Put another way, it's not upper middle class people designing these houses. They are merely out to get a house that's "their house" and possibly "finally a house of our own".

The real estate industry, architects and agents and developers who are designing these terrible houses to fit checklists rather than deliver a better value are at least part of the problem.

I am upper middle class and a fan of good architecture (all I knew was I liked modern) but I didn't realize a lot of what this blog points out. I have seen McMansions before and thought they were ugly in some vague way that I couldn't identify... but now I understand why.

Having attempted to get "my" house, I concluded that the only way I would get something up to my standards was to go custom and find an architect who would do things right. Which is a whole other level of expense, requires lower upper class levels of funds.

Most people stratify economic class into three or four bands (sometimes using different names):

1. Upper class/Wealthy/Elite

2. Middle Class

3. Lower Class/Working Class

4. Poor/Working Poor (some people lump this in with #3 above)

The problem is there are huge gradients of affluence even in these individual bands (and obviously more-so the higher you get). Poor would include most unemployed and part-time workers. Working poor would include people in debt living paycheck to paycheck, typically paid hourly, who depend on OT or multiple jobs to pay their bills. Working class is generally more of the same, but able to pay one's bills with a single job, maybe without overtime. Middle class can include everyone from the brand new teacher making $30k a year to the physician making $90k a year but paying $4k/mo in student loans. Upper class typically means people who don't have to work in order to put food on the table but it can also mean people who just have extremely high incomes (think the Fortune 5 EVP or other corporate big shot making $600k but may spend 98% of that every year)

The difference between "upper middle" (90% of the people reading this, excluding students) and "lower upper" (maybe 9% of the people reading this, excluding students) can be hundreds of thousands of dollars in income or millions in total net worth so I think it's a valid distinction.

Considering an acre is over 43,000 square feet, I would say 4K square foot house on 1 acre is pretty reasonable.

So here near Cleveland, about 20 years ago a development went up called Barrington. It was full of McMansions and was bought up by sports stars, music stars, a variety of rich and nearly-rich people.

The problem is that for houses of that size, they need a LOT of room between them. Even with 3/4th acre and full acre lots, the end result was what looked like a bunch of big houses essentially stacked right next to each other. There are other developments in other towns nearby that are similar. Large houses but not more than an acre between them. While what you say is technically correct, the overall look is not attractive.

It really depends on the context. An urban street lined with massive brownstones is nice. A nice little cottage in the woods by itself is nice. Large houses all bunched up, in some random suburban setting, is usually going to look kind of goofy. It would be better to have homes in a range of sizes, with some variation in lot sizes as well. That's going to blend in better with whatever surrounds the homes.

Correct. There are parts of Cleveland that still have large houses from when Cleveland was an industrial powerhouse that are close together, but it looks nicer. Part of that though is absolutely the cultural derision of "nouveau riche" vs "old money" seeping into our perceptions of what looks good and what does not.

I live in an area (East Sacramento) with many homes in the 3k sq/ft range built on 10,000 foot or smaller lots, and it is lovely. Mid-town sacramento has even larger victorian buildings on even smaller lots, also lovely.

The problem with todays building is not building-to-lot ratios.

east sac is beautiful.