Ranch Style Homes Are Hot Again

The Ranch Style Home, popular from 1945-1970, dominates established neighborhoods from coast-to-coast. The ranch is finding itself back in vogue with good reason. Good design and location.

Wonder why I Love my Ranch? The one story (ie: no stairs) ranch, with its functional floorplan is ideal for young families, couch potatoes and the elderly. Ranch neighborhoods typically offer the charm of mature landscape, neighborhood schools and parks, and are more centrally located than many new subdivisions.

Ranch is Trendy. The hip "I Generation", who came of age with the design simplicity of the Apple Computer and the iPod may have also found their dream home...their grandparent's. Many young professional's are attracted to the post World War II, simple, rectangle design and low profile roof that is a ranch style home. Scott Timbey with the LA Times explains, "Once dismissed as a conformist, suburban artifact, like white bread and kidney shaped pools, the ranch house has become the kind of home that abstractionists, cultists, preservationists and the scholarly find attractive."

Hipsters and Big Box Haters are good news for older generations who may be downsizing. Just snap up a ranch, add a media room in that large living area, rip up out that green shag carpet, and Grandma and Grandpa's house lives large for another generation.