Most Popular Home Types In Portland
Ranch, bungalow, modern; townhomes rowhouses and lofts — Portland has all the options.
Ever wondered how we stack up to other metros? The Washington Post breaks it down in a city-by-city housing comparison showing the most popular home types for major US cities.
A city’s housing mix says a lot about its culture, although the most important defining factor seems to be population. For example, Philadelphia and New York City showed the lowest percentage of single-family homes, between 8-10%. However, while Philly relies heavily on rowhouses (also known as townhouses) for about 60% of its housing, NYC has most of its residents living in apartment dwellings of 20 units or more.
Portland’s streetscapes are iconic for their unique and charming homes, but 30% of of the housing in the city actually consists of multi-family units.
Housing mix is also a factor of history and city planning policy. Portland architectural historian Thomas Hubka gives some great information in a special report to the Oregonian. For example, in Portland, a housing boom that happened right after WWII had everyone living the American dream in detached ranch homes. Now, the city is trying to grow without increasing its footprint, which means infill. Many of these older homes are being replaced with structures that house more people under the same roof.
It wouldn’t be the first time the City of Portland underwent a transformation, as Hubka describes. Although Victorian mansions have endured longer, most people in that era actually lived in multi-unit tenement and boarding houses or small, two-and-three room wooden houses and workers cottages. If you come across one of these structures in Portland you’re lucky — most were destroyed and replaced with today’s streets, highways and modern homes.
The architectural styles of these modern homes can be difficult to name precisely. If you own a Portland home built during or after that WWII housing boom, it might be described as “Minimal-traditional”, with ranch-style layouts but including traditional features like peaked roofs and shutters.
Older homes are less common but because they were so solidly built, most are still standing today. According to Hubka, homes built between 1920 and 1950 were usually labeled “period revivals.” They tended to imitate either American Colonial homes or European styles like the English cottage. Prior to 1920, the Bungalow style was popular.
Not sure what architectural tradition your home (or townhouse or apartment) represents? Some history could be intriguing to potential home buyers. Portlandmaps.com will tell you the date the structure was built, and The Multnomah County Central Library has old Portland directories where you can find names and occupations of those who once lived at your address.
Your Portland real estate agent is also a great resource. Having sold hundreds of homes in the Portland metro area, I’ve learned a thing or two along the way!
Don’t care about history and want to find or sell a thoroughly modern townhouse or new construction? I can help with that too, because Portland really does have it all.
