I'm working through my edits on Gravity, and my editor believes that I am not using the correct term to describe Jaeden's house in the Hollywood Hills (I used the word bungalow, but she says bungalows don't have stairs). I am a writer and data analyst, not a real estate agent, so I am inclined to believe her, but I need to find out what the right word is and the Google machine is failing me. This picture is very similar to what Jaeden's house looks like : Help me, writingforums community!
Elevated ranch is what I found. And in the real world: http://9elmplace.com/ Picture: https://s3.amazonaws.com/veewme.media/resized_tour_photos/614266f7-e169-4ddd-bf9d-9fb5ed614e81/8168136c-18d2-4fe0-89f6-cefed50c6a37.jpg
A bungalow is generally a house on a single storey which this may be, over the garage, but it still doesn't really look like a bungalow I would probably describe the house in your picture as a villa, which does have a specific meaning but tends to be used as a cover-all for a suburban house which doesn't really fit into any other category
Your editor is correct, a bungalow is single story. What I'm seeing in that pic is a modern ranch style, which is to say it's 1950s-1960s era. Might also fall into Craftsman, but lacks some details in my opinion.
I’m sure you could ask ten people what architectural style that buildng is and get fifteen different answers. The best I can do is to call it a contemporary Californian bungalow with some strong Frank Lloyd Wright influences, and to a lesser extent some influence from Robert Parker Coffin. As far as the stairs go, the house is on a hill. If the building is on a higher elevation than the street, there will be stairs. Unless you want visitors traipsing through that lovely landscaping. ETA: I live in a 1924 Craftsman bungalow and we have 2 floors, 3 bedrooms and a full basement. It’s the ranch style that’s usually a single floor, built on a slab foundation or may have a crawl space, although they have been built with full and partial basements too. Part of the thing with bungalows is that they tend to be on the small side- 1500sq ft or less.
I'm wondering now if there might be regional issues at play, and it might be called different things depending on location. Tagging @Shenanigator as she's familiar with the area.
That could easily be. I spent 30 years in the building trades, almost exclusively in the Midwest. When I moved to the DC area I was frustrated with how many things had different names than what I was used to.
The real estate listing is here: https://www.redfin.com/CA/Los-Angeles/3432-N-Knoll-Dr-90068/home/7128981 At 1.1 million dollars, it's a little out of my price range!
The reason the style is difficult to place is, I can tell it’s been remodeled at some point to make it look more “contemporary” in whatever era the remodeling took place. 1980’s perhaps. But it was originally a Midcentury Modern bungalow. Might’ve been a Midcentury ranch but it’s hard to tell with the monstrosity they added to the garage and front. I’d call it Midcentury Modern bungalow to be safe, because that’s the closest to what it is. ETA: Had a bad connection & can add more. L.K., since your editor has issues with the word bungalow, call it a remodeled Midcentury Modern ranch in the Hills. Also,1.1 mil is cheap in that area, so it probably has some sort of major issues (probably structural because it’s on a hill) or possibly has no original architectural features inside.
County tax records list the building as a single family bungalow at 1399 sq ft built between 1949 and 1951. The house last sold in March of 2012 for $620,006. It’s under contract now, but this time around it spent a grand total of 51 days on the market.
HOLY SHIT THANK YOU!!!!!!! The style on the real state listing just said "Custom Built" which was not helpful at all!!!!!
If you would like them I can send you the link for the tax records and another sale listing that includes 26 photos of the interior and lot. All I can say is wow, that’s a nice house. I’m sure being in California is reason for half the price tag, but I can see that being a $500-600k property no matter where you drop it. The danger of having those photos is the potential rewrites they might inspire.
Regional terminology is definitely a factor. We wouldn’t call anything in the Hills “elevated” for example, because most of the houses in the hills have stairs leading either up or down from the street or driveway. And the term “villa” in California vernacular refers to a very specific Mediterranean architectural style.
Sure, why not? I'm all curious now - maybe if I get rich off of this book I can buy it off of the current owner, LOL!
I wouldn’t actually. Look closely at the photos of the backyard. See that retaining wall? Blow up the photo. That wooden fence is askew, and in one of the other pics I see evidence of a past slide that went over the retaining wall into that lovely sunken patio. That sunken patio, and its placement, is primed to need major cleanup from mudslides, and I’ll bet they’ve had to do quite a lot of it over the years. A few years ago there were several water main breaks in the Hills that caused mud issues, but I don’t remember if that area is one of them.
Once I get rich I promise you can take me out and recommend all the best properties that I can snowbird to. You are a gift that keeps giving, and I would love to spend half the year in the neck of your woods.
"Snowbird" as a verb. I like it: "Every year, millions of Canadians snowbird to Arizona for the winter." (realized "for the winter" is redundant.) "Eunice, you're not snowbirding this year?" "I'll snowbird next year, Candice, but this year, I've got a grandbaby due in in Calgary."
I live in Wisconsin so snowbirding is common terminology here! My next door neighbors have a New Year's Eve party every year and then I don't see them until April.
Hi, I would actually term it a contemporary villa. It has plaster walls (I think you call it stucco in the US) and what appears to be a courtyard - very Mediterranean. The flat roof is mid-century modern. If the plaster was troweled it would be Spanish. The windows however are a distinctly Georgian style, updated. You could call it a Franken-house! Cheers, Greg.
