Guy things in a house

There was an interesting article in one of my news feeds recently about the growing importance of garages in home-buying decisions and in home construction. I have to believe that this is one of those guy-things. I have never known one of my female clients to get all excited about the garage. Guys, on the other hand tend to look for things like a big garage, along with several other things that the women could care less about.

Guys will go looking for the sump pump or open the electrical panel box to check out the circuit breaker count and the room for more. Guys will walk around the furnace and the hot water heater, perhaps making comments about their apparent condition or their size. Size apparently matters to guys, when it comes to hot water. Size also matters when it comes to closet space in the master suite. Most guys know that they will only get a tiny bit of the closet for their stuff, so having a big walk-in closet is a must, perhaps even a second closet for his stuff would be even better. More than once we've joked about storing his stuff in a spare bedroom closet.

The basement in general seems to be more of a guy space, unless it is already well finished. Even then, many conversations seem to turn on making a finished downstairs room into a man-cave fitted for watching football or housing a pool table. Guys will stand around for some time "harrumphing" about how they might finish off a bare basement, while most of the women just want to get out of the cold, dark space and get back to the main house.

Returning to the garage for a minute, the article had some advice about things that a would-be home seller might consider doing to make the garage more appealing. The tips included dry walling the whole thing and painting it, plus doing the floor in either epoxy paint or perhaps even tiling it. Of course, it was recommended that the garage not be ignored in the process of de-cluttering and straightening up the place. For real garage aficionados a natural gas powered garage heater is a must and for the fanatic there is nothing to drool over more than a garage with a lift built in.

Adding storage organizers and cabinet/work spaces also helps. Depending upon the construction technique used above the garage, one might also provide access to additional storage with a pull-down ladder. Don't do what one home-seller that I hit had done - he cut out a bunch of the stringers from the garage roof trusses to allow more space to be used for storage. The roof had already started to sag over the garage because of that and he had to make an expensive repair to sell the house. If the garage was built using pre-built roof trusses, leave them alone.

I suspect that guys know ahead of time that the only spaces that they will have to themselves will be out in the garage or in the basement somewhere and that's why they gravitate to those places while looking at houses. They might also spend some time out back on a patio or deck fantasizing about grilling burgers or steaks, since that too seems to be a part of the man's realm. But it is the garage or basement where they can hang their neon beer signs and pictures of their favorite NASCAR driver or put up the display of the old school colors for game day. And what could be better than having a place for a wide screen TV, an old sofa and an old refrigerator full of cold beer than the man-cave in the garage or basement.