The Rise of House Porn
by Barbara E. Hernandez
Many people have said that average people looking over $3 million estates on Redfin, drooling over $200,000 remodels on HGTV or watching and hoping to be picked for A&E’s Sell This House is nothing short of house porn.
Creating carnal desire for real estate is part of what fueled the housing boom in California. A realistic $550,000 two-bedroom bungalow in Mar Vista? Or a hot honey of a home—a $1.4 million refurbished Pasadena Craftsman with a $100,000 remodeled kitchen with granite counters and stainless steel appliances? New hardwood maple floors throughout, remodeled bathrooms with a pedestal sink and clawfoot tub! You can afford more than you think!
Fueling the lust were programs featuring falsely-smiling male and female DIY house-porn stars wearing little more than a toolbelt (didn’t you often wonder why Ty Pennington used any excuse not to wear a shirt?) pretending as if ripping out carpet and sanding floors in full make-up and hair was almost erotic. There were the retouched and airbrushed real estate photos, unsightly power poles or rooflines taken out like stretch marks or scars; dead grass was made green again and there was never a cloud in the sky. While previous generations only had Architectural Digest, we had scores: Elle Décor, House & Garden, Nest, O at Home, House Beautiful, Veranda, Domino, Traditional Home, Metropolitan Home, Coastal Living, Mountain Living, Midwest Living, Southern Living and Sunset.
Andrew Dan-Jumbo, of While You Were Out
and Take Home Handyman
But like regular porn, it wasn’t reality, it was based on fantasy.
So what if it is? There’s nothing wrong with a few consenting adults wanting to mix it up from time to time with a five-page spread in Dwell, or mouthwatering McMansion videos-on-demand from Comcast, or perhaps partake in some amateur action from public access. All they had was a 1,500-square-foot ranch in Sunland or Pomona—they needed fantasy.
REALTOR.com knows houses get people hot; that’s why it made these suggestions for luring people into your home (italics are mine):
- Set the dining room or kitchen table if you have particularly nice linen or china for a romantic tete-a-tete!
- Simmer a few drops of vanilla on the stove to drive them wild!
- Light your fireplace to start the lovin’.
More than one “sell your house” website said, “Think of it as romancing your buyer with your house, so you’ll want to set the mood.”
Wanda Colón,
of 24 Hour Design
Open houses are now dates. It’s the moment to impress a buyer, to make him/her fall in love with your home and be willing to commit to a 30-year mortgage. (Yes, there are those who only want a five to seven year commitment, but you want better for your home.) Ideally the house should be made beautiful, decorated in flowers, adorned only with tasteful furnishings, scrubbed clean and perfumed with citrus or cinnamon. Like the witch in “Hansel & Gretel,” sellers are told to bake cookies or other sweets to lure and keep their guests there.
According to Bankrate.com, one seller would “set up the bedroom to look like the night maid had just been through and pulled down the comforter, fluffed the pillow and placed a book open on the bed.”
Sure your house has to show a little bit of skin to spark that initial attraction, but it can’t give away all its secrets just yet. Nor do an inviting bed and cinnamon buns make someone commit to an $850,000 mortgage.
The open house is typically only a few hours in the afternoon, usually on a weekend, so neither the would-be buyer or house and agent has to spend too much time together if it’s not meant to be. This is solely a “just coffee” date. However, some homes wantonly have an open house several weekends in a row, showing everyone just how desperate and needy their owners are.
The most alluring open house is after the home has been on the market a few weeks. The house has kept its air of mystery, perhaps there’ve been photos posted, but you never know for sure until you meet in real life. Photos can hide cracks, faulty foundations or even mold.
I have gone on a few of these dates. I’m not saying I’m going there to find a commitment; I’m just checking out the inventory. Even real estate agents say the first 30 seconds are the most important and people (especially women) want that emotional attraction to a home, meaning once they see it, they want it and no other house will satisfy that person.
It sounds like falling in love—or lust.
I have been to a few houses but none that filled me with lust. That wasn’t for lack of trying—owners hire professional stylists, or stagers, to make their home look its best. Most were adequate and many had a lot of potential that drew me to them, but when it came to sealing a deal, I backed away. I thought it was nice, even pretty, but it was not mortgage-material.
Some were so awful that they were fodder for those awful first-date stories. Like the house that smelled of mold and Old Spice, the old Victorian with holes in the living room floor and a porch lined with Caution! yellow tape, the 476-square-foot home whose deluded owner was comfortable asking more than $1,000 a square foot. Oh, the times we had!
It was frustrating enough to make us all go back home and start using the porn again. Look at all those perfect, clean homes! Look at all the pretty people pretending to enjoy cleaning someone’s house, and the designer’s finishing touch on the $12,000 living room sofa were $600 pillows! Oooo, that would look so good in my new ho—oh, I don’t have one.
Architectural Digest, Dwell, Cottage Living, Country Living, and anything with Martha Stewart, told us it was possible and adjustable-rate mortgages made it so. It persuaded people living in perfectly affordable houses to “move up,” as real estate agents say, to the next tier of house. It made empty-nesters sell off their home, cash in their equity, and buy 3,500-square-foot homes with wine cellars and four-car garages for only two people.
House porn, like regular porn, leaves people momentarily satiated but ultimately frustrated. Regularly looking at airbrushed and surgically enhanced people can skew reality as much as looking at digitally enhanced and carefully cultivated photos of homes. Why can’t my house/spouse look like that? Because that house and that person don’t really exist.
It created desire, cultivated lust for more and killed contentment in reality. Whatever home people had, there was always something more, something better, something more expensive to be had.
Money can buy happiness, but not everyone has that kind of money.
Eventually the lending dried up, and the centerfold houses are now sitting empty, their values lowered monthly. Some even were part of a family’s dream for two or three years before being placed up for auction or becoming part of foreclosure listings. (Never to be an object of lust again, because banks/lenders/trustees see real estate as a business.)
The fantasy ended with damaged credit, no place to live and a memory of what almost was.
At least when no one’s home they can still close the blinds and watch While You Were Out.
more house porn
Comments
No comments.