Why Buy?

Jennifer Denbow’s article about the sociology of homeownership (“The Best Investment I Never Made,” February) provides vital and timely meditations not only on the “what,” “when,” and “how” of buying a home, but also the crucial, much-neglected “why.” I particularly enjoyed her discussion on the history of the idea of homeownership as an investment, which provoked a meaningful debate between my wife and me, thirty-ish professionals flirting with buying a house, about the emotional and personal reasons we weigh on the scales of renting versus buying.

Dr. Denbow’s attention to how quickly new homeowners’ interests switch from affordability and accessibility to scarcity and exclusivity made me want to learn more about how buying into any “investment” can suddenly change our personal ethics. Like many considering homeownership, I justify it to myself with reasonable social and personal arguments—I want to put down roots in a community, I want out from under landlords who think anything short of a gas leak is a problem for later, I want to paint the walls weird colors. The “investment” I envision for a home is an emotional currency, the feeling of security and belonging, with the knowledge that some portion of the mortgage could eventually be returned to us (though not necessarily with a profit) when we pass on the house to its next keepers. Dr. Denbow’s invocation of how quickly homeownership sways ethics makes me pause; will I be able to resist the siren call of profitability once I have sunk that much money and time into a home?

Steve DiKerby
Lansing, Mich.

A Homeplace

In her article, Jennifer Denbow traces the evolution of housing as an investment and the attendant problems for affordable housing.

Neither set of my grandparents continued to live in the houses where their children had grown up, but an uncle who married into my family did. His parents had a “homeplace,” a frame house in the mountains of North Carolina built with lumber given to them as a wedding gift. A contractor was instructed to “build a right nice house.” Located on a subsistence farm, they brought up their family there and lived there until they died.

I was still in elementary school when I realized this was what I wanted: a homeplace! It was a very old-fashioned idea. Get a house early in adulthood and never move? No “starter home,” followed by a bigger house, and, finally, a retirement apartment or residence in a community for old people? The house was to be a home, an anchor, a place where the important rituals and events of life took place. It was a sanctuary and a repository of memories. I did not get my homeplace until I was nearly fifty, but, finally, it was mine. Built in 1905–6, it had a rich history of its own and had even been a rooming house for decades.

Something in us wants a place, however modest, to call our own. Even children love to have their own houses: treehouses, playhouses, or toy houses. Barbie has one. The Son of Man may have had no place to lay his head, but we want one.

I understand why people talk about affordable housing, and I understand the economics of what is happening, but what some of us long for is a homeplace. People keep telling me I need to move somewhere more practical as old age is upon me, but nothing can quite replace a homeplace.

Patricia Hunt
Staunton, Va.

A Uniquely Catholic Review

I quite appreciated Rita Ferrone’s short review (“An Installation, Not a Liturgical Space,” January) of the liturgical furniture installed as part of the restoration of Paris’s Notre-Dame Cathedral. Not necessarily because I agree (or disagree) with its negative assessment. It was simply eye-opening that such works could be the subject of a cultural-theological review piece. I don’t believe that a font, altar, or ambo has ever previously been reviewed in Commonweal’s otherwise ample review section.

Mark Nelson
D.C.

Delicious Criticism

I always enjoy Rand Richards Cooper, but his article about negative reviews (“The Shredder’s Trade,” February) was especially enjoyable because he went about selecting his targets so well: a lovely barb thrown so lightly at that pompous Joseph Epstein and a delicious reserved comment about Renata Adler, whose venom must come from deep within. Sail on, Mr. Cooper.

John R. Horan
Washington, Conn.