<p>There are a lot of nice places in this thread. Many different styles. </p>
<p>I like La Jolla even though you don’t get much for your money.
Actually, that La Jolla house isn’t that bad. Much better than I thought. It is nice.
I like the smaller La Jolla place too. </p>
<p>This house is in Portland’s farmland suburbs. There was a garden store and nursery there until the family retired and decided to sell (about a year and a half ago).</p>
<p>What strikes me about a lot of the open plan contemporary McMansions is that they have rinky-dink cooktops on an island WITH NO HOOD!! One day of real cooking, and the entire house would be filled with grease and smoke and smells. What are they thinking? I figure these houses were built by people whose entire repertoire consists of microwaving meals that come in little boxes and sit in their useless side-by-side refrigerators. In many cases, you’d have to redo the entire kithen to make it something that you could actually cook in. (Many of them also have grossly inadequate cabinet space.)</p>
<p>A million dollar home in Lexington, KY could be an 8000 sq ft, 6-8 bed/4-6 bath. In McLean, VA (rich DC suburb) a million dollar home will get you a 4500-5000 sq ft, 5 bed/3 bath on a smaller lot.</p>
<p>The fans are underneath the surface of the island. You press a button or two and the fan rises above the island and takes care of the problem. You don’t need a hood. Looks better without a hood.</p>
<p>Consolation, we recently purchased a house built in 2008. It has a pretty decent sized gas cooktop (4 burners and two grills), but no hood (actually, there is a hood but it is for “looks” only). The vents are on the actual stove top, two of them. I was puzzled at first, but they do draw the smoke and smells down into them while you’re cooking. Either these or the pop up vents are probably what these newer homes have.</p>
<p>Downdraft or popup vents may be fine for people who don’t do a lot of high heat cooking ( wok, frying, broiling) or who weigh the pros and cons, but the consensus on the kitchen forums is that they are not as efficient or effective as a hood. I agree that it looks good when a cooktop is over an island, and in some very contemporary spaces, but on a wall the hood can be a beautiful focal point. Many are built right into the cabinetry with arches and woodworking detail.</p>
<p>^^^^I can only speak to my experience-I fry, wok, and broil, and these vents are as effective as my hood was. When they are on high, I see zero difference.</p>
<p>I don’t particularly care for cooktops on the island, though.</p>
<p>And one house I had the sink on the island-big mistake! At least the mistake was in not having a backsplash and bar. I would be cleaning dishes with the spray hose thingy, and if I missed, the water would shoot across the island and get all over the floor beyond. :mad:</p>
<p>^^ I don’t care for an island cooktop, either. But if a kitchen has one, I can see why many people prefer the clear line of sight, looks-wise. I have a sink in my island and one on a wall. I don’t notice any difference in water going all over the place between the two, but it may be because they are relatively deep and wide. </p>
<p>About area rugs on the first floor mentioned earlier - I would agree that there are a number of them that are way too small and don’t really anchor the room enough. It’s a lot easier and less expensive to find stock sizes than to go custom or oversized.</p>
<p>I’ve seen them. They don’t work for my kind of cooking. </p>
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<p>That’s probably because your hood fan was underpowered, too. Many, if not most of them are. I wnat a fan so strong it will suck the filings out of my teeth. I’m tired of the inadequate alternatives. (A lot has to do with placement, also. If the hood is on an outside wall or has a straight, level shot to the outdoors, it will be much more effective. My current one is in the center of the room, so it has to go up to the high ceiling, then across about 12 feet to the outer wall.</p>
<p>You’ll never find one of those downdraft tinkertoys in use with a professional gas range. :)</p>
<p>“rinky-dink cooktops on an island WITH NO HOOD!! One day of real cooking, and the entire house would be filled with grease and smoke and smells.”
-This is funny. We have never had a real cooking as we never ever ran our vent. system that we DO HAVE over our oven. And I absolutely love (and my H. also) when house smells like onions or garlic. the only negative - these smells make you hungly and make you it more. I know many here would like to have what I am having…sorry, cannot share…</p>
<p>I don’t know what is considered “professional grade.” We had a Viking range, six burners and griddle, with a hood allegedly designed to handle it. </p>
<p>I do know that I made bacon this morning, ran my fan (on outside wall), left the house for a couple of hours, and came home to no smell. So for my purposes, it works. In a professional environment, I assume they are cooking nonstop for the better part of the day and would therefore require more than an average person, even one who cooks a good deal.</p>
<p>The point of my response to your earlier post was to correct the notion that these stovetops had “no hood”, when it’s entirely possible that they might have something for adequate ventilation, albeit far short of a professional grade restaurant hood.</p>
<p>That $6,400/month apartment in Boston has been rented. Looks like it was on the market for about a week. Rents for studios just went up $100/month. Demand in Boston for housing is amazing. I imagine that it’s just as crazy if not crazier in NYC and SF.</p>
<p>Boston rents are high–it’s crazy. My D and son-in-law bought a place in the South End; it’s a small 2-bedroom walkout in the less fashionable part of the South End (close to Mass. Ave.). Son-in-law is going to UNC for a doctorate in August, so they’re going to rent it; they want to come back to Boston. Realtor told my D today that he could rent it for $3200 a month!</p>
<p>Does the rent cover your daughter’s expenses? Sounds like a great rent to receive. </p>
<p>My daughter lives in SF. I was in SF Sunday. I love SF, but the traffic is horrible. Better to live in Marin County where it is a little cheaper and just take a ferry to the city. The restaurants are better in SF.</p>