In our neighborhood of farcfrom starter homes 20 years ago most of the families were in 30s and 40s with numerous children.
Now. One young 30 yo couple and first baby on street oin 25 years. Most elders are staying in place in their big houses. So they don’t move and then people who can afford these places with families cannot move out of their starters and every thing stops.
We bought our first house in the Bay Area (CA) in 1983. The neighborhood had been developed in the early 50s, so it was 30 years old when we moved in. No surprise that the original buyers in the 50s were 30-40 year old couples and they were all aging out when we moved in. We had a couple of nice neighbors who stayed in their homes into their mid and late 90s and were “guilty” of selfishly having extra bedrooms. When we moved in, the neighborhood was going through its first turnover to new couples in their 30s and 40s.
Now it’s happening again. All of us buyers in the 1980s are aging-out in our 70s and 80s. Our dear neighbor across the street bought their house the same month we did, but she is now 91 (her husband passed earlier this year).
The thing that’s different is our neighborhood was medium-sized homes when built in the post-war era running 1,500 to 2,000 sq feet. Modern homes are frequently twice that size, so there’s lots more square footage going unused.