Shared Driveways - Not for Me

I read an article in the Washington Post today about shared driveways and how they can sometimes be an after thought for home buyers. The buyer may be overly excited about the house itself and less concerned about the fact that you and your new neighbor will have to get along very closely if you share a driveway. The theory for building a shared driveway is to allow more green areas on both you and your neighbor's property.

For my wife and I, we were actually looking at a home with a shared driveway. In Lafayette CA, many of the homes were built in the 40's and 50's - new homes are not very common - at least not like they are in San Ramon or Danville. Most of the new homes in Lafayette are tear downs of older homes that build new ones right on top. However, every now and then you'll see a few parcels of vacant land amongst the neighborhood homes.

For us, we found a home for sale that was about 6 years old, had a great layout, and was just as good as new. It was priced reasonable for the area, that is until we drove up to the house. This house had a shared driveway with one other house. Given the shape of the lot and the street, it was apparent that a shared driveway was the only solution for these 2 homes. At first, my wife and I tried to overlook the shared driveway. We focused on the granite counters, hardwood floors, and the spacious master suite. As soon as we got outside, we were reminded of the shared driveway once again.

We really looked the house - we even started brainstorming about ways we could put a divider of some sort in the middle of the driveway. Big flower pots, large shrubs, you name it - we thought of it. In the end, after driving by the home several times at all hours of the night, we realized that the driveway was not going to work for us. Every morning when we leave for work and when we return from work, it would be the first thing that we saw. So we passed.

I'm sure some people would be okay with a shared driveway in the right situation. For us, it was a deal breaker. I write about this now because the Washington Post feature really brought back that entire thought process.