help improve self-satisfaction within adolescents (Dadvand, 2019).
Personally, moving from a single-family home that I lived in for 17 years to a high-rise apartment close to downtown Austin, I can see the flaws and attraction that come from high-rise living. Living in an apartment has allowed me to socially interact with my neighbors more often than I ever did in my single-family home. I have also noticed I now run into the same people consecutively due to the close-knit environment I have chosen to be a part of. My complex also has phenomenal management that has really fostered a since of community for me away from my childhood-home. Growing up, I saw my mom struggle with the problems around our house and getting trust-worthy individuals to come fix them. My apartment has an on-site maintenance man who has been incredibly nice and helpful to my roommates in I, as we don’t know how to fix most appliances. The only downside for me, is the lack of green space within my complex. Green space is very important to me, as I am happiest when I am outside and active. My apartment offers little to no green areas and has no yard on the property. I have a dog and the fact that I have to take her on three walks a day is a major pitfall to living in a high-rise apartment over a single-family home.
As Austin has seen itself transition into a hub of technology and opportunity, it has also seen a boom in urban growth. As there is little space within the city, the increased amount of high-rise apartment complexes is growing at an increasing rate. As the standard of living shifts from single-family homes to multi-family complexes, we’ll need to start looking at how this effects individuals. When you way the pros and cons of high-rise buildings, I believe it truly is up to the preferences of the individual. High rise complexes offer community, social interaction, amenities, less maintenance, and increased security. On the other hand, they offer little green space, they are not ideal for families, and not much change can happen to the unit without management approval. I do believe high-rise complexes aren’t the ideal living space for families with young kids. Having no connection to the environment and no free space outside of the apartment can be detrimental to children physical and mental health. As amenities are more often than not built for adults, until these high-rise complex buildings can learn to keep growing families in mind, they will not be ideal for parents with young kids. As for other individuals, it boils down to what they are willing to give up living in an apartment. You would be giving up yards, privacy, creativity for the sake of being in a more urban environment. In conclusion, the decision to move to a high-rise complex should be heavily weighed upon the resident to determine if it is the right choice for them.
Work Cited:
Dadvand, P., Hariri, S., Abbasi, B., Heshmat, R., Qorbani, M., Motlagh, M. E., … Kelishadi, R. (2019). Use of green spaces, self-satisfaction and social contacts in adolescents: A population-based CASPIAN-V study. Environmental Research, 168, 171–177. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from, https://doi.org/10/1016/j.envres.2018.09.033
Fisher, R., & McPhail, R. (2014). Residents’ Experiences in Condominiums: A Case Study of Australian Apartment Living. Housing Studies, 29(6), 781–799. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from, https://doi.org/10.1080/02673037.2014.898250
Hanson, A. R., Hawley, Z., & Turnbull, G. (2018). The value of community: Evidence from the CARES program. Journal of Housing Economics, 41, 218–226. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhe.2018.06.009
Karsten, L. (2015). Middle-class households with children on vertical family living in Hong Kong. Habitat International, 47, 241–247.Retrieved December 2, 2018, from, https://doi-org.ezproxy.lib.utexas.edu/10.1016/j.habitatint.2015.01.023
MOSER, M. M. (1981) Philosophy of tall buildings, in: R. C. HERRENKOHL, W. HENN and C. NORBERG-SCHULZ (Eds) Planning and Design of Tall Buildings, pp. 1–79. Reston, VA: American Society of Civil Engineers. Retrieved December 2, 2018.
Prilleltensky, I. (2005). Promoting well-being: time for a paradigm shift in health and human services. Scandinavian journal of Public Health, 33(66), 53–60. Retrieved December 2, 2018.
Stebbins, S. (2018, June 08). Migration and growth: The fastest growing (and shrinking) cities in the US. Retrieved October 31, 2018, from https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/economy/2018/05/26/fastest-growing-and-shrinking-us-cities/34813515/
Yip, N. & Forrest, R. (2002) Property owning democracies? Home owner corporations in Hong Kong, Housing Studies, 17(5), pp. 703–720. Retrieved December 2, 2018.
Widner, C. (2017, March 03). Is Austin dense enough to be a smart city? Retrieved October 31, 2018, from https://austin.curbed.com/2017/3/3/14798754/austin-population-density-comparison
