House Styles in Greater Hartford

Most people have a favorite house style. Ranches, capes, colonials, contemporaries, bungalows, split levels, tudors, farm houses, raised ranches, victorians- and a few others I’m surely forgetting. There is a house type for everyone and each of these styles have unique layouts and design features.

When we work with buyers sometimes they are familiar with house styles and sometimes they are not. For example, we often find that buyers don’t realize that capes usually have a bedroom on the first floor. They may be surprised when visiting their first 3-bedroom cape that only 2 of the bedrooms are upstairs. The third bedroom is tucked away in a corner on the first floor. For some folks that works, for others it doesn’t.

These layout differences are what drive people to gravitate towards a favorite house style. Or they may be showing a preference simply based on their fondness for the type of home they grew up in. Whatever the case, people usually pick a certain house style or two and focus their search on those choices.

We thought it would be interesting to look at home sales in Hartford County and see how they break down by house style. Is there a dominant style that rules the market? (We’re guessing that would be colonials being good ole New England and all) Do some towns have more capes than others? Where can you find the contemporaries? Here’s a look at the data of single family homes that have sold so far this year in Hartford County, broken down by style and town. As always, data comes from the CT Multiple Listing Service and is deemed reliable, but not guaranteed…


House Styles In Hartford County

Surprise, surprise- colonials come in as the most common type of home sold this year (and probably every other year) with 39.5% of the market. Ranches and capes are the next most common home styles.

But what if one wants a less common house style, say a contemporary or bungalow? Where should you focus your search? Well, based on the data provided, Simsbury or Glastonbury would probably be your best bets to find a contemporary and West Hartford and New Britain could score you a bungalow.

We find that most people focus their search on one specific town or a couple of towns. Location seems to trump house type. So, if I want to live in a tudor I’m either going to need to be really flexible on town or aggressively stalk the tudors in my town of choice. A word of advice, if you’re stalking a house try not to alarm the owner or its neighbors…

Do you have a preferred house style? What makes it your favorite?