Why Size Doesn’t Matter

BUNGALOW

It took a lot of patience to land a house with a yard in Venice. Now they’re living large.

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Chelsea can be a dream neighborhood, but not if you can afford to rent just 500 square feet--and there are two of you. For artist Maggie Hill Ward and her husband, Mal Ward, an agent for TV-commercial directors, three years in a tiny apartment were enough of Big Apple living.

So in 2000, Maggie, 33, and Mal, 35, left New York and headed west, dreaming of a place close enough to the coast so that Mal could surf every day. “We had both grown up in houses near the ocean,” Maggie says. “And we didn’t want anyone living below or above us any longer.”

Easier said than done. They looked at more than 80 houses over the course of 10 months before they fell in love with a 1928 Spanish bungalow that was a five-minute bike ride from the beach and boasted a deep yard planted with palm and citrus trees. Then the crazy real estate market threatened to stand in the way. The asking price was $539,000 on a Tuesday morning; there were five bids by that afternoon. They offered $549,000, then $4,000 more, and won the war for 1,185 square feet. Ten percent down, and they had their first nest.

That was three years ago. With the house now appraised at more than $900,000, the couple recently refinanced their mortgage at a lower 4Aº% rate and banked $80,000 for an expansion. But they didn’t proceed as you might expect: The main house is basically as it was, while the two-car garage became a whole new living area.

After redirecting the entrance off the back alley, Maggie and Mal pulled down walls, reconfigured the footprint and more than doubled the 350 square feet of space. Within, they created a den/media room, a guest bedroom and bath and an art studio that reverts to temporary housing for automobiles when they leave town.

The overgrown yard was cleared out, and a swath of lawn and concrete pavers was installed to create an outdoor living area. “In New York, we had no green space and could never have more than four people over at a time--even that seemed crowded,” Maggie says. “We can throw a party for 100 here.”

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TOWNHOUSE

They chased traditional homes, but got more for their money in a South Pasadena complex

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When graphic designer Jane Fitts and her husband, John Bennett Fitts, tried to buy a single-family house, they came up $80,000 short. The asking price was $430,000. They offered $450,000; it sold for $530,000. “We were devastated,” Jane, 33, says. Their Realtor then imparted this advice: There is more bang for the buck in a townhouse. And there’s an additional bonus: The insurance is less than on a detached residence.

The bungalow they lost was 1,000 square feet; the South Pasadena townhouse they bought is 1,100 square feet and cost less than the house had sold for. Even better, the sellers were architects who had recently renovated, installing handsome bamboo floors, built-ins and a new IKEA kitchen.

There is a living area on the first floor, a kitchen/dining mezzanine and two baths and two bedrooms upstairs. John, 28, a fine art photographer with the Paul Kopeikin Gallery, turned one bedroom into his home office, which allows them to deduct 10% of the mortgage from their taxes.

For the couple, the best part about owning is not having to call the landlord when they want to make a change. “I swore if I had my own place the first thing I would do would be to paint the walls,” John says. After nearly 10 months, the walls are still white. No matter. “It’s nice at a certain point in your life to know you can afford a place. It feels good.”

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TOWNHOUSE

A West Hollywood dwelling is stripped down to reflect a minimalist’s tastes

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Arvind Manocha, the Hollywood Bowl’s vice president and general manager, had been house-hunting for three months when his real estate agent called about a ‘70s-era West Hollywood townhouse. “I knew the asking price, $330,000, was a good deal,” Manocha says. He put down 20% and--this being four years ago--got a mortgage at 4.5% interest.

Although he loved the arrangement of contiguous units that allowed him to have his own front door--”like a real home”--he was less than enthusiastic about the fussy decor. A minimalist, he began to strip away layers. The cottage cheese ceiling went first; then the heavy wood moldings, the pink-and-yellow floral wallpaper and the peach carpet were ditched. He painted the space art-gallery white, stained the hardwood floors ebony and added a few choice pieces of furniture: a pair of Mies van der Rohe chairs, Arne Jacobsen- inspired dining chairs, a Le Corbusier dining table. There’s not a knickknack in sight.

The monochromatic palette and minimal furnishings make the 1,300 square feet feel spacious, as does the repetition of materials: stainless-steel sinks and concrete countertops in the bathrooms and kitchen; brushed stainless-steel handles on cabinets as well as closet doors; slate on the fireplace surround and shower stalls; white paper shades and wood-and-glass doors in each room.

“It’s the first time I have a place that reflects me,” Manocha, 34, says. “It was important for me in this first home-buying experience not to have someone do it for me. These are all my choices--they might not all have been correct but they are mine. My townhouse has been my learning lab.”

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LOFT

What was once a Long Beach department store becomes a highflying living space

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They never shopped there, but independent filmmaker Ali Reza Kohani, 32, and his girlfriend Barri Williams, 34, a kindergarten teacher, live in what was once the home-furnishings section of Walker’s department store in the heart of downtown Long Beach.

Built in 1929, the five-story building was converted in 2002. Kohani and Williams first saw it before the transformation, when the only hint of what was to come were lines drawn on the floors to indicate where future units would be. They were interested anyway, in part because they had been hunting for, and not finding at the right price, land on which to build a house in Orange County, where their families live. “In the end it would have cost us twice as much and been half as big,” Kohani says. “It seemed wiser to start on a smaller scale with something that was already built.”

Plus, Kohani had always wanted to live in a loft. What appealed to him, he says, was “the idea of an open space you can change according to your needs.” Which is what he and Williams did.

They paid $404,000 for their 1,680 urban square feet four years ago. Since then, the couple is happy to report, the loft’s value has more than doubled.

The square footage has gone up too. To make the most of their live/work loft, the couple took full advantage of the 14-foot ceilings. Kohani added 550 square feet with two highflying mini-mezzanines. At one end of the loft, a master bedroom hangs like a suspension bridge above the living room--with a dramatic staircase leading to the main floor (and bathroom). At the other end, Kohani devised a split-level that created an airy lounge/guest room sitting atop a small office.

He likes the office, but he often carries his laptop up to the glass-and-steel walkway that is wrapped around a structural column. The landing is a see-through space where guests hang out during parties. For Kohani, it’s an escape. “I have an amazing view of the harbor from here,” he says. “I really dig the urban nature of the port--with all the big cranes, the cars on the bridges, it’s a constantly moving landscape.”

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CONDO

The space in Santa Monica was tiny, but the ocean view made the sale

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Larry Fitzgibbon’s accountant was single-minded from the day they met. “He kept telling me, ‘I don’t want to hear excuses about how expensive houses are. Buy something,’” Fitzgibbon recalls.

He looked at single-family homes and even flirted with a downtown loft before settling on a Santa Monica condo near the beach. When its price suddenly dropped to under $500,000, he plunked down 20% and landed a 5% rate on a 30-year mortgage. He and his wife, Charlene, were proud homeowners of 800 square feet.

Undaunted, Charlene called Christine Markatos Lowe, a designer friend, who suggested replacing the drab beige tile floor with teak. A half-wall the couple built near the front door helped to define the small entry while doubling as a bookcase. In the bathroom, they removed a wall that separated the sink from the toilet and shower. They also renovated and added cabinets in the kitchen for a sleek ship’s galley look.

At night, Larry, 37, and Charlene, 36--she’s a Yahoo publicist, he’s vice president of business development for the online guide Citysearch--watch the sunset over the Pacific. “We lucked out,” Larry says. “If I had bought the loft, we would have had twice the space for the same price--but we wouldn’t have had the ocean or this view.”