Brave New Home: Our Future in Smarter, Simpler, Happier Housing

A smart, provocative look at why single-family homes, white picket fences, and two car garages should be piled into the dustbin of history, and how new trends in housing can help us live better.
Over the past century, American demographics and social norms have shifted dramatically. If trends continue, we should expect to see more people living alone, later-in-life marriages, fewer (and smaller) new families, and a majority-minority population that skews older and older. Americans' daily life and preferences have also changed, whether by choice or by force, to become more virtual, more mobile, and less stable. But housing today largely looks the same as it did in 1950.

In Brave New Home, Diana Lind shows why the government-subsidized suburbs full of single-family houses are bad for us and our planet, and details the new efforts underway that better reflect the way we live now, to ensure that the way we live next is both less lonely and more affordable. Lind takes readers into the homes and communities that are seeking alternatives to the American norm, from multi-generational living, in-law suites, and co-living to microapartments, tiny houses, and new rural communities. Drawing on Lind's expertise and the stories of Americans caught in or forging their on paths outside of our cookie-cutter housing trap, Brave New Home offers a diagnosis of the current crisis in American housing and a radical re-imagining of the possibilities of housing.

This smart, provocative look at how the American Dream of single-family homes, white picket fences, and two-car garages became a lonely, overpriced nightmare explores how new trends in housing can help us live better.

Over the past century, American demographics and social norms have shifted dramatically. More people are living alone, marrying later in life, and having smaller families. At the same time, their lifestyles are changing, whether by choice or by force, to become more virtual, more mobile, and less stable. But despite the ways that today's America is different and more diverse, housing still looks stuck in the 1950s.

In Brave New Home, Diana Lind shows why a country full of single-family houses is bad for us and our planet, and details the new efforts underway that better reflect the way we live now, to ensure that the way we live next is both less lonely and more affordable. Lind takes readers into the homes and communities that are seeking alternatives to the American norm, from multi-generational living, in-law suites, and co-living to microapartments, tiny houses, and new rural communities.

Drawing on Lind's expertise and the stories of Americans caught in or forging their own paths outside of our cookie-cutter housing trap, Brave New Home offers a diagnosis of the current American housing crisis and a radical re-imagining of future possibilities.