[htss2013]

It's just odd from the perspective of a non American, because in much of the rest of the world houses are usually kept in families multi generationally. So your dream of passing on the oven would have worked most other places. It's just your desires are incompatible with the American treatment of houses as commodities to be frequently traded in bidding auctions.

[masklinn]

That’s not been the case for a while in developed economies. The vagaries of modern life and work means most people can’t live where they grew up, make their life elsewhere, possibly multiple elsewhere, and only go back to visit. Unless there’s a real business to inherit e.g. a farm or hotel or some such.

That was already the case in my grandparents generation. On my father’s side is a large farm, but my grandparents moved into it. The eldest lives there, and a few of the aunts and uncles have shares from inheritance so they might move into it eventually. Most of them made their lives elsewhere, and their kids went even further afield.

On the other side, the grandparents came down from the mountain, built a house, the kids made their own lives throughout the country. The house was sold when my grandmother died a few years back. And she died in that home, for most of my friends the houses were sold when the elder had to move to assisted living (or worse when the house was lost for lack of income).

Generational homes were a thing when people didn’t need to move around, but my own parents moved 4 times just in my lifetime. So far.

[varjag]

I think it's not even the case in developing economies, with substantial economic and population growth. It simply can't work like that.

[bombcar]

Even with significant growth it can happen - existing houses stay in the family, but the majority of people live in new housing.

[balderdash]

That probably worked when life expectancies were lower, where are people supposed to live the other 25+ years of housing?