Ask an Architect, Custom Residential
Sharing A Vacation Home Between Two Families
Are you considering sharing a vacation home with another family? It’s not uncommon, and a great investment, but make sure you go into it with eyes wide open. Here are a few questions you and the family you’ll be sharing with should ask yourselves before starting design.
February 27, 2018
Vacation homes are one of our passions here. They’re also a far more common investment opportunity for people who are priced out of the local Seattle real estate market. We’re seeing more and more people coming to us with a unique proposition: they want to start building equity and enjoying a home, so they’ve teamed up with another couple and the four of them are going to build a custom vacation home. This is a way to leverage their money, get enjoyment out of a home (as a vacation home isn’t used all that frequently, two families can often easily navigate the sharing of time), and create some income as these homes often rent out the rest of the year.
If you’re thinking about going down this path, here are some things to think about when you’re debating how to design and share a common vacation home.
Questions to Ask Yourself When Designing a Home to Share
- Who will make the design decisions? Four opinions are certainly more complicated than two. Sit down and decide as a team who makes the decisions and how that all works. I advise creating a shared agreement about how this works and sticking to it. It’ll help the design team understand how to best work with your team.
- What are your specific programmatic needs? A house can easily accommodate two families, but you’ll want to understand how the house will accommodate them. Will there only be one shared master suite that you use on separate weeks, or will you each have your own separate suite? Are their shared bunk rooms for kids? Do you each have a separate locked closet for personal items or is that shared, too?
- What are your top goals? You should each have maybe three things that are in the “must have” category to really make sure this home feels like yours, even though it’ll be used by others. The cost of doing this is the price of creating this house, so know that while you may not see the value of paying for a covered outdoor room or a hot tub, your partners may have that on their “must have” list. Agree to allow each family a certain number of must-haves and just make that part of the deal. It will allow you to better negotiate the “would be nice” items.
- Where will the house be? Obviously, this is one of the first items you’ll want to tackle once you agree to do this joint project in the first place. You’ll want to have a shared passion for the area and, if you’re also going to be renting it out, understand the local market and how feasible it actually is to rent it out for short-term stays. Be honest with each other, as you don’t want to resent a decision years later because you were too afraid to hurt someone’s feelings that you hated the village you built a house in.
- What is your escape plan? A great vacation home may be something that stays in your family for generations. But, when you add another family into the mix, things can get complicated. What if one family needs to sell and you don’t have the capital to buy them out? Create a clear exit plan for everyone involved before you get started.
In the end, building a vacation home with another family can be an incredibly rewarding experience. You’re mitigating the risk by sharing the costs and still creating a space that will feel personal and special. Your kids may get to grow up together on vacations and you’ll build some equity and passive income. Go into this with eyes wide open, a clear working agreement in place, and a design team that delights everyone with their skills (hey! I know people like that), and you’ll be building memories for decades to come.
