Tip of the Month - September 2006


Quality of Neighborhood Life  (Part #1)

Source: Houses: 3rd Edition-Henry S. Harrison


How does the neighborhood look? Are community areas will kept & clean? Do yards & houses reflect ongoing interest & care by their Owners?  The way a neighborhood looks tells a lot about the people who live there.  Talking to those people is another good way to learn about their neighborhood.  They can tell what they feel are the neighborhood’s special attractions & defects.  People usually are willing to discuss neighborhood pros & cons with an interested listener.

People actually can do more to make or break a neighborhood than anything else can.  The people who live in a good neighborhood do much to hold it together by their shared interest in events & conditions that affect it & sometimes by their attempts to change these conditions.  Underlying this practical relationship is a deeper basis for neighborhood unity: people’s acceptance, consideration & acknowledgment of each other as members of a living community.

Taking walks around a neighborhood @ different hours of the day can provide a feeling for the quality of neighborhood life & uncover the presence of any adverse influences or nuisances.  For instance, is there a lot of noise?  If so, what kind of noise is it?  If the noise is made by children playing outside, it could be music to the ears of a Buyer with four children of his or her own.  But if the noise is from a commercial airliner whose flight pattern lies directly over or near the neighborhood, a person should know about that before he or she buys.
  
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This web page was updated on 09/09/2006.