How to Find a Home that Matches Your Lifestyle

Everyone knows the old real estate mantra, “Location, Location, Location”. That was an apt philosophy for many years, and it still has some relevance today. But times have changed. For most home buyers, it’s becoming less about where they want to live and more about how they want to live. Perhaps it’s time to update the old triple “L”  real estate saying to “Location, Lifestyle, and Livability”. After all, a home isn’t just four walls to house you in between work, school, the store, and activities. It’s a place to live your best life.

The idea of choosing a home based on lifestyle is not a terribly new one, but it has become more popular in recent years. In fact, a May 2019 article in RealtyTimes about choosing the right neighborhood pointed out the importance of asking the question, “Does it meld with your lifestyle?” You may find a beautiful home in a lovely neighborhood, but does it fit the way you want to live? The RealtyTimes article pointed out the various things we may take for granted and forget to consider when looking for a home, thus disrupting our normal or desired lifestyle.

“It’s imperative to survey local grocery stores, convenience stores, hardware stores, and gas stations. These are the kinds of amenities and conveniences which most people take for granted, and their absence in your new neighborhood could quickly drive you mad. Less important but still worthwhile is the surveying of the local nightlife and restaurant scene; if romance is important to you, don’t purchase property in a neighborhood devoid of good dating spots, for instance.”

If the convenience and livability of finding the right home and neighborhood to fit your lifestyle aren’t enough to make you a believer, then at least consider it for
your health.

Home is where you spend most of your time and therefore it must support your physical health and your emotional well-being. This is such a strongly held belief
by some that there is a complete subset of homes called “Lifestyle Properties”.

So, what is a Lifestyle Property?

According to the Lifestyles and Properties blog:

 “A lifestyle property is a home that has one or more unique features that help improve daily quality of life…Choosing the right neighborhood is one of the most important decisions a person makes in their adult life because a house is not only a significant financial investment, it’s a health investment…For example, if you enjoy taking an after-dinner stroll each evening, then moving into a neighborhood that lacks walkability is probably going to start to impact you negatively after a while.”

Kansas City Homes Lifestyle Search Tool

Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Kansas City Homes embraces this lifestyle living philosophy and has introduced a new way to search for homes on our website. The new search goes beyond looking for homes by price, bedrooms and bathrooms, square footage, etc. It enables you to dig much deeper and find homes that fit your lifestyle. Kansas City Homes’ lifestyle search lets you choose the lifestyle elements that are most important to you.

Lifestyle Search Options

After you select the lifestyle choices that are most important to you, the listings on the page will display a number between 1 and 10. These numbers tell you how each home in the search matches up with your lifestyle preferences. This lets you immediately rule out homes with lower average lifestyle scores so you can focus on homes that fit with how you want to live.

Your peek behind the curtain doesn’t end with just the average score on the listings page. When you find a home you like that has an impressive lifestyle score, click on it for even more in-depth information. A chart on the home’s page shows an exact breakdown of how the home you chose, and the neighborhood it’s in, score on each individual lifestyle characteristic.

Now you can see a complete picture of just how well this home fits your lifestyle. If it’s a great match, fantastic! You can contact your agent and request your showing. If it’s not quite what you’re looking for, you can look at other homes with comparable scores, change the location of where you’re looking, and even tweak the lifestyle options to see how it affects the listing results.

The lifestyle tool’s versatility and ease-of-use mean you can narrow down your search until you find THE perfect home, in a great neighborhood, where you can live the life you’ve always wanted.

It’s a new day with a new way to search for homes. So, stop counting bedrooms, measuring square feet, and looking at landscaping. If you want to find a home that can give you a happy and fulfilling life; try our new lifestyle home search today.