Yeah as for complaints about needing repairs, as long as the castle has just one room that's livable you've still got the same living space as the equivalent-price apartment. Now it's just a matter of whether you value being out in the country vs. being in the city: plenty of people prefer the country but I can see the price of land in the city being higher regardless. But to counter the repair argument completely, let's just say you don't buy one of THOSE castles, you buy a smaller one that also needs repairs. Say, 1/6th the square footage and acreage. You spend 1/6th of the price, spend 5x that repairing it, and it's now a beautiful castle in the country that's still 10x the square footage as the apartment in NY. This also reduces the staff and support needed to maintain it.
So now we have a comparison of equal price and equal dilapidation.
Except that it's a castle, vs. an apartment, and I challenge anyone to say the repaired castle is just as nice as the apartment on the inside. The quality is much better.
Second, the castle has 10x the square footage. It also has grounds, meaning parking is never a challenge.
Taking those two into consideration, the castle wins out easily. But we still have the "city living" vs. "country living" argument. In the country you're far from anything. You're driving half an hour to go see a movie or go shopping, and your commute to work is going to be pretty long. Then again, many people live in the city and have commutes to a neighboring city. There's also problems in the city of getting your car out of parking, dealing with traffic, getting where you're going, and finding parking again. The same trip to go see a movie could be a simple stroll or bicycle ride of 10 minutes. At rush hour I could see it taking an hour to get across town in NY.
There's also a stronger music and arts culture in NY than the English countryside. If you enjoy seeing plays and such, you're going to have a much better variety in the city. You'll also have a lot more interesting people around. The night life is definitely better. But now we're getting into personal preference: are you the kind of person who goes out to museums, nightclubs, and art galleries on a weekly basis?
Basically I see it boiling down to this:
Castle: 10x the size, is an awesome castle, away from people, clean air and no noise
Apartment: Commutes are 1/3 to 1/6 the length, near lots of fun people
Based on that I'm pretty sure I'd pick the castle. But then again I don't think I'd go that far on either side: I'm not a big-town kinda guy.
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Topic: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O (Read 14915657 times)